Slim Dortch on Lightning Ball

Slim Dortch - Pappy (Lightning Ball LB-45-8501), 1993

Slim Dortch fascinated me right from the moment I heard "Big Boy Rock" for the first time. After long and intensive research, I was able to put up an article about him, which was published last year in American Music Magazine. Unfortunately, this disc is not included because I just discovered it. I bought it from a seller out of Poplar Bluff, Missouri.

The songs on this 45rpm record are pure country music. Both "Pappy" and "Walking Through the Sand in Texas" were also included on Dortch's 1993 LP "Below the Dixie Line." All the tracks were recorded at Kennett Sound Studio in Kennett, Missouri, in 1993. As noted on the label, James Prince is playing lead as well as steel guitar with Dortch on vocals and rhythm guitar, Lee Barnes on bass, and Jeff Bost on drums. 

Another Lightning Ball single featured "Easy Street" b/w "Jim, the Truck Driving Man." Those titles were not included on the album. The Lightning Ball label was used prior to these 1990s releases in the 1960s by Dortch for two 45rpm discs. Thus, I assume this was his own label.

For further reading on Dortch, see American Music Magazine #133 (September 2013).

Rusty York R.I.P.

Legendary rockabilly and bluegrass musician Rusty York died January 26, 2014. York was famous for his song "Sugaree" and recorded a lot of singles for such labels as King, Starday, and others. He also played for Jimmie Skinner and owned his own Jewel recording studio in label in Mt. Healthy for decades.

Chuck Miller on Mercury

Chuck Miller - Boogie Blues (Mercury 70767X45), 1956
Chuck Miller, a today mostly forgotten pop singer and pianist of the 1940s and 1950s, recorded this piece of big band style rock'n'roll in 1955 for the Mercury label. He had two chart entries during the mid 1950s but "Boogie Blues" unfortunately was not one of them. This is his best rock'n'roll outing by far with a driving beat, a furious beginning and a solid performance by Miller.

Charles Nelson Miller was born on August 30, 1924, in rural Wellington, Kansas. By the 1940s, Miller was playing piano and singing in the clubs of Los Angeles and surrounding areas. Through his friend, saxophonist Big Dave Cavanaugh, he got to know Robert Douglass and formed the "Chuck Miller Trio" with him in the late 1940s. Cavanaugh became an A&R manager for Capitol Records in the early 1950s and secured his friend Miller a recording contract with the label in 1953. Back then, Miller's music was in the vein of pop stars like Dean Martin or Bing Crosby. Miller recorded a couple of songs for Capitol from 1953 up to 1954 with Cavanaugh's orchestra. With the recording of "Idaho Red" (originally cut by country singer Wade Ray), Miller's style became more dynamic and rock'n'roll oriented.

Though Miller's singles for Capitol sold well, none of them entered the charts, though. Therefore, he moved to Mercury Records in 1955, where he had his first (and only) big hit "The House of Blue Lights." It reached #9 on Billboard's Hot 100 and was originally a Freddy Slack hit in the 1940s. Mercury pitched Bobby Lord's rocker "Hawk-Eye" to Miller, which became his next single, followed by "Boogie Blues." The latter was a Gene Krupa original on Columbia from 1945 with Anita O'Day on vocals. Miller turned it into a hot rock'n'roll performance when recording it on November 13, 1955, at the Mercury Sound Studios in New York City. Backed by the haunting "Lookout Mountain" (waxed at the same session), the disc was released on January 1, 1956, but did not saw any chart action. An alternate version of "Boogie Blues" from an August 1955 session at the Universal Studios in Chicago, is still burried in the Mercury vaults and waits for its release to the public.

Miller continued to record uptempo songs like "Bright Red Convertible," "Cool It Baby!," "Baby Doll," "The Auctioneer" (his only other chart entry, #56 in December 1956), among others. None of his later singles became a hit and Mercury dropped Miller from its roster in 1958. By 1959, the Chuck Miller Trio disbanded and Miller moved to Anchorage, Alaska, in the 1960s, before settling down on the Hawaiian islands. There, he kept on performing for many years. Miller died on January 15, 2000.

Willie Gregg on Waterflow

  Willie Gregg and the Country Kings - If You Want to Be My Woman (Waterflow 702), ca. 1969
One must love this record - not only because of the great Merle Haggard cover version but also because of the nice label design. I bought this one from Mack Stevens, a record collector and rockabilly musician from Texas. There's nearly no info out there on Willie Gregg and the Country Kings except that this is some really great Country Bop. Gregg had another release on the Kay-Bar Dane label out of Orange, Texas, featuring the slow ballad "You Fool" in 1960, credited to "Willie Gregg and the Velvetones."

