A Quartet of Dreamy Love Songs from Cara Stewart

Howdy, 

It's been nearly three weeks - events at home continue to leave me with little time for fun and games. Hopefully, that will change soon. But for now, I will pretty much slap up some stuff worth hearing without significant comment. 

I do, however, want to share that Sammy Reed, who knows his Bobbi Blake far better than me - maybe better than anyone - has cast doubt on my supposition in my last post that the singer of those songs was Ms. Blake. I have changed the text on that post and the tags accordingly. Thanks, Sammy!

~~

As I said, nothing much to say today. Here are four love songs, from and Air Records label EP. They are all more or less in the same dreamy style, and all written by the same song-poet, sung by my favorite female song-poem singer, Cara Stewart. 

The songs are "Once Again, Once Again", "Heart Flame", "Worn Out Words" and "Do You?". 

The only comment I have is that "Once Again, Once Again" (would that be Twice Again?) comes pretty darn close, at times, to infringing on the copyright for "The Tennessee Waltz". At least to my ears. 

Here they are:  

Download: Cara Stewart - Once Again, Once Again

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Download: Cara Stewart - Heart Flame

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Download: Cara Stewart - Worn Out Words

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Download: Cara Stewart - Do You? 

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Linda Dahrling's Greatest Hits

Right off the bat, let me point y'all to Sammy Reed's page, where he has just posted a fairly ridiculous song-poem album. 

And now: 

Today, I have a bit of an oddball release - this preview release appears to be the only record ever credited under the oddly named spelling "Linda Dahrling". It's been suggested to me that this is Bobbi Blake, and I initially identified her as such, but Sammy Reed, who knows his Bobbi Blake perhaps better than anyone in the world, says that's not the case, and suggests that it might be the singer identified elsewhere as Joan Merrill. I have no idea, so I am leaving her identified as Linda Dahrling in the tags. 

This is clearly, to my ears, a Rodd Keith production, and I'm fairly certain that's Rodd singing in the background, too. It's not one of his best - both songs sound very much alike to me and the level of creativity is far below what he was capable of. But... it's a relatively early Preview release with Rodd's involvement and for those reasons alone, good enough to share. 

The first song is "Poor Little Sparrow", in which the song-poet minimizes the future problems of a bird suffering from a broken wing (she seems to think it will heal itself - I don't think it works that way) when compared to her life, given that her man is in Vietnam and might not come back. 

Download: Linda Darhling - Poor Little Sparrow 

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The flip side, "God Bless You" is standard issue "thanks for loving me" paean to a woman's lover. 

Download: Linda Darhling - God Bless You 

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Blazing Hoofs and Impeachment, Too! - Another Ridiculous Record from Gary Roberts

Hi, everyone, 

Well, I said things might slow down here and they sure enough have. I want to explain that an immediate family member has received a serious diagnosis and has had two surgeries since my last post. Depending on the news coming in the next week or so, I might return to having the same amount of time to post here as in the recent past, or... I might not. I hope you will continue to visit and view, read and listen whenever I do post. 

But I do have something today, a record I pretty much literally JUMPED at the chance to buy on eBay, just based on a awesomely weird titles, and the fact that the songs attached to those titles were such by the ridiculous Gary Roberts. 

"Blazing Hoofs". Okay. I had to look that up, and it appears that, in addition to "Hooves", "Hoofs" is an acceptable plural of "Hoof". Who knew? It still looks goofy to me. And of course, who better to sing a western outlaw ballad than Gary Roberts. I know, almost anyone would be better. After a faux Flamenco guitar introduction, the band settles in to a "Western" gallop which is about as authentic as one might have heard at the time in a skit on a local kiddie TV show. 

The lyrics are a compendium of genre clichés (although I did web search for the phrase "My Pinto's Going Dry" and it literally came up with no hits - an absolutely original, if genuinely stupid, set of four words). The words of the lyrics are manipulated into phrases that just don't work, all for the sake of rhymes. My favorite example, in which a rhyme for "sleep" was needed: 

The girl I left behind / yes the girl who says she's mine

Whom I kissed before I left / began to weep

The whole thing is over in barely two minutes. I found myself wondering what Halmark would have done with this material. 

Download: Gary Roberts - Blazing Hoofs

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Based on Sterling's numbering system, it would appear that his record came out at the end of 1974 or, more likely, in 1975. And that would line up nicely with the title of the flip side, "Impeachment of Love", as well as with the wah-wah sound and beat (such as it is) heard on the track. 

It is, as you might guess, a song of a cheating lover being discovered. We're off to a fun start in the two lines, in which "love" is rhymed with, um, "love". And then, when the protagonist discovers his lover's indiscretion, he appears to have witnessed - "Hiding like a clown" (another line shoehorned in to create a rhyme) - an unusual lover's embrace, to be sure: 

I saw you kissing, embracing and strangled in strangled in strange arms.

Gary gives his all to try to sound outraged, hurt and enraged, but it's just beyond his abilities. Just picture what Gene Marshall, for example, could have done while singing that last verse. 

Download: Gary Roberts - Impeachment of Love

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All in all, money very well spent. 

Rocket To the Moon

As I alluded to in my last post, I have precious little time right now, so I will not have much to say. I do want to share a vintage song-poem ad sent to me by longtime reader/listener/commenter Tommy. Here it is: 

Thanks, Tommy!

~~

Today we have the always entertaining and barely competent Billy Grey, on the Tin Pan Alley label. The song is "Rocket to the Moon", the conceit here being that, apparently, going into outer space is the latest move to make when one is pursuing romance (?). My favorite line, a complete non-sequitur, is "Let's Not Be Different" - I can't figure out what that means, in OR out of context. 

Download: Billy Grey - Rocket to the Moon

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On the flip side, with virtually the same tempo and feel, is the sad lyric of a man who has learned his gal is moving on. He is nice enough to tell her "you're free to go", which is mighty sporty, but he'd really like her to stay, even redundantly saying "Please darling, please change your mind". 

Actually, the best things about this track, by far, are the guitarist and drummer, who are clearly in a better record than the singer, particular in the last 20 seconds, when the drummer, in particular, seems to think he's playing with a hard rock band. 

Download: Billy Grey - Darling, Please Change Your Mind

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An Easter Egg For You - A Rare Rodd Keith Album from Australia - COMPLETE!

First, let me just say that there are some things going on in my personal life which may - or may not - impact just how much time I have to give to sharing and writing here for the next month or more. If there are fewer posts, I hope it is only for this month and next. 

But TODAY, I have something ultra rare and exciting: An entire album that Rodd Keith produced, under the Film City umbrella but clearly with more money and options, for a song-writer in Australia, and released in Australia on a legitimate Australian label - W & G records. 

The existence of this album has long been known, and its contents are duly related on the Film City page of the song-poem website - although that listing shows that the album was released domestically by Film City. But I can't find that its contents have ever been shared online. My copy is the Australian release, obtained from a friendly Australian record dealer named Michael. Thanks a million, Michael!

The album is called "Island Songs of the Great Barrier Reef", and indeed, all twelve songs are about Hayman Island and the surrounding areas. 

I am fairly certain that this entire album is a song-poem/vanity hybrid album, and that these are songs written - music and words - by the listed songwriters: Reg Hudson for the first song, and John Ashe for all the others. The tunes are quite pedestrian, for the most part, although some have a nice, and appropriate, South Pacific type of lilt. But none of them have the sort of tune-writing excellence I would associate with Rodd Keith. 

What they DO have, though, is embellishment. This is Rodd Keith working with at least a somewhat larger budget than he usually had, particularly at Film City, where he was usually a one-man band. Not only is there a female singer heard nearly throughout the album - heard, in fact, virtually as much as Rodd himself - as well as both a female chorus and a mixed chorus on other songs. There are also horns playing here and there - a sax solo on the first, song, for example, and a veritable Dixieland combo playing on the fourth song on side two, South Molle Memories. In addition, there is clearly a "real" piano being played over the Chamberlin backing on a few tracks. 

And despite the bland nature of the tunes, Rodd's musicianship, vocal chops and particularly, genius for arrangement, shine through over and over again. 

Below are files containing each of the two sides, with no attempt made to separate the tracks, followed by photos of the album and the labels. 

I have NOT listened to the files I made of this album - I listened to it first before making the files, and as I said, I'm a bit busy just now. If there are any glitches, let me know and I will fix them. 

I hope you receive this with as much excitement and enthusiasm as I had in receiving it. 

Download: Rod Rogers with the Tropic Island Serenaders - Island Songs of the Great Barrier Reef, Side One

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Download: Rod Rogers with the Tropic Island Serenaders - Island Songs of the Great Barrier Reef, Side Two

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Gene's Talkin' Jesus

 

With the Christian Holy Week approaching quickly (and this is one of those years when the Western Churches and the Orthodox Church observe Holy Week's events at the same time), what better occasion than to have Gene Marshall tell us about Jesus. 

That's right, Gene is going to tell us, not sing to us. Oh, he sings a little, but mostly he's going to read a statement. A sermon of sorts. When I hear a record such as "Let Jesus Save You", I wonder a couple of things. 

First, did the song-poet understand how lyricism works, as opposed to prose? There is nothing in the spoken word section here that could have reasonably, or even unreasonably, been set to a melody. And second, was the song-poet satisfied with this performance? Gene gives a good sermon, I'll say that. But presumably, the lyricist (sic) paid for a song. What we have here, aside from about 10 seconds of instrumental passages is: 

Gene singing: 40 seconds

Gene talking: 100 seconds

Download: Gene Marshall - Let Jesus Save You

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The folks at Preview were nice enough to team up two Christian songs on one 45. It wasn't automatically going to be that way - can you imagine the song-poet of either of these sides taking a gander at the flip side and having it be either of the two songs heard in this post (you'll have to listen to those songs to get what I'm joking about). 

Anyway, "On This Mountain" is an actual song, and if nothing else, Gene provides an excellent vocal, with an appropriate aching tone in spots, unfortunately not in the service of anything special in the way of lyrics (the line "He died for all colors: black and white, you see" seems particularly half-baked) or of  backing support. Indeed, the instrumental section has to be among the more low-energy solo sections I've heard on a Preview disc, and the keyboardist and bass player don't really seem to be working from the same chord changes during this section. 

Download: Gene Marshall - On This Mountain

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A Great Day... Just Before... A Not So Great Day

Right off the bat, I want to correct an oversight, something I meant to link to two months ago. Sammy Reed has posted several songs from the ultra-rare JOiFU song-poem label, including Gene Marshall singing a song that I posted in a completely different, Tin Pan Alley recording, nearly sixteen years ago. Have a listen!

And now, for something I ALSO forgot to do when I intended to: 

I totally meant to share this one for St. Patrick's day. Perhaps still being in March and only two weeks late will suffice. It's no great shakes, but it does have that St. Patrick's day tie-in, and it's also about someone who was a favorite of song-poets for a while, John F. Kennedy. Now most of the JFK records came out after his death, just as most legit albums about JFK came out after his death. But I don't think this one did. 

No, "A Great Day for J.F.K.", as sung by Sammy Marshall under the name Ben Tate, which was always his credited name when he sang on the Ronnie Label, makes no mention of JFK's death, and quite clearly was a lyric full of pride, by the extremely Irish-ly named Marcella Ridenour, about the current president being Irish. 

The song itself is another one of these nearly soulless Ronnie performances. Sammy provides a nice, warm vocal, but the backing band could be playing any of at least 50 other Ronnie tracks. I wonder how many of these they did in a day or week. 

It's also worth noting that, although there is no copyright date on this 45, dates are known for other Ronnie releases, and 2043 seems to have been the first 1963 release on the label. Then, by Ronnie 2151, it was 1965. The label seems to have released fewer and fewer records per year as the decade continued - and almost certainly fewer than 100 records during 1963. As this is number 2099, I suspect it was made well after the half-point of 1963. If so, or even if it was made in the spring of that year, Ms. Ridenour probably only had a few months - perhaps only a few weeks - to play it for her friends before a certain world famous event caused her to throw it on the pile with Vaughn Meader's "First Family" albums and not think about it for a long, long time. 

Download: Ben Tate (Sammy Marshall) - A Great Day for J. F. K.

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The less said about the lethargic flip side, "Thinking of You", the better. 

Download: Ben Tate (Sammy Marshall) - Thinking of You

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Letter From the Great Beyond!

It's maudlin hour here at song-poem central. Today we have Norm Burns, singing a first-person narrated letter from Billy in heaven to the family down below. It's called "Billy's Poem". I'm going to guess that there was a real Billy and that this composition meant a great deal to the song-poet named on the label. that being the case, I hate to be critical. And yet.... well, I'll just say that if I had the opportunity to write my family from the great beyond - or imagine what a family member might do, given the same chance - I would like to think I'd be more eloquent and say considerably more than the greeting-card level thoughts offered here. 

This is among the last records that Norm Burns made. It's from 1973, and he died unexpectedly in 1974 after a very short illness, from what I've been told. This is number 641 - the last known Norm release (aside from one several months later, which may have been held back for some reason) is number 666. I'd love to have heard a poem from Norm from the hereafter. 

Download: Norm Burns - Billy's Poem

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The flip side is a snoozer of a track called "Someone to Need Me", and it is one of innumerable song-poems on the subject of being alone / looking for love / looking back sadly. I'd really be more interested to hear what happened to the people with whom the song-poet used to enjoy happy times around the fire. The hard swing into religion in the second half is a bit unexpected for this particular breed of song-poem, but even that doesn't pull me out of the stupor caused by the arrangement and performance.

Download: Norm Burns - Someone to Need Me

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A Mike By Any Other Name Would Sing Just As Poorly

Hello! 

First, I want to acknowledge a comment from a poster on my previous post, a Hal(l)mark release that you can find here. That poster wrote that the record was a Rite pressing from 1964. Now, I know nothing about Rite pressings (or any others), how they are determined, etc. And honestly, I don't want to know how this sort of thing is determined - it's enough for me to be told what someone else figured out. 

The reason I mention this here is that the Halmark (or Hallmark) label has been documented to have begun operations in 1967. If this 1964 date is correct, it is a significant new understanding (well, for me anyway) about this label. I have always guessed that the "Hallmark" version of the label was the first one, and have further guessed that a lawsuit from that other "Hallmark" resulted in the permanent loss of one "L" from the label, so this one is probably among their earlier releases. If that poster (or someone else) can confirm 1964, I'd be much interested. 

And now for a voice frequent visitors will know, but not by this name. 

Before getting to this week's songs, I want to acknowledge that my pal Darryl Bullock got to this record first, and shared one side of it on his "World's Worst Records" blog more than a dozen years ago. However, that post's offerings are now dead links, so I thought I'd make it - both sides of it - available. The post in question, though, is well worth reading, being that it contains the memories of a niece of Tin Pan Alley chief Jack Covais. You can read it here. 

And I was excited to get this record, anyway. Not only is their scrawling on one side of the label, written by the song-poet, but it also promised to offer a taste of a previously unknown (to me) Tin Pan Alley warbler, one Mike Yantorno. 

