A Real Pro in Napoli

Our trip to locations around the world continues today with a delightful trip to Italy with our one-man-band friend who for a time was known as "The Real Pros". I've no doubt that, when this conglomeration is mentioned, most song-poem collectors think of the glory days of the MSR crew, who, on their days off from MSR, took over the anonymous role of Cinema's "Real Pros" by about 1973.

But as I've said before, I'm much partial to the nameless man who's work is featured on the earliest Cinema sides. He sounds a bit like Gene Marshall at times (and, as friends have noted, he sometimes sounds like your humble blogger my own self), and he's usually accompanied solely by one of those all-in-one keyboards which were so common 40 years ago (although not, as you'll hear, on this record, where there is a guitarist present).

This record also has the distinction of having the lowest label number of any Cinema release yet documented, even lower than this truly atrocious release.

All that is sort of besides the point, but I guess I like to type. The real news is that this record, "Fun in Napoli", is a truly enjoyable little ditty, with corny but good natured lyrics, sung in a stereotypical accent which might be obnoxious, were the entire enterprise not so fun and lighthearted. With Lou Monte, I tend to find this sort of thing unlistenable, but the lo-fi and low-tech nature of this record makes it irresistible to me.

Download: The Real Pros - Fun in Napoli
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The flip side of this record is called "The Magic of a Song", and while I can heartily agree that there is magic in many, many songs, including the one I just featured before this paragraph, I find none of that magic, or even interest, in this record, behind a minor bit of enjoyment in some of the guitar playing. Ah, well - it's probably asking too much to routinely find two songs to enjoy on one song-poem record.

Actually, one of the more interesting things about this record is the production credit, a rarity in itself on a song-poem record, but especially here, in that each side lists "the author" as a co-producer. A similar credit appears on that other early Cinema release I linked, above. That seems unlikely to begin with, but since the two songs were written by two different song-poets, it seems virtually impossible. I'm also intrigued by the credit to "Action Music" publishers, and wonder if that doesn't indicate a previously unknown link to the Fable/Film City family of labels, which had a subsidiary called "Action Records".

All of that speculation interests me considerably more than does "The Magic of a Song", but here it is, anyway:


Download: The Real Pros - The Magic of a Song
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Whisk Him Off!

Well, we all had fun last week doing the polka in Arizona, but now it's time to go to a region where polka is something of a local religion - Wisconsin. And here's our friend Rodd Keith/Rod Rogers, along with his pals in the Swinging Strings (as the folks at Film City termed Rodd's five nimble, talented fingers on this recording), in a peppy request, "Whisk Me Off to Wisconsin".

This has everything I look for in a one man band Chamberlin vocal - an upbeat tempo, some interesting choices for voicings on that keyboard - especially the organ-esque fills, the choral 'ooh's' and the string section on the brief instrumental break. The handling of the key change near the end reminds me of a similar turn around in an all time favorite of mine "Go Daddy Go". See if you don't agree!

Download: Rod Rogers and the Swinging Strings - Whisk Me Off to Wisconsin
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In comparison to "Whisk Me", or even if heard on its own, the flip side "Peace of Mind", is a turgid piece of music, with Rodd at his slimiest and smarmiest. I could do without this record entirely - it seems to go on too long, even at barely over 90 seconds.


Download: Rod Rogers and the Film City Orchestra - Peace of Mind
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Let's Polka in the Sun!

As promised last week, I'm planning to take a tour around the country via song-poems, and that trip continues today! If I mentioned American cities and areas which come to mind when you think of Polkas, one would likely think of Chicago, Milwaukee, or all of Wisconsin, or perhaps the entire upper midwest.

However, one place not likely to come immediately to mind is the home of today's polka. See below:

Yes, Arizona. And yes, it's our friends Cara Stewart and Lee Hudson, along with the Polka-Cats (as well as an uncredited assist from Jeff Lawrence), with a delightful pair of polkas, perhaps the best song-poem record I've shared here in many weeks - or at least the equal of "I Liked the Old Year" from a month or so again.

Today's record comes to us via Lee Hudson's song-poem factory, but the tracks were leased out to the tiny Lectron label of Detriot, MI (another place I don't really associate with polkas). Lectron seems to have been the house label for the various song-poets named on this record - all three of them show up as the writers on another known Lectron record.

First, as mentioned, it's off to Arizona, for the Arizona Polka. This is a lovely little record, with a lilting melody, sweet violins, a bouncy rhythm, a neat instrumental break and thoroughly appropriate polka lyrics. There are even some nice backing vocals from the aformentioned Jeff Reynolds, including some well placed "yippees" and the like.

Download: Cara Stewart and the Polka-Cats - Arizona Polka
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As much as I enjoy that record - and really, really do, I like the flip side, The Whirleybird Polka, quite a bit more. I adore this arrangement, and the detail put into it. As much as it resembles "The Arizona Polka", there are little touches here that put this one over the top, particularly Jeff and Cara in the backing vocals offering verbal encourgement here and there ("'Til You're Full of Pep"), and "yee-haws" in other places.

Perhaps it because the backing vocals remind me of the vocal comments offered up by Jeff Lawrence in between a few lines within the backing track of Doc Nut, one of my favorite song-poems ever. And of course, Cara Stewart is near incomparable among the vocalists of the song-poem world - this record features a typically sexy, upbeat, sweet and sly vocal. She's one of the mysteries of the song-poem world, and I sure wish I knew who and where she is/was.

Download: Cara Stewart and the Polka-Cats - Whirleybird Polka
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All in all, an absolutely wonderful record!

Gene Dreams Again

Can you believe it's been five years ago this week that I began this project - the years have flown by, helped along at times by the accidental or surprising wonderfulness found in certain song poems, and perhaps dragged out by some of the lesser material I've shared, at other times!

Thanks to everyone who reads these postings, listens to/shares these tracks and/or offers up comments. It's been a great opportunity to share the wealth of my 17 years and counting of song-poem collecting (and, when the spirit moves me, to offer up something else from my 40 or so years of collecting records! Again, THANKS!

I find that it's been three full months since I featured a Gene Marshall record, certainly the longest that I've gone between postings featuring that golden throat majesty. And here's one which by rights (i.e. the quality of the lyrics) should be just another ho-hum song-poem release - and I wouldn't be surprised if some find it to be just that. But I think it rises a bit above the material, thanks to another stellar vocal performance by Gene, and, especially, a really engaging backing track by the Preview house band.

If you can get past the goopy backing singers at the start, you'll hear a nice, soulful track under Gene's strong reading of the lyrics to "I Had a Dream". The drummer, in particular, makes this track for me - in fact, I've often wondered who provided the frequently excellent drumming on these late '60's/early '70's Preview sides. The guitarist is also doing some really nice things, and I appreciate the piano fills here and there, too. All in all, a much nicer record than it could have been, due to the superior talents of everyone involved.

Download: Gene Marshall - I Had a Dream
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On the flip side, we have the rather bland stylings of Fred Flagg. Mr.Flagg turns up on a dozen or more Preview waxings, all of which appear to be from between 1968 and 1971, initially billed as Freddie, then Fred. "My Own Home State" has precious little to recommend it (is the statement that "I've Been Everywhere" really justified by listing about a half-dozen midwestern and southern states one has visited?).

But this record does remind me of ALL of the other songs about states and cities which are found on the song-poem 45's in my collection, and I think maybe I'll make a point of doing a song-poem travelogue (as long as the material is interesting), over the next several weeks.

Download: Fred Flagg - My Own Home State
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Not So Lucky

As the year comes to an end - the fifth year of this project - I wanted to squeeze one more posting in. No time for typing, got a party to host, just wanted to offer up a decent Rodd Keith offering, with the ironic title of "Lucky Guy" - based on the lyric, the protagonist thinks that's far from an accurate description for his life situation. Have a listen.

Download: Rodd Keith - Lucky Guy
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A far more pedestrian entry is found on the flip side, in the song "My Sweet Michelle". Sorry about the increasingly cruddy sound quality as this one goes on...

Download: Rodd Keith - My Sweet Michelle
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HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE!!!

Halmark: The Christmas People

What U.S. company's name is more synonymous with Christmas than Hallmark? With their ornaments, commercials, decorations, TV specials, etc. etc., they could be called The Christmas People. I'll leave it to each of you to decide how good or bad a thing that is.

In honor of the Hallmark people, for Christmas Eve, here is their near-namesake company, The Halmark Records label, and two Christ-tastic offerings. On one side, heard below, you can hear about "The Christmas Message", in a typically stultifying arrangement and performance. Interestingly, just this month I received an MP3 in e-mail, of another Halmark number, titled "A Christmas Dream", set to the same backing track, and featuring what sounds like the same singer. This one, if anything, is even worse than "Christmas Dream", although it's a close race.

Download: Halmark Productions - The Christmas Message
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If you're still awake, you can reward yourself with the wonders of "The Bible Message". Not content to stop the proceedings, with a spoken word passage (as they so often did), this vocal performance contained on this "song" features nothing but narration, a sort of "God's Greatest Hits", tripping lightly through a series of generic summing ups bible stories, focusing primarily on the story of Jesus.

All in all, the ideal music for the opening of presents, whether your tradition starts as the sun goes down tonight, or as the sun comes up tomorrow.

