Cheap hits (in alphabetical order)!

Promenade, Top Tunes, Hit Parader, Song Hits, Columbia Record Club, Audition, Variety, Crown, and Waldorf are the budget labels we'll hear from today. My favorite of the bunch? The Hit Parader version of Surfin' Bird, which doesn't disgrace the original (by the Trashmen). Of course, "original" has to be taken in context, since the tune was a plagiarism of The Rivington's Papa Oom Mow Mow and The Bird's the Word.

The three Columbia Record Club tracks are pretty good, too. All told, these are some of the more successful no-budget covers in my collection. And on a single zip file for your downloading convenience. And in alphabetical order by title. What I won't do for my readers.

By the way, I didn't put an early fade-out on A Well Respected Man--that's how it shows up on the disc. And the title shows up last on the list, of course, because I alphabetized it as Well Respected Man, A. Correct way to it, the.

Click here to download these choice cheap covers: ZIP FILE NO LONGER AVAILABLE

PLAYLIST

ALL OVER NOW--(20 Top Pop Song Hits!; Columbia Record Club)
BLOWIN' IN THE WIND--(Song Hits 42)
BLUE SUEDE SHOES--(Variety EPV-1812)
BREATHLESS--Billie Case (Promenade 27)
COME GO WITH ME--The Promineers (Promenade 12)
DO WAH DIDDY DIDDY--Bobby Cash (Top Pop Song Hits, Vol. 2)
DON'T--Jimmy Aires (Promenade 27)
GEE--The Four Jacks (Top Tunes 1075), 1954.
GET OFF OF MY CLOUD--(Song Hits 38)
GOOD VIBRATIONS--(Hit Parader 43)
GREAT BALLS OF FIRE--Billie Case (Promenade 27)
HARD-HEADED WOMAN (Audition 59500)
HEARTBREAK HOTEL--The Cadets (Crown)
JOHNNY B. GOODE--Sugar Beat (Promenade 41)
OH HAPPY DAY--Dolph Dixon (Waldorf Record Corp. A-114)
SOUNDS OF SILENCE--(Hit Parader 39)
SURFIN' BIRD--(Hit Parader 27)
A WELL RESPECTED MAN--(Hit Parader 39)


Lee

78s that cry out to be heard--The Whisper Song, That's All Right, more!

And so we have Western Extended Play Records, made by the Record-o-Mail Co. of Newark, New Jersey. A new one on me. We'll be hearing a budget cover of That's All Right from this disc, though it's not Elvis being mimicked but, rather, Marty Robbins. Oh, well. Looks like Western was one of the pioneers in the no-artists-credited school of fake versions. This label has a no-brand look to it.

Our no-brand rockabilly is followed, logically enough, by Carmen Cavallaro. The 1947 Cavallaro file, along with the three Victor discs that follow, are examples of my new approach to shellac ripping, in which I reduce treble on my 31-band equalizer prior to sending the signal to my PC. Whereupon I do some precise tweaking with MAGIX's parametric equalizer and some very light applying of that same program's denoiser feature, using sampled hiss to create a custom filter. By making the application "adaptive," I ensure that the quieter moments receive more dehissing than the louder ones.

Let me know if you like the results. To the 78s: ZIP FILE NO LONGER AVAILABLE

PLAYLIST

THAT'S ALL RIGHT--Western Extended Play Records.
BEYOND THE SEA (LA MER)--Carmen Cavallaro and His Orch., 1947.
MAY ALL YOUR TROUBLES BE LITTLE ONES--Jack Hylton Orch., 1936.
THE WHISPER SONG (WHEN THE PUSSY WILLOW WHISPERS TO THE CATNIP)--Art Landry Orch., 1927.
ONE O'CLOCK BABY--Johnny Hamp's Kentucky Serenaders; Vocal: Franklyn Baur, 1927.




























Lee

Catnip hammock, 2-D vision

This is my third (3 of 3) tuxedo cat, Griff, sleeping in his catnip hammock, which doubles as a hanging catnip planter. I should point out that what you see in the photo is pretty much what I saw when I was taking it--which is to say, I have mostly flat vision. Because of my "lazy" right eye, my brain never learned to properly combine the input of both eyes--hence, there's just the slightest stereo perception. And not so much that I'd notice. Mostly, the input from my right eye is suppressed, making my left eye the workhorse peeper. (You guessed it--I've always wanted to type "workhorse peeper.") The suppression mechanism keeps me from seeing double.

Not that I look cross-eyed (strabismic), though I am. I've been informed more than once that, past a certain young age, the brain can't be trained to see in stereo. But, check this out:

"Fixing My Gaze." I just ordered it.

Reading issues? Trouble judging distances? Walking by people and not seeing them? Yup, yes, and absolutely. I wonder if my gaze can be fixed, after all?

Griff doesn't care--he's in catnip paradise....



























Music coming up.




Lee

Moon, tooth

I'm one of the many Americans who believes the moon shot was not staged. Call me crazy....

The moon shots, I should say (plural). There were a number of them. That I believe, too.

Saw my dentist, and yes, my tooth is in bad shape. The filling was surrounded by decay which reached quite low in the tooth. He put in a temporary filling of a purely medicinal nature (save for the fact it plugs the hole he drilled), and if I'm not in a lot of pain over the next two months, then the tooth can be saved.

Otherwise, extraction. Which means going to an oral surgeon. I have long, slender roots, he says, and everything is too close to an important central nerve. Joy.

The nerve inflammation is apparently setting off my sinusitis. That explains the woozy head, etc.

But there's a 50/50 chance this was caught in time.

Through all this, I continue to blog, because blogging is... well... my life.


Lee

Sunday morning gospel: Pat Boone--Hymns We Love (1957)

A fabulous 1957 gospel LP by Pat Boone--Grade-A tunes, Pat's voice at its youthful best (I've always wanted to type "youthful best"), and, for that matter, much better than average Dot label jacket art. I speak as someone not impressed, in general, by Dot's cover concoctions.

Fully expecting to find the usual macho pan, I check out Allmusic's review of Hymns We Love and was pleasantly surprised to discover nothing but nice words. Cool.

A shoutout to the awesome Cyberhymnal site, who I turned to for fill-in data for the composer credits in today's post. The best resource of its type, and it's been a while since I sang their praises.

To the hymns: ZIP FILE NO LONGER AVAILABLE

PLAYLIST

THE OLD RUGGED CROSS (Rev. George Bennard)
IT IS NO SECRET (Stuart Hamblen)
WHISPERING HOPE (Septimus Winner)
SWEET HOUR OF PRAYER (Walford-Bradbury)
MY GOD IS REAL (Kenneth Morris)
BEYOND THE SUNSET (Virgil P. and Blanche Kerr Brock)
IN THE GARDEN (C. Austin Miles)
SOFTLY AND TENDERLY (Will L. Thompson)
WILL THE CIRCLE BE UNBROKEN (Habershon-Gabriel)
YIELD NOT TO TEMPTATION (Palmer)
HAVE THINE OWN WAY (Stebbins-Pollard)
NOW THE DAY IS OVER (Baring-Gould--Barnby)

Lee