Connie’s Insider was the local newspaper for Minneapolis-St Paul bands, clubs and music industry that wanted the “inside” story on the local scene. The paper was published by Coleman “Connie” Hechter and he truly was a friend to the bands and everyone in the music industry. By trade he was a jazz musician and it was rare for “professional” musicians to have anything to do with rock, R&B bands–let alone, work to build the rock industry. Connie knew everyone and he would greet you by name, so the business that came his way was well deserved as he was a master networker.
The Connie Awards were appropriately named after him as he worked to bring recognition to the local and regional bands. In this issue of Connie’s Insider you will see the Nickel Revolution (pictures and mentions) as the bands single Oscar Crunch on Mercury-Phillips records won the Best Single for 1969. “Single,” for vinyl-challenged youth is a 45-rpm vinyl record.
Enjoy the insight in to Connie’s Insider. We have several issues to share and will be posting updates in the coming weeks.
Connie’s Insider was the local newspaper for bands, clubs and fans in Minneapolis-St Paul during the late 1960s and early 1970s. The paper was published by Coleman “Connie” Hector after which the Connie Awards were named. We will detail this further in an upcoming post.
Special thanks to Scott Jeffy and Kent Saunders for gathering and scanning several issues of Connie’s Insider so we could share them with you. Each issue is quite lengthy, so we will publish them individually. This issue is from June 7, 1969 and it came out after the Connie Awards in May. Members of The Nickel Revolution can be seen in this issue as their single, Oscar Crunch on Mercury’s Phillps label, was awarded the Connie Award for best single–that’s a 45-rpm record to vinyl-challenged youth.
nickel revolution 