Listen: Jerry Mathers once fronted a rocking garage band called Beaver and the Trappers

Beaver is more rock 'n' roll than you think.

Modern Harmonic / Sundazed

All-American boy Theodore "Beaver" Cleaver is best known for saying "Golly" and "Gee." Television audiences watched Jerry Mathers come of age in the role, as he grew from age nine to 15 years old. But those fans who kept paying attention to Mathers after Leave It to Beaver concluded witnessed a far more drastic maturation.

A few years after the series ended, Mathers entered a recording studio. He stepped to the microphone — his voice drenched in reverb with a faint echo of Bob Dylan — and snarled, "Happiness is goin' about a 100 / Blowin' your mind and comin' back down again!" Beaver singing about speeding and recreational highs over a clattering rock 'n' roll racket? Well, it was a far cry from "Gee, Wally!"

But Mathers hardly distanced himself from that iconic TV kid. Shucks, he called his group Beaver and the Trappers.

The small White Cliffs label originally pressed the band's lone single, "Happiness Is Havin'" / "In Misery," in 1966. Last year, Modern Harmonic Records re-released the seven-inch. [You can purchase it here for $10.98.]

Mathers reminisced about his garage-rock days on the back of the sleeve. "I would go out on stage [at county fairs and amusement parks] with the band, sing my songs and few other current pop hits, and then autograph photos and records for the many fans," he recalled. "This was my summer job and I bought my first car, a '64 GTO." The former child-star was in high school at the time.

Beaver and his band even played on the Sunset Strip at the Whiskey-a-Go-Go, just like the Doors and Mötley Crüe. After you listen to the proto-punk-ish tune, that sentence is not strange as it looks on paper. Take a listen.

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10 Comments

u2runku 26 months ago
sounded a bit like MJagger can also perceive some of the same style, like garage bands pre-grunge and don't have malo's first, than this is a good choice 4 company
Doug41160 26 months ago
It was better than i expected, but The Beatles didn't have to worry about any competition from them!
JeffTanner 68 months ago
I just listened to the song, and I don't really care for it. I never thought that ''Beaver'' Cleaver, Jerry Mathers, would record a song like that.
DoubleNaughtSpy 68 months ago
The label on the 45 indicates that the song was co-written and arranged by Richard Correll, who played one of Beaver's frequent sidekicks, Richard Rickover, in the series. WOW!!
Barry22 68 months ago
Did they play at Woodstock?
cperrynaples Barry22 68 months ago
Wouldn't that have been weird? No, according to harlow1313 he was dying in Vietnam...LOL!!!
u2runku Barry22 26 months ago
might of helped, the spirit in the sky was there
ETristanBooth 68 months ago
The music isn't bad, but he doesn't have the best voice for this type of music.
u2runku ETristanBooth 26 months ago
let MJagger be the judge :))
Deleted 68 months ago
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cperrynaples 68 months ago
No, Eddie was porn star John Holmes!! I know all the LITB urban legends and the true story is that Eddie became a cop and even fooled the panel on To Tell The Truth!!
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