The Ballad of Spiro Agnew

From John Denver's Rhymes and Reasons (1969), this classic track written by Tom Paxton (please click on photo for file):



















Love that number....


Lee

More political stuff for your Saturday afternoon

Well, the first number is kind of political--to the extent that everything "rock and roll" is widely considered to be political in nature. Future historians are going to look back and wonder what we were smoking to believe such horsecrap. (Rim shot) Freak-Out U.S.A. is interesting, if not very funny (just my opinion)--it was created by Bobby (Honey) Russell and Buzz Cason of Ronny and the Daytonas (G.T.O., 1964). Bobby, I just read, supplies most of the voices. The record is paced like a Monkees episode:

Freak-out U.S.A. (Cason-Russell), Communication Aggregation, 1966. From RCA Victor six-record set 60 Great Hit Songs.

"Restoring" that one to mono was a fun challenge--RCA had stuck it in a single channel (the left) on the six-LP set 60 Great Hit Songs, and I couldn't get a decent signal by simply pressing the Mono button on my Sony amp. So I ripped the track to MAGIX, copied it, and laid the two (identical) tracks one atop the other, leaving the first track as it was and messing with the stereo balance on the bottom track so that some sound--any sound--were coming from the right channel. The result: mono sound, more or less.

Now you know.

Two years later, Senator Everett McKinley Dirksen won a Grammy for Best Documentary Recording for the stirring recitation we're about to hear (hey, I like it!). I'd planned to feature it earlier as a tribute to Jack Murtha. Better late than not at all:

Gallant Men, Sen. Everett McKinley Dirksen, 1968. From Capitol LP of same name.

I love that record. I'm a patriotic sap, what can I say?


Lee

Kennedys in Trouble, Part 2

We start with a record put out by (or, at least, affiliated with) Sick magazine. Sick, you probably know, was one of many second-rate MAD imitations, and one of the few that lasted (along with, I think it was called, Cracked).

I believe this single was taken from an Amy label LP called Sick #2: Personalities of the World, which is credited to Will Jordan, Sandy Baron and the Sickniks. I'm fairly sure. The track is pretty amusing, and very well produced, if overall not very different from the other JFK digs of the time (monotone voice, references to youth, etc.)--see how many musical personalities you can identify:

The Presidential Press Conference, The Sickniks, 1961. From Amy label 45.

And, of course, there were the hero-worship JFK numbers, and not all of them post-assassination. Jimmy Dean, apparently working with Johnny Horton's arranger and snare drummer, targeted and torpedoed the Top Ten in 1962 with this catchy classic:

P.T. 109, Jimmy Dean, 1962. From LP.

Luckily for Jack, the P.T. Boat Veterans for Truth barely had time to get a mailing list going by late 1963....

Lee

Tracks I thought I'd posted, Part 2: Pied Pipers, Stuart Wade, Doris Day

I could have sworn I already posted Dingbat the Singing Cat and Dream. Doesn't look like it....

It's funny when we think we've done something but we haven't. Unless it's something that we vitally needed to do, in which case it's not so funny. (Oops. Forgot to give my army of murdering robots the "Stop!" command. Where did I put that transmitter....)

So, here's one of the best feline novelties ever waxed, plus one of the most serene reveries ever dreamed up. (I'm trying to come up with some kind of cat/rat/Pied Piper word play here. I'll get back to you):

Dingbat the Singing Cat, Freddy Martin and Orchestra, 1946. Stuart Wade, vocal. From RCA Victor 78.

Dream (Johnny Mercer), The Pied Pipers with Paul Weston and His Orchestra, 1944. From Capitol 78.

Dingbat was swiped from Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf, of course. You'd think there'd have been copyright issues, since the two works were only ten years removed. I guess not. Very cleverly done, anyway.

And here's another one I thought I'd put up but hadn't (even after two uploads!). From the movie of the same title. The song, by Walter Donaldson, was written in 1928:

Love Me or Leave Me (Donaldson), Doris Day with Percy Faith and His Orchestra, 1955.

You know, that's one heck of a fine song. Donaldson might be my favorite pop song writer of all. He's the man who gave us Little White Lies, Carolina in the Morning, I've Had My Moments (which Gershwin, probably unwittingly, redid as A Foggy Day), Makin' Whoopee, and My Blue Heaven. Along with a zillion others. I wish I had a fraction of his talent....

Lee

Frankie Laine, 1947

Another great find from my last thrift:


















Two 1947 radio-only recordings by Frankie Laine (one on each side) with Carl Fisher's Orchestra. These same two tracks appeared on the Hindsight label in the (I think) 1980s.

Early, jazzy Laine for your listening pleasure:

Old Fashioned Love, Frankie Laine with Carl Fisher's Orchestra, 1947. From Seeburg 45 rpm EP.

Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams, Frankie Laine, 1947. From same EP.

The Lawrence Welk sides aren't bad, either--especially the shuffle version of Walter Donaldson's Love Me or Leave Me:

Love Me or Leave Me (Donaldson), Lawrence Welk and His Orch., year unknown. From Seeburg 45 rpm EP.

Let a Smile Be Your Umbrella, Lawrence Welk and His Orchestra. Same EP.

In fact, I like those two a lot. Four radio-only gems--at half a buck, only 12.5 cents per track. I think I'll keep on thriftin'....












Lee "Keep on thriftin'!" Hartsfeld

"Cumana" and "Junglero." Plus "Cumana."

I'll tell you--if it isn't one thing, it's another.

And if it isn't another, it's one thing. I refer to the weirdness of Blogger at the moment--it's slower than slow, plus the pages are coming up weird.

Speaking of which, this very box has come up oddly. There's no "Edit Html" option!!

I swear. If it ain't one thing, it's two things.

Speaking of two, here's a pair of tracks that I keep thinking I've already put up but haven't. So, for the record, here they are. I suppose I ought to post them at Vintage Lounge, but they make such nice companions to the Cavallaro selection I put up last night. So I'll stick 'em here.

Don't know the date on the Barclay Allen side, but it's likely the late Forties, in spite of the 1951 year of release. As an added bonus (don't you love the redundancy of "added bonus"?), I'll make the extra addition of Percy Faith's big-orchestra Cumana version. Such additional add-ons are an MY(P)WHAE extra.

Cumana (Allen-Hillman-Spina), Barclay Allen (late 1940s), from Capitol label 45.

Junglero (Poli-Raga), Dick Hyman Trio--Dick Hyman, harpsichord, 1956. From MGM 45.

I love the Popcorn sound to that--as in, the group called Popcorn. Though I guess Popcorn was one person--Stan Free. Popcorn's big hit, of course, was Hot Butter (1972). For years, I had no idea what that was called. Or who'd done it.

Oh, and here's Faith's Cumana, making its second appearance at the Lounge. I mean, at MY(P)WHAE. Hello.

Cumana, Percy Faith and His Orchestra, 1949. From RCA Victor 45 rpm EP.

Additional MP3 add-ons yet still to come!


Lee

The incredible disappearing MP3s

Ohhhh-kay. It looks like many (if not most) of the recent MP3s I posted are... gone. Vanished. No more. I don't know what's going on. Hopefully, this is a temporary issue.

They are not at Box.net. Any file not assigned a folder is gone. "Item not found" comes up instead of the music. Good grief.

I'll have to write Box.net and find out what's up. I'm hoping the files have gone to some temporary Twilight Zone and will be back. I can't think of any reason those files, and those files only, would leave the site.

Update (hence, the red font): Box.net tells me that the problem will be resolved "very shortly." The files will return. Hooray!

By the way, I just took a tranquilizer. It's working.

Lee

"Samba--Voodoo Instrumental--with Female Sextette"

I've always wanted to type "Samba--Voodoo Instrumental--with Female Sextette," and at last my dream has been fulfilled. Those very words appear (without dashes) on the following label:

















I think the dashes are implied by the spacing, but there's no way to be for sure. I do know that Rudy Vallee isn't the first name that jumps to mind when exotica is mentioned, yet Rudy was the cowriter of this very exotica-sounding 1929 number, a big hit in its day. It's all in Carmen Cavallaro's treatment, of course. Vallee's own recording casts a pleasant spell but is totally voodooless. (Voodooless?)

Wow. 46 Google matches for "Voodooless." I'll be cursed. I mean, darned.

Anyway, Deep Night showed up in the form of a hammered 45 at my latest thrift, and I loved it, but I couldn't deal with the surface noise. Then I remembered I'd found a Cavallaro best-of album last week--maybe it was on there. I looked, and there it was. (This gig can get pretty complicated.) And here it is:

Deep Night (Charlie Henderson-Rudy Vallee), Carmen Cavallaro and His Orchestra, 1951. From two-LP set on MCA.

Amazingly ahead of its day, to my ears, anyway. I'd expect to hear something like this in stereo from, oh, 1961. Love the rhythm section--and that incredible flute. Carmen, as always, is amazing.

Oh, and the female sextette ain't bad, either. A voodoo classic. Mesmerizing.















Your blogger, mesmerized by Rudy Vallee's exercise in voodoo ....

Lee

The incredible expanding playlist

I just added a number of titles to the MY(P)WHAE playlist, including Ray Anthony's 1957 recording of the theme from the 1957 Jack Arnold sci-fi flick The Incredible Shrinking Man.