Producer of the disc Tee Bruce, whose real name was John Lloyd Broussard, played a major role in bringing Cajun music on the radio in Texas. He hosted several shows on local stations, including the "Cajun Jamboree" on KOGT in Orange, Texas, by 1965. He also had a record label called Cajun Jamboree and Waterflow Records was definitely also owned by him. Jamboree Enterprises, located on 3218 15th Street in Port Arthur, Texas, as stated on the label, was a Tee Bruce venture. Both the Jamboree Ent. as well as the Waterflow Publishing is also shown on Cajun Jamboree record labels. Bruce died March 18, 2010, at the age of 81.

The record was pressed by Houston Recorders from Houston, Texas, in 1969. The "LH" prefix in the matrix number tell us "mastered at Location Records, Los Angeles."

Information on Tee Bruce taken from John Broven: "South to Louisiana - The Music of the Cajun Bayous"

Arkansas Travelers

  Arkansas Travelers - Travelers Boogie (Benz 1207), 1961
This is a really nice rockabilly instrumental. And when I type r-o-c-k-a-b-i-l-l-y, I mean it. This is not the usual stuff credited with being a rockabilly instro. Just a slapp bass, a rhythm guitar, and an electric lead guitar - that's all.

I couldn't come up with anything on the Arkansas Travelers. According to Bob (from Dead Wax), Benz Records was operated by Mac Engle and Ben Baldwin, Jr., out of Champaign, Illinois. The label published its records through the Merrbach Record Service from Houston, Texas. I would have dated it around 1955-1958 but Bob tells us this disc is actually from late 1960 or early 1961. In addition, another visitor noted the disc was mastered by ACA (also from Houston) in January 1961. I especially like the fact that they printed the key on the label, so anybody could easily play along with his guitar to this tune. The A side of this record, by the way, is "Arkansas Mountain Rag," which features a fiddle and points more towards country music.

RCS doesn't list it and I never saw another copy, this is possibly the only copy known. Never turned up anywhere, quite mysterious.

Phil Everly RIP

Phil Everly, one half of the hit-making Everly Brothers, died January 3, 2014, at a hospital in Burbank, California, at the age of 74. He and his brother Don were signed to Cadence Records in the mid-1950s and are well-known for such hits as "Bird Dog," "Bye Bye Love," "Wake Up Little Susie," "All I Have to Do Is Dream" or "Cathy's Clown." They were influential for many artists to come and created an unique sound with their soft hamorny singing, influenced by the country and folk duos of their youth.

Read more here.

Nash's B.B. label

By Nash: The B.B. label

Coming up next in our string of Murray Nash related posts is a feature about B.B. Records, one of his many independent and short-lived ventures. B.B. was located in Nash's new home on 198 Kenner Avenue in Nashville, Tennessee. He had moved there after leaving his business partners Ray Scrivener and Charles Bingham, with whom he had operated Murray Nash Associates, Inc. After Nash's unsuccessful try to run Spangle Records' subsidiary Audio Music Company with Floyd Whited and Brien Fisher in February/March 1958, B.B. was probably his next undertaking in the music business.

The label started approximately in the summer of 1958 and the first known release was by the Dixieland Drifters (B.B. #45-222). There were possibly earlier discs issued but those have yet to be discovered. Publisher on all of the label's records was Ashna Music, Nash's own firm.

Pictured left is a June 23, 1958, Billboard mention of the Dixieland Drifters' new release on "Murray Nash's new B.B. label." One week later, on June 30, the magazine reviewed the disc.

The Dixieland Drifters were a bluegrass band from Chattanooga, Tennessee, and worked with Nash on and off well into the early 1960s. Members included Buck Turner, Norman Blake, Howell Culpepper, Peanuts Faircloth, and a lot of other local musicians who played mostly for a short time with the band. They had a total of three releases on B.B.

Nash only released a handful of singles on B.B., ca. from mid 1958 up to late 1959. By then, he had started a new label, Do-Ra-Me Records, which had a much more prolific output than its precursor.

For further reading, see also:

• By Nash: The MusiCenter label

• Joe Reavis' Recording Studio

• The Do-Ra-Me label

• The Hap label

Discography

B.B. 45-222

Dixieland Drifters

The Trot (Blake) / Walk Easy (Blake)

45-F786 / 45-F787

1958

Billboard C&W review on June 30, 1958

B.B. 45-223

Dixieland Drifters 

Don't You Be Still (Blake-Culpepper-Evans-Powell) / Church Steeples & White Flowers (Blake-Culpepper-Evans-Powell)

45-F 798 / 45-F 799

B.B. 45-224

Dixieland Drifters Quartet

Will You Meet Me () / Glory Glory (Blake-Culpepper-Evans-Powell)

? / F-802

B.B. 45-225

Johnny Varnell & Jim Pipkins

What Can I Do Without You () / Blue Tears in Your Eyes ()

B.B. 45-226

Ralph Pruett

Someone Like You (Biggs-Biggs-Robbins) / Louise (Pruett)

F-812 / F-813

Nash's MusiCenter

By Nash: The MusiCenter label

Murray Nash's activities as an independent record producer in the late 1950s and early 1960s have been the subject on this blog several times. Another label that was operated by Nash was the small MusiCenter Records, which had at least six releases. He started this outlet in 1965 and ran it also from his Recording of Nashville studio that also housed his other labels such as Do-Ra-Me, Topic, Round-Up, and Cee Cee.

