Stood Up AND Standing Tall

Today, we return to the waning days of one of my favorite labels, Tin Pan Alley. At this point, they were about at the end of their series of releases by "The Melodiers", and about to move towards their final credited artist, another band called "New Image". For "The Melodiers", at least, I tend to hear the records that feature a male singer as having been sung by the same vocalist who had been with the label for some time - Mike Thomas - only now backed with a thicker band sound. I'd be interested to hear if others think the same, or differently.

Anyway, I was quite taken with the mouthful of an ungrammatical title of "Stood Up and Standing Tall in My Saddle Tonight", and was very happy to find that I wasn't disappointed by the song, either. The band plays an energetic, peppy backing, while the singer voices the lyricists tale. That tale is a first person story of a man who was two-timed, then left alone, by his gal, and spends some of the song telling us how proud and happy he is in his saddle, while spending the rest of the song - an inordinate amount of time for someone is feeling "no pain at all" - about how she done him wrong. Meanwhile, the band bashes away behind him most enthusiastically. 

Download: The Melodiers - Stood Up and Standing Tall in My Saddle Tonight

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On the flip side, we have the same ensemble, in thuddish slow rock-a-ballad mode, and with their female lead singer, with "Just Because". The same person wrote both of this lyrics, and I hope he was much more pleased with "Stood Up". 

After one of those dreaded spoken introductions, we get to the song at about the 0:45 point, and it's the equally dreaded "you look happy, but I know you're not" sort of things, with "ain't this a meaningful song" broken chords on the guitar throughout. Blech. 

Download: The Melodiers - Just Because

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And now, something much more enjoyable than that last track. It's two more of my "cut-up" tracks from way back when. If you don't know what this is about, please read the bottom of this post, or any post from late January or February. 

I have two of these for you today, an appetizer and a main course. And for the first time in several weeks, there are no obscenities hidden within these two cut-ups. 

First up, a brief, but I think entertaining little take on Elvis' "Can't Help Fallin' In Love". This doesn't even get us to the second time he sings the chorus, but what's there is fun: 

Download: Elvis Presley - Can't Help Fallin' In Love (cut-up)

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And something a more substantial - a cut-up of one of the sweetest records to ever hit the top ten, Patience and Prudence's "Tonight, You Belong to Me". If you're not familiar with this record, I encourage you to seek it out, and be charmed just about out of your boots, and then seek out more of their material, much of which is off-the-charts wonderful. Anyway, I think this one is pretty funny. 

Download: Patience and Prudence - Tonight, You Belong to Me (cut-up)

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Vilma Records

 Howdy, 

Before we get to today's offering, I wanted to call attention to something written by frequent commenter Sammy Reed, in response to last week's Nita Craig 45. He has encouraged people to check out a six part story about the woman who was known as Bonnie on Preview 45's, and which also covers some of Nita's story. He explains it better in the comment at the bottom of this post. He has posts, as well, some of which are of song-poems, and they can be found here. Thanks, as always, Sammy!

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Let me say, right off the bat, that I don't think that today's offerings are particularly outstanding. However, they do represent two tracks from a label which is not on the AS/PMA website, has never been featured here, and has barely been documented anywhere online, with the exception of a listing on discogs (and, I suppose, maybe somewhere else that I may have missed). Plus, it features a song sung by the only person in the song-poem world that I have interviewed, Rod Barton: for me, and for that reason, hearing from him is always nice. 

We'll hear from Rod first, but before that, look how fun the Vilma Records label is!: 

Rod's song is "Drifting Along", and it, like the flip side, is a pretty staid, maybe even stodgy number, not terribly unlike what you'd hear on a George Liberace, Star-Crest or Noval record. Discogs suggests that this record is from 1957, and while I have no idea where they got that, it certainly seems possible, since the actual performance sounds like it's from about 1943. On the plus side, someone put in enough work on this to make it sound like it could have been an actual pop record meant for sales and hoped-for success, if not a terribly good one. 

I also get a kick out of the fact that this record fades in. 

Download: Rod Barton - Drifting Along

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By the way, the author of the lyrics to both of these songs is Paul Bostic, who may have been the mastermind behind Vilma Records (I wonder if he ever created a companion label called "Vred Records"). And Paul Bostic later had at least one of his songs worked up and recorded by Preview records, and sung by another Rod, the much better known Rodd Keith. 

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On the flip side, we have Drake Morgan, who I've featured here once before, and who appeared on the Air and Caveman labels, which AS/PMA seems to think was associated with Globe. If this is from 1957, and is a Globe production, it's fairly early, indeed, for that song-poem factory, at least as to my understanding. 

