Yellow Balloon

by Linda SeidaYellow Balloons major claim to fame was that the bands membership boasted a celebrity, actor Don Grady from the television series My Three Sons, which starred Fred MacMurray. The band at one time also included Daryl Dragon, who wasnt as famous at the time as he would be a few years down the road as the male half of the popular duo Captain & Tennille. In 1967 Yellow Balloon scored its first and only hit single, which was named after the group. The band released an eponymous album that same year through Canterbury Records. In addition to Grady and Dragon, who both played drums, its membership included lead singer Alex Valdez, keyboardist Frosty Green, bassist Don Braught, and guitarist Paul Canella.Grady, who was born Don Agrati, played previously with the Palace Guard, a folk-rock band. Yellow Balloon formed during the 60s when he joined forces in Los Angeles with Gary Zekley, a songwriter and producer who had initially written the single Yellow Balloon for surf duo Jan & Dean. Zekley also released a version of the song, and when it skipped into the Top 30, he and Grady pulled together a band for live performances and put out an album. Grady culled Braught and Green from a band called Rising Sons in Oregon, and drew Canella and Valdez from Five of Us, an Arizona group. Grady had previously recorded their names in a list he kept of musicians whose skill impressed him when he saw them play while he toured on other business, sometimes with a band called Windupwatchband. When the time came to pull together the band that would be Yellow Balloon, he gave them a call. After failing to score on the charts again, the group disbanded. Grady went solo for a while and recorded as Don Agrati. Braught, Canella, Green, and Valdez re-formed under the name the Popcorn Explosion. Zekley continued to write hits, among them Sooner or Later and Id Wait a Million Years for the Grass Roots. Sundazed reissued Yellow Balloons lone album as a CD in 1998. The release includes all 11 songs from the original album, plus a few numbers Grady had released as singles, a demo, and a recorded interview with Zekley.