However, one listen to Mr. Yantorno convinced me - surely this is Mike Thomas under another name. And... I'm guessing that's his real name. Perhaps his full name is Michael Thomas Yantorno. I dunno. But that's certainly the same singer who made dozens of half-assed vocal performances for Tin Pan Alley during the mid to mid/late period. A glance at the label numbers does everything short of confirms this - the two documented "Mike Yantorno" records come in sequence immediately before the first known Mike Thomas record - literally no more than three (known) releases before Mike Thomas shows up. 

So, I hear you clambering to know - are the the songs / performances any good? 

NO!!!!

Of course not. "A Beggar's Life" is an Oompah song without the Oompah tuba or bass, but with some less than stellar attempts to stay on the beat. Lyrically, it features the complaint of a man of the street, featuring the requisite mean policeman, the request for money for a drink, repeated verses and second grade level rhymes. Sing it, Mike!

Download: Mike Yantorno - A Beggar's Life

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Aside from the unknown (now known) singer, it was the title of the flip side of this record that drew me to it. What the hell does "I Tried, John (Joan)" mean? Unfortunately, the lyrics of the actual song don't give us a clue, as they are entirely directed at Joan. My guess is that the song-poet meant for the song to be sung by either a man or woman, with the singer deciding who he or she was singing it for. But it's weird to put it on the label like that, isn't it? 

The actual song and performance - dreary and draggy, with our Mike doing his version of the Bob Dylan imitation that popped up on seemingly every tenth record released in 1966. The last word of the song sort of gets buried in the music, but I think it's "me", and if that's the case, at least the song-poet got creative and included a surprise ending to her song. 

Oh, and on this side of the record, the song poet has written "Permanent Request: Play For Me - Kay B." Well, Kay, here's your long distance dedication. 

Download: Mike Yantorno - I Tried, John (Joan)

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I Can't Live Without Your Imagination

I am distressed at how little I've posted so far this year - an average of less than once every two weeks so far. So I really wanted to get something up here before nine weeks of the year had gone by with only four posts. And what better way to do that than with something I have very little to say about: A Halmark record that doesn't feature the crazy-voiced Bob Storm. 

To be sure, this one is credited to Bob Storm, but it's the other Bob Storm (search my posts for his name if you need an explanation). And aside from the hilarity that crazy-voiced Bob Storm causes for me, I think I'm just about out of things to say about Halmark (or in this case, Hallmark) releases. 

Here we have "I Can't Live Without You", backed by one of the most common of the Halmark backing tracks. Please note, I did not clip the start of the backing track. The record was released that way. I think that marks three posts in a row in which there is something faulty about the recording heard on one side of the record. Aside from the faultiness of the entire endeavor, in this case, I mean. 

Download: Bob Storm - I Can't Live Without You

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And yet another of the classic, most overused backing tracks is featured on the flip side, "Imagination". There is, at least, an interest conceit in the lyrical makeup of this one, although the resulting record is just as stultifying as at least 85% of Halmark, er Hallmark releases. 

Sing it, Other Bob!

Download: Bob Storm - Imagination

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Gabriel Is the Pin Boy

I haven't featured Gene Marshall for a while, so today it's Gene Marshall day. "Thunder Lullabye" consists of a parent trying to calm a child down when the child is frightened by a storm. The parent's explanation here is an old standby (or perhaps "standbye" given the spelling of "Lullabye") fleshed out with some unlikely manual tasks assigned to a few heavenly heavy hitters. 

This record also features a rare flub by the folks behind the scenes at Preview, which you'll no doubt notice as the song comes to an end. 

Download: Gene Marshall - Thunder Lullabye

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I would love to tell you the name of the song on the flip side, and share the label with you, but this particular record came to me with the same label - the one for "Thunder Lullabye" - so I don't know its name. And this record never made it into the song-poem archives database. So feel free to supply whatever name you feel most fits the track. 

