Tim Bogart's Sporty

I like to post up old rock & roller's rides, and here's a pretty nice Sporty owned by Tim Bogart in '75. Tim had this bike chopped, then rebuilt after an accident in which he broke his foot. As you can see by studying the picture, there's a lot of Jammer parts used on the second incarnation.

The name Tim Bogart should be familiar to even a casual listener of classic rock, from his heavy bass work with Vanilla Fudge. I remember seeing Vanilla Fudge open up for Jefferson Airplane at the CNE (the Canadian National Exhibition) in Toronto in the summer of '68, and they blew out the arena's sound system, delaying the concert for almost an hour.

Tim Bogart started out playing piano when he was 8, and when he was 13, he switched to saxophone. He gigged around in high school, and wound up in a band that did a lot of stage backup work on tour with such do-wop bands as the Shirelles, the Crests, The Earls, and The Doves. When the '60 "British Invasion" happened, along with Bogart's interest in surf music, he switched to bass guitar.

From there, it was a quick jump to Vanilla Fudge in '67, followed by stints with Cactus, and Beck, Bogart, and Appice (Bogart and Appice played almost their entire early rock careers together). Later on, Bogart did stints with Pat Travers, Rick Derringer (again with Appice), and Bob Weir's side project Bobby and the Midnites. After a Vanilla Fudge reunion tour in '83, Bogart became a faculty member at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood, CA for 18 years.

Tim Bogart still continues to do studio work as a bass player, and has toured again with a Vanilla Fudge reunion. See, riding Sportsters can do a lot for your career! Well, that and a huge musical talent, I guess.