Download: Halmark Productions - The Bible Message
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A Very Happy Christmas to One and All!!!

Christmas With Lew and Norm

 As we ramp up to Christmas, here's another song for the season. This is an early Sterling Records release, early enough that Lew Tobin was still taking primary credit for the performance, above the singer (this is record #318 - by the mid 300's, he had discontinued this practice). But the focus really should be on my main man, Norm Burns (or, as credited here, Norman Burns). 

I wish I could report that this record, "The Toy Shop Mouse", was the sort that could have found its way into the hearts of millions, if only given the chance, and competed for time on Christmas radio stations, mall programming, and perhaps even TV viewers to its animated special. But it's not that sort. It's fairly tedious. The story is told in minute detail, over nearly five minutes, building up to a punchline that was no doubt supposed to be heartwarming, but actually just captures a mice-related annoyance. 

Still, it is Christmassy, takes place in Santa's workshop, and concludes with Santa's ride on Christmas Eve, AND Norm sings it, so it can't be all bad!

Download: Lew Tobin's Orchestra, Vocal by Norm Burns - The Toy Shop Mouse
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This record came to me in a sleeve with an inscription from the song-poet, one which curiously is mostly about how to make sure the record plays without skipping (a problem I didn't actually find I had to deal with, with this record:

The flip side of the record also features Lew and Norman, in a story of prospecting "Way Out in Arizona". The melody hews dangerously close to "This Land is Your Land" at times, which I guess is not wholly inappropriate, given the focus on one part of that Land. I generally love the reverb on these Sterling records anyway, and I really like the way that the reverb here makes the drumbeat echo so much as to sound like a chugging train.

On the other hand, a close listen to the lyrics will demonstrate that there is no story here - the writer introduces us to a prospector, then, for the rest of the lyric, tells us how great Arizona is, and how much he'd like to be there.

Download: Lew Tobin's Orchestra, Vocal by Norm Burns - Way Out in Arizona
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I Liked the Old Year

Just when time pressures looked to keep me from having the time to record, improve the sound as necessary and scan, from out of the ether of the internet (or perhaps it's a series of tubes - I've heard that's what it is), came an wonderful two sided hit produced by our friends at Film City. Since this was offered up by a correspondent, and is not from my collection, I don't have label scans, but I think the material itself will prove its worth.

And I'll leave it to each of you to determine if you deem this a song-poem. As it is sung by a child, and written by another person with the same last name, it seems likely that this was written by the singer's parent, or at least a family member, and then produced by the fine folks at Film City, in what seems to have been one of their last releases (#4091, in a series that is not known to have run beyond #4200, to my knowledge).

So was it a song-poem in the sense that someone at Film City wrote the music, or is it not so much, in that perhaps they only arranged the backing for a song which was already fully written? There's really no way to tell, I suppose.

Both sides are quite well done, but while one song is better suited for today (being a Christmas song), I'm going to lead to the one I much prefer, which would be a better fit in two weeks, given that it's a look back at a year which is about to end.

The singer is Beth-Anne Haves, accompanied, of course, by the Film City Orchestra (aka The Chamberlin, very likely operated by Rodd Keith). I really enjoy "I Liked the Old Year", both because I enjoy hearing untrained, naturally on-key kids singing as much as just about anything in the world, and also because the lyric is inspired. While a few of the lines sound nothing like anything a kid would say ("it gave me time to grow"), far more of them sound to me not only like a kid's thoughts, but exactly how a kid might phrase them. And on top of all that is the wonderful Chamberlin arrangement, featuring a variety of voicings, all of which fit the song perfectly:

Download: Beth-Anne Hayes - I Liked the Old Year
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The flip side, "Oh Dear Santa Claus", is bittersweet, and more than a bit maudlin, but still most excellent in arrangement and performance. Last Christmas was great, but daddy's has left the family in the time since, and all she wants is for him to return. Again, the wizardry on the Chamberlin stands out here.

Download: Beth-Anne Hayes - Oh Dear Santa Claus
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Sammy - Unplugged!

This is another one of those weeks when time is exceptionally short around our place, so I'm not going to go into any great detail about today's offering. Suffice it to say that it is not a song-poem release, but a demo on the Globe label, sent to the customer, most likely to encourage her to pay for the full band treatment.

Here we have Sammy Marshall unplugged, with just a piano and a tasty little 90 second song-poem-ette nugget, titled "Lost My Independence":

Download: Sammy Marshall - Lost My Independence
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Here is the flip side, by one of the co-writers of the a-side, but with none of the clever lyrics or jaunty sound of "Independence". This rather morose number is titled "Sometimes I Wonder":

Download: Sammy Marshall - Sometimes I Wonder
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Make Those Dishes Dance!

