Only two posts this month, I'm afraid. It's been quite an ordeal of a month, but one which suddenly turned bright and lovely in the last three days.....
But last time I had eight songs to share, and this week, you'll barely be able to get through the two I have for you without losing your lunch. Yes, it's Noval Time.
Last time around, I paid tribute to the great Gene Marshall. Gene and the folks at Preview were certainly among those at the pinnacle of the song-poem business, at least for a time, and Gene himself was utterly professional, talented and did a flawless job 99% of the time. As I wrote a few weeks ago:
in many, if not most cases, he was singing the song-poems you hear on this site the very first (and last) time that he ever saw the sheet music.
Such a practice does not always turn out well. Perhaps the very opposite of the 1960's and early 1970's version of Preview (and the opposite of certain periods at Sterling and at Tin Pan Alley, among others), was the Noval label. And for that reason, I consider them to be another quintessential song-poem level, just at the other end of the quality scale.
The stereotype of the song-poem, I think, is a talentless person writing trite lyrics and being tricked into parting with a good amount of money for a recording made my hack musicians who barely have any interest in what they're doing. And often, the first part is true. Anyone reading this knows the sort of lyrics that turn up on these records.
The hack musician going through the motions part is unfair to a lot of people who worked their tails off, often for material which didn't deserve it.
But Noval.... oh, Noval.... This is where the complete stereotype I just described comes utterly true. Most of the song-poetry heard on Noval 45s is thoroughly awful, the arrangements are bland and plodding, the singers are not even credited, there is NO address for the label, and the singing is the very opposite of Gene Marshall. For the singer on this record, I certainly hope, beyond hope, that he was seeing the words and music for the first time, because this guy clearly either was not a good site reader or was simply a terrible singer, or perhaps both. The anti-Gene Marshall.
Have a listen to "Rose of Love", in which the singer misses the second note of the song, despite the fact that the pianist is also hitting the note and it's the tonic note for the key they are in (for all you musicians out there). As he typically did (this guy is on a lot of Noval records), this singer shows no technique whatsoever, and continues to find stay on the melody challenging here and there, culminating on a note he simply fails to hit at 1:59.
And don't even get me started on these lyrics...
Download: No Artist Named - Rose of Love
Play:( I must point out at this point, that every now and then something accidentally turned magical, in Noval's hands.)
On the flip side is "All I Want is You", featuring some additional cookie cutter lyrics. Somewhere during the course of listening this particular song, I became convinced that the reason the pianist constantly doubles the melody of the songs on Noval records is because that was the only way to keep this guy at or near the right notes of those melodies. Sort of a real life Jonathan and Darlene Edwards.
Download: No Artist Named - All I Want is You
Play:
