Starstruck (10)

Starstruck (also known as The Starstruck Band) is a hard rock band from Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, that was formed in 1970. The band split up in 1975. Starstruck released the original version of the well-known rock classic Black Betty in 1975. After the split of the band, bandleader Bill Bartlett (2) presented both songs of the single ("Black Betty" and "I Should Have Known") to producers Jerry Kasenetz and Jeff Katz. After that, Bartlett was offered to create a band around him, when he owns the rights of the songs that were released on the single. So Bartlett paid the other Starstruck members, took the master tapes of the single with him and relocated to New York in 1976. Finally in 1977, an edited and re-arranged version of Black Betty was released as a single (again with the same b-side "I Shoud Have Known") under the name Ram Jam and this version of the song became that popular rock classic, which is so well-known around the world. But actually the Ram Jam version of the song is no new recording of the song. It's just an edited and re-arranged version of the Starstruck recording. So the musicians that can be heard on the Ram Jam version are not the musicians of Ram Jam - the band was formed after the release and success of "Black Betty" - but the musicians of Starstruck.