A Belated Happy Thanksgiving to everyone who celebrated it yesterday, and a more belated wish of the same to those who celebrated it in October.

My guess is that more dishes are washed across the United States on Thanksgiving than on any other day of the year. And in honor of that supposition, here is an absolutely marvelous song-poem titled "Dance of the Dishes", from our friends at Tin Pan Alley, and led by the enthusiastic Lillian Mars, a record which is compilation worthy as far as I'm concerned.

I don't know what it was about Tin Pan Alley - maybe the places that they chose to advertise? - but they certainly seem to have had more than their share of genuinely witty or at least humor-enhanced writers who took part in their little scam. This is a prime example - with everything from the fork complaining of not being able to dance, due to his "four feet" to the bewitching soup bowls - and the tiny three piece combo is lead by a pianist who is clearly having just as much fun as the vocalist is, with this material. A first-rate winner.

Download: Lilian Mars - Dance of the Dishes
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I do not, unfortunately, have anything so complimentary to say about the flip side of this disc, a turgid, badly sung number called "Paradise Valley", in which Lillian Mars is joined by label favorite Phil Celia.

Download: Lillian Mars and Phil Celia - Paradise Valley
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Neither Fish Nor Fowl?

Today's post is for that subset of readers who are, like me, fascinated by the Halmark label. Because this is a Halmark record unlike any other I've seen. I suppose technically it's not even a song-poem record, but that's kind of the point. As indicated by the title of this post, I'm not sure how to categorize this record.

What we have hear is a Halmark release, featuring a singer I've never seen credited on any song-poem record, Halmark or otherwise, first singing a song written by the owner of Halmark Records, Ted Rosen, and then on the flip side, covering a big hit single from a few years earlier.

Ted Rosen often claimed co-composer credits with his song-poet customers, but AS/PMA shows only one other record (an acetate) with a song credited solely to Rosen as composer, and no references to Barry Craig. Were it not for the information on the label, though, I'd have thought this was just another Halmark release, as it would appear that Rosen was prone to the same sort of overblown language as his customers, and (presumably) that he was a fan of the flowery, out of date and sappy music that graced his other releases.

Download: Barry Craig - I Climbed to the Top of a Mountain
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The flip side is an equally big headscratcher. Identified only as "Phoenix" with absolutely NO author credited, this is actually a version of "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" by Jimmy Webb (not that you asked, but both the song and the songwriter are about as far away from my tastes as one can get).

Curiously, as long time reader, correspondent and commenter Sammy Reed has pointed out, one of the backing tracks Halmark used from time to time was, in fact, a backing which perfectly fits "By the Time I Get to Phoenix". You can hear it used under the song "It's Not the World, It's What's In the World", which is item number five on this post. And well, whattaya know, here's that same backing track, employed in the recording of the song for which it was recorded!

An oddball release from one of the oddest of labels imaginable!

Download: Barry Craig - Phoenix
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God is His

Almost invariably, when I hear a Noval 45 for the first time, two thoughts come to mind:

1.) What on earth would the average record collector - one with no knowledge of song-poems - think upon happening upon this record, and listening to it for the first time? (Especially, but not limited to, situations where what they probably assume is the artist billing - in this case, Ada Billy - doesn't match the masculine singing on the record.)

2.) Was any customer EVER satisfied with the product the received from Noval? Given, that is, that virtually every record I've heard on the label features a singer who seems incapable of either staying on pitch or reading the melody on the page in front of him accurately.

Today's feature, "God is Mine" is a perfect example of the latter question. This is the same guy, I think, who is on most of the Noval records I've heard, and he is thoroughly incompetent. Listen how he hesitantly pauses over the word "step" at the 32 second point, and then wavers on the long note just after that. And there's more than a little wavering on the last note. He also lands poorly almost every time there is a jump of more than a few notes up or down the scale, and generally seems to be unsure of where about half of the notes are supposed to be - the whole thing is just sung tentatively, as if he's afraid of stepping on a land mine.

And it's not like this would be a difficult song to sing - it moves at a snail's pace, has simple words and stays within a rather small range. Add that all of that is on top of a dreary, deadly backing arrangement, and you have quite the song-poem pastry.

Download: Noval Productions - God is Mine
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The flip side, "Little Band of Gold" is, at least, peppy, but the same problems continue. Right from the start, in the first two lines, the vocalist comes within striking distance of the melody at several points without quite getting there (I particularly like the notes on the word "message", and the complete breakdown of his reading of the tune on the title line) - despite the fact that the pianist is playing the notes of the melody behind him.

I sure love that Noval label.

Download: Noval Productions - Little Band of Gold
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