"Huh?" you say? My reaction, too. I had no idea Ray Anthony had recorded the theme from The Incredible Shrinking Man. A lesser bandleader might have shrunk from the task (pulling off a chart this complex is no small challenge), but not Anthony--he had just been to his shrink, who told him (with a Freudian accent) to be a big boy and get back in the studio. Note the way this arrangement steadily increases in intensity and volume, as if the arranger were inspired in reverse by the film title. When, by all logic, the entire side should be one long volume drop. But this is a tiny point--overall, the treatment is hugely effective:

The Incredible Shrinking Man (Foster Carling-Earl E. Lawrence), Ray Anthony and His Orchestra, 1957. From Capitol label 45.


















Presenting this has been a colossal honor. I daresay this one will grow on you.


Lee

Please read this--it says it all (and then some)!!

Our copy of TIME came in the mail, and I just read Andrew Sullivan's essay My Problem with Christianism, and I agree with every word, and I'm eternally grateful to Sullivan for saying it all and saying it so well, and... I'm sure his essay will make little or no difference to the bigots who wish to turn everyone into conservative Christians. Or to the bigots who relentlessly stereotype all Christians as Kenneth Blackwell sorts. I don't know which group is more deserving of our pity. But you've got to read this wonderful essay anyway, if you haven't already. And if you have, please reread it:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1191826-2,00.html

If I had to single out any observation, it would be Sullivan's point that the press has relentlessly made the "Christian vote" synonymous with "the Republican base." His point being that Christianity knows no party, that it's not an ideology or ism, to use his adjectives. More power to Republican Christians--and just as much power to those of us who follow Jesus and vote Donkey. May we both work to keep politics and religion in their respective places.

Meanwhile, while hosts of Internet adolescents write their retarded "believing in God and having a brain are mutually exclusive"-style essays, the press is aiding such bigotry big-time. Wonderful.

It's funny, when you think about it--it took an entire demographic to replace Stepin Fetchit. At this rate, the global population will comprise the next Bunkeresque strike target. Oh, well, better the target be Christians than poor African-Americans. Or the mentally ill. Or non-upperclass women. This is progress of a sort, I suppose.

Lee

The Kennedys are in trouble again....

If you want to be in the news all the time, change your last name to Kennedy. That should work.

And if you want the press to treat your drug addiction softly, change your last name to Limbaugh. That works, too.

The lack-of-soft-treatment phenomenon in question started with JFK, who of course became a saint in the latter part of 1963. So we forget that, up to that point, he was given much hell for being young and Catholic, and for having a Massachusetts accent. Most political humor of the early 1960s was very much like most of its modern counterpart--lame, adolescent, and designed to pander to petty class and regional prejudices. And way before such pandering became "hip." So, don't expect much from our first entry. Btw, doesn't Joel Langran sound more like the governor of California than the 35th president, or is it just my ears?

I Really Wanted To Be a "Singar" (Goodman-Dicker), Joel Langran, prob. 1962. Rori R 714.

I'm assuming that "Goodman" is Dickie Goodman. Not one of Dickie's better efforts, imo. He did do some classics....

I like the (non-political) flip better, on which Joel sounds a lot like Sammy Davis, Jr.:

Young and Foolish (A.B. Horwitt-A. Hague), Joel Langran, prob. 1962.

The Jackie Look is beautifully conceived but not so well executed. I like it, anyway. The lyrics needed work and "The Jackies" sing off-key throughout, but at least the ideas and images are funny. Less than fully professional but no "song poem," either:

The Jackie Look (We Wanna Look Like Jackie), Jack Bartley with "The Jackies," 1961. Kenco 5016.

The flip is an old Rodgers and Hart number, strangely rendered. The Jackies sound better on this one:

My Heart Stood Still (Rodgers-Hart), Jack Bartley, 1961. Same 45.

Please don't be alarmed, but I have more of these!! Buwa-ha-haaaaa!!


Lee

"Stairway to Laredo," with more echo.

This version of Stairway to Laredo features a different acoustical simulation. In some ways, I like it better than my other version. In some ways, I don't.

If I were a politician (especially a Democratic one), I'd be accused of "flip-flopping."

Anyway, here's the more echoey Stairway to Laredo file:

Stairway to Laredo 2, Lee Hartsfeld (by way of Noteworthy Composer).


Lee(eeee-ha!!)

"Stairway to Laredo" and other wake-up wonders for Sunday

Stairway to Laredo--Lee Hartsfeld, 2006.

The March of Siamese Children (Rodgers), Norman Leyden's Child's World Orchestra, 1960(?). From Bluebird label 45.

The Sound of Love (Costa), Don Costa and His Orchestra and Chorus, 1960. From United Artists 45.

Barabbas (Mario Nascimbene), Mantovani and His Orchestra, 1962. From London label LP.

Bark, Battle and Ball (Taylor-Miles), The Platters, 1954. From Mercury 45.


Lee