The singer is again Gene Marshall, and it's one of the endless series of "you're leaving me" song-poems, as well as yet another one of those records where the chirpy backup singers repeat the last thing the singer said, like a child with echolalia. And a hint to the song-poet (sadly unnamed, due to the lack of label credit): The phrase "Please Repeat This Again" is redundant.  

Download: Gene Marshall - Flip Side of "Thunder Lullabye"

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LIsten to the Eagle Scream!

Howdee, 

I'm going to lead off with a funny comment from Sammy Reed, in response to my last post, in which a song about a steel guitar didn't actually feature a steel guitar. He wrote, regarding two other songs I've posted:

Gene Marshall was also "Hummin' and a-Strummin' on a steel guitar" with no steel guitar. Then there was his "Didgeridoo" song with no didgeridoo.

 

Quite right, indeed. I would add that, so far as I know, one doesn't usually "strum" a steel guitar, at least not in the way I would use the word "strum"....

On to some ridiculous patriotism!

I've probably explained the "Air" label far too many times. Suffice it to say that the label re-released (or provided the only release) for the products of multiple other song-poem labels, and does not appear to have produced any work of its own. I don't understand how or why this worked, but there it is. 

And like plenty of other Air releases I've  heard, both of these sides seem to have been mastered directly from a 45 or acetate provided by the respective song-poem factories, as the sound is relatively poor and, on each side, there is a moment in which the sound dips, considerably, for no apparent reason. I doubt those dips in sound were on the original tapes or on the original discs which contained these songs. Both sides also cut off VERY suddenly, before the last chords have a chance to fade away. 

From the Film City company - complete with requisite Chamberlin, played, perhaps, by Rodd Keith - comes the rarely utilized Joe Staunton, manly vocalist. (Air also released multiple tracks by a Joe Stanton, a much less manly singer and clearly not the same person - also, Joe Stanton's records were clearly not Film City productions. Whether either Joe was related to Film City and Fable Records maestro Sandy Stanton, I just don't know.)

ADDENDUM: My friend Stu suggests that Joe Staunton is Rodd Keith. I can certainly hear that, after the fact, but I don't think it occurred to me because as far as I know, Rodd didn't use any pseudonyms on Film City apart from "Rod Rogers". But then, this was licensed out to Air Records. So yeah, it could well be. Probably is!

 

Joe Staunton gets to sing - double tracked, yet - the song "Stand Proud and Tall On the U.S.A.". And it's exactly the sort of patriotic clap-trap that I'd expect from a title like that. The march arrangement is perfectly suited to the lyric and yet ridiculous at the same time. 

By the way, shouldn't that be "With the U.S.A." or "For the U.S.A." Maybe that's just me. And then there's the line that made me laugh out loud the first time: "This is the land where the eagle screams". I looked it up, and I guess eagles really do scream, and there are even alcoholic drinks and restaurants called "Screaming Eagle", but it still sounded REALLY weird to me. And that ending is classically incompetent. 

Download: Joe Staunton - Stand Proud and Tall On the U.S.A.

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The flip side is from the fabulous Lee Hudson's song-poem factory. And I would have to say that, well over 95% of the time, if I have a record with Cara Stewart on only one side, I'm going to lead with the Cara side. She might just be my favorite song-poem singer. However, the oddness of the U.S.A. song won out here, especially since Cara turns out to be a supporting player on "Wishful Thinking". It's a duet with Jeff Reynolds, but Jeff gets all the solo bits, as it's clearly - in this arrangement anyway - the man's story being told. In fact, it's a little weird that Lee Hudson put Cara on it at all, as she seems to be singing Jeff's story along with him, while he's singing about her. I mean, by the end of the first chorus, wouldn't she know all the things he seems to think she doesn't know? 

Anyway, this song bounces along in a pleasant slow clip-clop, with an absolutely typical Lee Hudson arrangement, and that's just fine with me - I love his sound. 

Download: Cara Stewart and Jeff Reynolds - Wishful Thinking

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