This song, Lonesome, strikes me as sounding as if it's an even older recording than "Drifting Along". I'm put in the mind of the mid 1930's, perhaps part of that is Drake's singing style, but the sentimental lyrics, specific word choices ("Gee!") and the arrangement add to that impression, as well. 

Download: Drake Morgan - Lonesome

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Switching gears about as violently as possible, perhaps akin to slamming the car into park while going 35 MPH, now I have this week's "Cut-Up". If you haven't seen my recent posts, feel free to review them to find out what I'm talking about here, and if you don't do so, prepare to be surprised. 

Anyway, a few posts ago, I featured a cut-up down with my best pal Stu, circa 1982, of "Jailhouse Rock". Whatever day that was, it was a very productive day in terms of wasting time being funny, because after completing our rearrangement of Elvis, we turned to "Da Doo Ron Ron" by the Crystals. 

Now "Da Doo Ron Ron" happens to be my favorite hit record of all time, and certainly one of my top ten tracks that anyone's ever released. As perfect a song, arrangement, production, vocal performance and overall recording as I ever expect to hear. So this was particularly fun for me. 

A couple of thoughts. 1.) Again, this is not safe for work, due to one f-bomb near the start. 2.) The name you might not be able to make out replacing "Ron" in the first verse is Chicago Cubs great Ron Santo, saying his own name. 3.) The name replacing "Ron" in the second verse is that of Ron Selle, a Chicago area native who sued the Bee Gees, eventually unsuccessfully, for stealing a song of his when they wrote "How Deep Is Your Love". 

I think everything else is understandable and, hopefully, humorous. 

Download: The Crystals - Da Doo Ron Ron (cut-up)

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Maybe There Is No Fantasy

Today, as promised, I'm going back to back with Rodd Keith posts, since I hadn't shared any of his material in several months, prior to last week. This week's offering is a disc he shares with another singer, but we'll get to that in a moment. 

Rodd's side is titled "There Is No Maybe", and it's a record with a groovy mid-'60's midtempo thing, complete with verses that describe the hesitation on the part of the writer's sweetheart, leading into pre-chorus and chorus where the writer responds with the title phrase. The structure reminds me of some Neil Diamond records, although I suspect there hadn't been many of those, yet, to result in such an homage, when this record was made. 

Download: Rodd Keith - There Is No Maybe

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On the flip side, we have Nita Craig with "Fantasy". Presumably, Nita Craig is the same Nita who shows up on a handful of records by Rodd and Nita and by Bonnie and Nita. And while "Nita Craig" is only credited on two documented Preview sides, other singers named "Nita", with different last names, show up on about a dozen Preview singles. I'm guessing they're all by the same person. 

"Fantasy" is a 6/8 thing, loping along while Nita sings about imagining all the places she could go, and the backup singers doot-doot, ooh and aah, and answer her with the same thing she just said many times, in the manner than Preview would beat to death in the Gene Marshall era. And maybe it's just me, but this record seems to go on forever...

Download: Nita Craig - Fantasy

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And now to my cut-up of the week. And again, if you're not familiar with these, check out the link to "cut-ups", below, and read the earlier posts. 

Almost all of the cut-ups I've shared thus far have been from the period when I was making these seemingly all the time, between 1981 and 1985. In 1985, I graduated from college, got my first job in my chosen career, and met my future wife, all in the space of three months, and time for goofing around with cassette recorders and records plunged to close to zero. So I didn't make any more cut-ups for close to 20 years, at which point I had a short period of doing all sorts of mash-ups and cut-ups with my then-new computer editing software. 

One of the handful of songs I did in this manner was "The Green Door" by Jim Lowe. If you don't know this record, first, you really should, in my opinion. It's one of my all time favorite hits, and surely one of my dozen or so favorite songs to hit # 1 in the USA, which it did in late 1956. If you don't know it, you can hear it here. A perfect record, with an absolutely indelible melody and unique sound - and apparently recorded in the artist's apartment!

Anyway, I had a lot more things to "drop in" by the early 2000's, including some words and sound effects from a CD-ROM game my children were playing at the time. I also made some use of tracks which had been shared in the 365 days project, which I had been a part of, from 2003. 

While there's nothing as aggressively off color in this one as there has been in some of the other cut-ups, there is one tame four letter word, and a few other things that, while not obscene, are probably not safe for work. 

Download: Jim Lowe - The Green Door (cut-up)

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