Texas-born guitarist, bassist, and vocalist Keith Allison wove his path through American rock & roll and pop/rock from the mid-1960s onward. Born Sydney Keith Allison and raised in San Antonio, he drew early local attention while still in high school during his mid-teens, thanks to both his guitar skills and his striking resemblance to Paul McCartney. Relocating to Los Angeles in the mid-1960s launched his professional trajectory. Brief stints in the Crickets followed, along with sessions alongside Roy Orbison and Ray Peterson, yet his breakthrough arrived unexpectedly through that McCartney-like appearance. Spotted at the Whisky a Go Go during filming for the rock & roll program Where the Action Is, he landed on camera and was invited back repeatedly, soon becoming a regular presence in the show's audience segments. Friendships soon formed with Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere & the Raiders and fellow Texan Michael Nesmith of the Monkees. On the Monkees' self-titled 1966 debut album he contributed harmonica, later adding guitar to Headquarters; he also cut sides with Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart for A&M Records.
Columbia Records signed him in 1967, resulting in the album Keith Allison in Action, produced by Gary Usher. The well-crafted pop/rock release featured covers of the Lindsay-penned “Good Thing,” the Where the Action Is theme “Action, Action, Action” by Boyce and Hart, Donovan’s “Catch the Wind” and “Colours,” Ray Charles’ “Leave My Woman Alone,” and Neil Diamond’s “Do It.” The single “Louise,” written by the Rising Sons’ Jesse Lee Kincaid and backed with “Freeborn Man” co-written by Allison and Lindsay, failed to chart. Session work continued on three further Monkees albums—The Birds, the Bees & the Monkees and Head (both 1968) and Instant Replay (1969). In 1969 he joined Paul Revere & the Raiders, handling organ, guitar, piano, and bass while supplying vocals on Hard ’n’ Heavy (With Marshmallow). He remained through the next three years, co-writing with Lindsay on Collage in an attempt to steer the band into the 1970s, though the album met with little commercial success. Guitar and bass duties continued on Indian Reservation, interspersed with appearances on Al Kooper’s Easy Does It plus recordings for Tommy Roe, Ronnie Hawkins, Johnny Rivers, and the duo Spring. Acting occupied much of the following decade, yet the 1980s brought a return to music that extended into the twenty-first century. Longtime membership in the Waddy Wachtel Band accompanied a bass credit on Jerry Lee Lewis’s 2007 album Last Man Standing. Real Gone Music issued an expanded reissue of Keith Allison in Action in 2014, appending several non-album single sides. Keith Allison died at his Sherman Oaks, California, home on November 17, 2021, aged 79.
