Thursday, January 22, 2009

CalypSong-Poem

Today's song-poem offerings come from two labels which are not featured as often as others, when song-poems are a compiled, shared or discussed. In the case of both these labels, it appears they released song-poems, legit singles and vanity recordings. I am sure today's first offering is a song poem, and am not quite as sure to which world the second one begins.

First is a record on the Tin Pan Alley label. Tin Pan Alley dated back earlier than most of the song-poem labels which get more attention, and released enough legit or borderline legit records to have been the subject of an anthology of their "best doo-wop records", although whether that CD is, itself, legit, is anyone's guess. They soon moved into the song-poem game full time, and produced some of the weirdest records I've heard from the genre, including "It's Spring", which I recently featured here. Today's featured record comes from the earlier years of the label, however.

And this one seems made just for me, as it combines the song-poem concept with perhaps my favorite genre of music, Calypso. Phil Celia, previously heard on this site performing the classic "Atom Dynomic Dance", here tries his hand at "If Mama's and Papa's Would Stay At Home". Views reflected in this song-poem do not necessarily reflect those of the management: 

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Next up is a favorite from the Fable label. This label seems to have been all over the map. I have vanity pressings, novelty records, and song-poems on Fable, and I've seen early rock and roll and doo-wop from the label go for hundreds of dollars on eBay. Whether today's feature was an attempt at an actual country hit or a song-poem is a mystery to me. It does feature label head Sandy Stanton doing the music, but so do some of the label's legit releases. Whatever it is, you're not likely to hear anything else quite like it today. Enjoy Little Donnie Lane with "Go Away":

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4 comments:

Stuart Shea said...

I enjoyed Donnie Lane's song-poem more than Phil Celia's. The lyrics to "If Mama's.." are suitably ridiculous, but I don't like his faux Calypsoisms.

Donnie Lane's thing is great, though...thanks for posting these!

Anonymous said...
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KL from NYC said...

I wonder who blacked out the music publisher's credit on the Donnie Lane 45.

Sammy Reed said...

"Mama's and Papa's" isn't working now.