18 Top Hits, Part 2--Loren Becker, Jimmy Helms, Curtis Smith, The Woodchuckers, Hollis Harbison, The Zig Zags

 

I'm treating this post as a follow-up to this "18 Top Hits" post of last year, though I suppose it's logically more a follow-up to this post, except that one has already had two sequels.  But why worry about technicalities?  Plus, I've already titled the zip, so...  You know, at this rate, I'm going to run out of Waldorf fakes to post.  I will have reached a milestone never reached before by man.  Or woman.  Or child.  Or robot.

"To boldly go where where no buttinsky, platitude-spewing humans have gone before!"  Wasn't that the line?  (I like Star Trek, btw, but given my age, I could never get into any of the spin-offs past TNG.)

Back to topic, these Waldorf EP tracks--all ripped from 18 Top Hits and Top Hit Tunes EPs--date from 1956 and 1957, which places them around the late-1959 moment when Ampar (aka, Am-Par) acquired Enoch Light's labels.  It's an interesting period, because it marks the spot where Waldorf, after two years of failing to capture the sound of rock and roll, suddenly proved itself quite adept at the art.  Maybe Enoch Light realized, "Hey, this music isn't going anyplace.  Maybe we'd better do it justice."  I don't know.  Or maybe he was looking ahead to a post-Waldorf period of better labels and better pressings, and he had ceased caring about the fake-hit wing of his operation.  We'll never know.

In this 30-track playllist, we'll be hearing from the regular Waldrof gang--Artie Malvin, Dottie Evans, Loren Becker, Jerry Duane, and so on--and the quality of their vocalizing varies, as ever, depending on the material.  For instance, Artie, Jerry, Loren, and Dottie do very well on some rockers, and not so well on others. I strongly suspect that rushed arrangements were the cause, there--I imagine the ink had barely dried on most of the charts as the arrangers raced them to the music stands, and such matters as picking the ideal key for a given singer, or matching the right singer to the right number probably took second seat to getting these things out there.

And, vocal-wise, the weakest showing in our playlist comes courtesy of Curtis Smith, the lead on the otherwise excellent Get a Job, while the least of the instrumentals (and the only one, come to think of it) is Raunchy, a performance so lackluster, you almost expect it to simply stop in the middle, with all the musicians getting up and leaving.  Loren Becker's best work can be heard on Blue Monday, the superb My Baby Left Me, and, in particular, Confidential, on which he's nothing less than terrific.  My Baby Left Me is interesting as a big band-ized Waldorf rock cover that genuinely rocks--it makes a great companion number for the Elvis original.  Becker is fine on Rock-A-Billy, but a weak setting brings things down.  Good ol' Artie Malvin almost gives us a classic Moonlight Gambler fake, but I can only guess that the arranger had never heard Laine's hit, because the lame setting totally misses the mark.  That'll Be the Day saves the day, however, with both Artie and the arrangement first-rate--I'd be tempted to call Day the best rocker of the bunch, if it weren't for the marvelous School Day, with Jerry Duane doing a perfectly decent Chuck Berry imitation, though the real star of the side is the guy playing the perfect Chuck Berry fills.

The Best Vocal award has to go to one Keith Textor for Chances Are, which is extremely well produced.  The track comes as a slight shock on the EP, with major label-level audio suddenly filling the headphones.

The expertly rocking At the Hop and Rock and Roll Music are blog repeats, but... this EP version of At the Hop is actually longer than the LP pressing (a reverse of the norm), and it's pitched higher, to boot.  Rock and Roll Music is also pitched higher than in its LP appearance.  Was this on purpose?  Who knows?

Other genuinely rocking fakes include The Woodchuckers' Wake up Little Susie and Hollis Harbison's Buzz, Buzz, Buzz.  My Stanton 500 cartridge, with its very high output, brings these cheap but lovingly made tracks to vivid life.

 18 Top Hits, Pt. II

Lotta Lovin'--Jimmy Helms (Top Hit Tunes TH-15-1)
Treat Me Nice--Jimmy Helms With the Cotton Pickers (Same)
Wait and See--Jack Brown With Enoch Light Orch. (Same)
Get a Job--Curtis Smith (Top Hit Tunes TH-18-2)
A White Sport Coat--Loren Becker With Enoch Light and His Orch. (Top Hit Tunes TH-13-1)
Fabulous--Loren Becker and The Zig Zags (Same)
Moonlight Gambler--Artie Malvin With Enoch Light and His Orch. (18 Top Hits 206)
That'll Be the Day--Artie Malvin With the Zig Zags (18 Top Hits TH-14-3)
School Day--Jerry Duane With Enoch Light and Orch. (18 Top Hits TH-12-3)
Rock-A-Billy--Artie Malvin With Enoch Light and Orch. (Same)
Yes Tonight Josephine--Artie Malvin Enoch Light and Orch. (Same)
Melodie D'Amour--The Hi-Fi's (Top Hit Tunes TH-15-3)
Raunchy--Enoch Light and His Orch. (Same)
Singing the Blues--Loren Becker With Enoch Light and Orch. (18 Top Hits 204)
Miracle of Love-Sylvia Textor With Enoch Light Orch. (Same)
Blue Monday--Loren Becker (18 Top Hits TH-11-2)
Party Doll--Artie Malvin With Enoch Light and His Orch. (Same)
Round and Round--Loren Becker With Enoch Light His Orch. (Same)
Love Is Strange--The Ink Spots (Same)
Butterfly--Loren Becker and the Zig Zags (18 Top Hits TH-11-3)
I'm Walking--Jimmy Blaine and the Rhythm Rockets (Same)
My Baby Left Me--Loren Becker (18 Top Hits 193)
Confidential--Loren Becker (18 Top Hits 206)
At the Hop--Hal Willis and the Woodchuckers (Top Hit Tune TH-15-1)
Rock and Roll Music--Hollis Harbison (Same)
Chances Are--Keith Textor (Same)
Buzz, Buzz, Buzz--Hollis Harbison (Same)
Wake up Little Susie--The Woodchuckers (Same)
Jailhouse Rock--Jimmy Helms (Same)
Happy, Happy Birthday Baby--Dottie Evans With the Hi-Fi's (Same)

Lee