Here's a real doozy of a record, all the way around. It's a mid-period Preview release, performed by someone named Randy Rudolph. This name turns up from time to time in the Preview discography (and nowhere else in song-poem-land), and based on this record (as well as on the one Rudolph track released on song-poem compilations) it would seem that it was an assumed name, used for at least two different singers. The first side heard here, "We Are the Guys Who Win Wars", is quite the car crash. The opening few seconds, in particular, sound like an outtake. I would fully expect there to be an immediate breakdown, followed by a directive to everyone involved to "tune up". I'll let the lyrics themselves speak for themselves.
It strikes me that this could be Dick Kent singing, but I'm just not sure - I'm not even sure I've heard this singer before.
Play:
This record is also interesting for the presence of the name Lew Tobin among the credits on the flip side. Lew was the head honcho at one of my favorite song-poem labels, Sterling, A quick look at the Preview discography shows that Lew's name pops up repeatedly, which I'd never noticed before, and which confuses the hell out of me, since Preview was one of the mainstays of the LA song-poem world, and Sterling was based in Boston.
Ah, the mysteries of the song-poem world. However, those who are familiar with Lew Tobin's Sterling productions will likely find some similarities to that label's sound in this track, "Stop Your Wishing", by the fascinatingly named Doll H. Dorsey.
This song is credited to Randy Rudolph. In this case, the singer sounds (to me, anyway) nothing like the performer on the A-side. In fact, this singer sounds very much like Rodd Keith. The "hello" in the lyric at about the 1:20 point cracks me up. On the whole, this side of the record sounds, to me, more than a bit like Rodd Keith replacing Norm Burns on a Lew Tobin arrangement.
Download: Randy Rudolph - Stop Your Wishing
Play:
5 comments:
cool post..Lew tobin was my grandfather. do you know how I can find some hard copies of these records?
I'm sure that's Dick Kent on "We Are the Guys Who Win Wars."
"Stop Your Wishing" isn't working now.
That sounds like a young Norm Burns on the b-side (to me at least). Listen to the vibrato in the voice, especially before the jazzy piano kicks in and it goes all Vegas. That, of course, would also explain the Lew Tobin connection
Hey David When my mom was about 16 she had a song placed on an EP of one of his artists "Mel Moore", and Lew arranged the music to one of her songs "Dying Of Affection" trying to find out more info about him.. I have quite a few hard copies of the single BTW :)
Post a Comment