You've gotta love that Percy Faith jacket: "How to sell these elegant popular concert numbers to the still-evolving 12-inch-LP market? Sex! That's the only way." The streak up the man's back is the result of the lamp whose glare I couldn't totally suppress--not the photographer's fault. Anyway, I love that "Get me out of here!" look on the lady's face. Or, "Darn, I forgot to let the sitter know I'd be this late..."
So, a Golden Records classic, some recently-thrifted shellac, the Mills Brothers doing doo-wop, a couple century-plus-year-old goodies, fine rural '40s gospel, and an authentic Hawaiian number from back when everyone expected that state to become my country's 49th.
And, luckily, there are still local thrifts (two of them) that haven't gotten stupid with their vinyl pricing, and so I've hauled in a decent amount of analog audio since my last "Various Artists" bash (in March). I think the principal inspiration for this VA post was the atypical appearance of 40 or 50 78s in fine condition at the big city Goodwill--of which I nabbed nine or so. Also, Hi Yo Silver! simply demands a blog slot. (And let me check to make sure I haven't already posted it... Nope; we're good.) Amazing work by the Arthur Norman Singers and the virtuoso accordionist--plus, surprisingly decent audio from a six-inch Golden Records release. Audio which sounded dreadful in stereo but just fine with the channels summed.
Ripped in mono from Music from Hollywood is Percy Faith's superb 1953 instrumental version of Song from Moulin Rouge, and from Mantovani's 1962 Moon River and Other Great Film Themes LP, the equally superb Big Country theme.
And, from that recent 10"-shellac haul, the soft and sultry crooning of Peggy King (whose Zero Hour is among my all-time favorite pop gems), with the amusing Gentleman in the Next Apartment, plus Bob Merrill's great Make Yourself Comfortable (made famous by Sarah Vaughan), both 1954. And Freddy Martin pianist Murray Arnold on the Cardinal label, performing his own Boo Boo Boogie and a boogie-woogie version of Camptown Races. No record collection is complete without one.
The 1955 Sid King 45 showed up in the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift, and when I saw the title--Sag, Drag and Fall--something told me that I was in for some Shake, Rattle and Roll-style rockabilly. I was correct. Fine stuff, with a nice flip.
And a good dance-band version of the famous Black and White Rag (George Botsford, 1908), and though I have no idea who Bobby Mills was, I suspect he may have been European or European-American. Just a guess from a Discogs listing. Actually, the label, K and K, was a country operation. So... dunno. And we move on with the marvelous West Lawn Polka (1912), by banjo mega-virtuoso Frederick J. Bacon, followed by a 1914 rendition of the National Anthem (another no-collection-should-be-without disc), and great 1946 country gospel by Roy Acuff--That Glory Bound Train. I was very happy with the 1946 rip, since picking the right Columbia response curve is always a matter of guesswork.
From the RCA Camden Easy to Love Skeeter Davis LP of 1970, Carole King's magnificent 1964 Let Me Get Close to You. And, further down the list, another Goffin-King classic, Down Home (Little Eva, 1963), from an original, much-played 45 release.
Elsewhere, Neal Hefti and Woody Herman's 12-bar-blues rocker, Blowin' up a Storm (1946, Carnegie Hall), an almost hilariously over-the-top Pink Panther (theme) by the world-famous Columbia Musical Treasuries Orch. (1968), and an I-hoped-it-would-be-better Hugo Montenegro version of Good Vibrations.
From the Tops-related cheapie line Golden Tone, a marvelous budget cover of the Peter Gunn Theme, credited to "The Hi-Tones" (whatever), and from the 49th State Hawaii Record company, Little Brown Gal. Apparently, Hawaii was in the running for No. 49, until Alaska took that slot. And two numbers from my mono copy of Dionne Warwick's 1965 Here I Am LP: (Are You There) With Another Girl, and the astounding Lookin' With My Eyes, both Hal and Burt, of course.
Garage-band gold with the Kingsmen's rendition of Money (too bad about the piped-in audience noise), and Paul Revere and the Raiders' 1963 Louie, Louie. A standard cover tune which, in an under-rehearsed take, was a huge hit for the Kingsmen, of course. And, back to Bob Merrill, the superb Take Me Along (from a Broadway show), as performed by the Mills Brothers in either 1959 or 1961. It all depends on whether or not my source LP--the MB's 1961 Yellow Bird--utilized the single release, which I strongly suspect was the case. From the same LP, MB's excellent Get a Job cover, which may or may not be the 1958 single release.
And who hasn't wanted, more than anything else, to hear Sheb Wooley's rendition of Rawhide? Well, long no longer--it's here. Sheb was no Frankie Laine, but his take is decent enough. We close with the 1971 jazz-rock of Get It On by Chase--a huge hit in my home town of Toledo, and one of my fondest AM-radio memories. We even had a call-in talk show named after it.
Enjoy!
DOWNLOAD: Various Artists August 2025.zip
9 comments:
Hello, thanks again for the covers, may i ask why your rips bitrates is so low lately? I'm far from being a flac/320kbps groupie but in my experience anything below 128kbps usually clearly changed the sound. Isn't that the case? Cheers
Monkey D. Sound,
I didn't realize this--I only recently started using my present editing program as my main program. I'll have to adjust the bitrate. Darn; I can't fathom why my program's default setting would be so low. I'll check that now.
Monkey D. Sound,
And, apologies for the low rate. Apparently, it's an exporting issue, since the original files are WAV. They become mp3s upon export, and the program default must be unusually low. I'll see if i can figure it out...
What a feel-good collection for Summer. Thanks so much.
I love these random dumps, always a good listen. Thanks!
Christina and Ernie,
My pleasure! VA posts are a lot of work, but very satisfying work!
Don't apologize for it, i just noticed it randomly because i have a habit of checking tags and stuff of what i keep. I'm thankfull either way! Just thought i'd let you know because as you said the work is done on the Wavs usually, so it'd be a waste if audio suffered for smth actually not related to the vinyl or the ripping. Cheers
Got some good ones posted here! I do have that Mills Brothers Yellow Bird album in my collection, as well as the In Crowd and Hullabaloo-A-Go-Go albums you just thrifted a few days ago. My copy of the In Crowd is pristine, while Hullabaloo is in Maybe it Wil Play (MIWP) condition, which it does. Looking for another copy as we speak.
I do have an original 45 of Skeeter Davis' "Let Me Close to You." It's one of my favorites from her, particularly because she does a really good job of approximating her vocals to sound like Carole King's the way Carole did it on the demo of the song. I did have the Sid King one for a while--19 years ago. Bought it for just pennies at a book sale where they were selling a lot of mostly original Elvis and Beatles 45s for just 15 cents!! Naturally, they stayed in the collection while Sid King (a promo pressing, no less) did not. Both Dean Martin and Rick Nelson recorded the Little Eva song featured here.
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