The Fifth Estate - Ding, Dong! The Witch Is Dead (1967) Vinyl

The band began in Stamford, Connecticut, in 1963, as The D-Men. Early on, as The D-Men, the band played many small shows and local clubs but soon gravitated to Greenwich Village and larger clubs where they often played six nights a week for long stretches. They released three singles, two on Veep/United Artists and one on the Kapp labels, which along with much of their later material have become collectors' items and established them as a central part of the garage rock movement. Boston Skyline released a 28-song collection of their music in 1993 and published a 41-page booklet of their story.

The band made a number of appearances on television, including several NYC Clay Cole appearances, where on the first they were on the same taping session as The Rolling Stones when The Stones made their very first American East Coast TV appearance, and Hullabaloo, on which the D-Men performed "I Just Don't Care". The program was at that time co-hosted by Brian Epstein, who expressed an interest in signing them. They later won a Murray the K call-in contest for best new release over The Dave Clark Five and The Animals in 1965. In 1966 they changed their name to "The Fifth Estate".