Chuck Wiley and band

The debut release was by Chuck Wiley and featured "Come Back Baby" b/w "Little Star, Little Star."  Curtis Hobock, a rock'n'roll singer from Tennessee, also cut two discs for MusiCenter. He also had two releases on Cee Cee, one of Nash's other labels.

MusiCenter releases are easier to date because Nash used RCA's custom pressing service, thus a reliable indicator of the pressing year. Nash's account number at RCA was 692B, which also appeared on Country Music Nashville, another one of Nash's labels. MusiCenter lasted at least until 1966. Most of the known releases have Nash's "By-Nash of Nashville" listed as publisher. If anyone has more info on MusiCenter or can fill gaps in the discography, please feel free to contact me.

For further reading, see also:

• Joe Reavis' Recording Studio

• The Do-Ra-Me label

• The Hap label

Discography

MusiCenter 3101

Chuck Wiley

Come Back Baby (Charles Wiley) / Little Star, Little Star (Charles Wiley)

S4KM-8430 / S4KM-8431 (RCA)

1965

"Produced by: Murray Nash"

MusiCenter 3102

The Valiants
All Night Long () / I'm Getting Tired of You ()

MusiCenter 3103

Curtis Hobock and the Stardusters

Lonely Weekends (C. Rich) / I Found a Way (C. Hobock)

SK4M-3561 / SK4M-3562 (RCA)

1965

"Produced by: Murray Nash"

MusiCenter 3104

Kenny Norton
To Know You (Biggs-Biggs-Robbins) / Oonie, Oonie, Yah, Yah, Yah ()
SK4M-3563 / ? (RCA)
1965 

 

MusiCenter 3105

Curtis Hobock and the Stardusters

Definition of Love (Geneva Hobock) / One Heart'll Love You (Hobock-Jones-Howell-Bates-Luther)

T4KM-2327 / T4KM-2327 (RCA)

1966

Note: Geneva Hobock was Curtis Hobock's wife. The other composers listed on "One Heart'll Love You" were members of the Stardusters: Tommy Jones (ld gtr), Bobby Howell (dms), Howard Bates (bs), Richard Luther (pno).

MusiCenter 3106

Eugenia Oaks

There Stands the Glass (Russ Hull-M. J. Shurtz) / Country Hotel (Russ Hull)

TK4M-3219 / TK4M-3220 (RCA)

1966

Reavis Recording Studio

Someone asked me about Joe Reavis' Recording Studios recently but I lost contact information to that person, unfortunately. I hope he or she is reading this little piece now and that this is some useful information. If anyone out there has more knowledge about this little recording studio, feel free to pass it along.

Joseph Adam Reavis, Jr., was the owner of "Reavis Recording" on 2014 Beech Avenue in Nashville, Tennessee. Reavis was born in 1931 in Nashville. According to Bo Berglind, the studio was active at least since late 1955. Information on Reavis and his venture is scarce and confusing. Buzz Cason recalled in his autobiography "Living the Rock'n'Roll Dream" that the studio was operated by Kenny Marlow by 1958, a young attorney, and songwriter Gary Walker, who changed the name of the facility to "Fidelity." Apparently, Bobby Russell and the Impollos recorded their "She's Gonna Be Sorry" b/w "The Raven" (Felsted 45-8520) that year there under the new ownership. 

However, Billboard reported on April 25, 1960, that Murray Nash purchased the studio from Joe Reavis (!). Nash renamed it "Recording of Nashville" and operated his labels like Do-Ra-Me, MusiCenter and onthers out of it. By 1964, Nash had given up working in the music industry and probably sold the studio to whomever. Reavis died on December 6, 1961. from an overdose of barbituates, following the death of his father Joseph Adam Reavis, Sr., on October 30, 1961.

Buzz Cason remembered the studio: 

[...]  I will always be thankful for the people I met at that rat hole of a facility and the life-changing events that transpired in those early days of recorded music in Nashville long before there was a Music Row. [...]

"The Walls Came Tumblin' Down" and "That's What Children Are For" on a 45rpm

acetate recorded at Reavis Recording Studio. The artists on this disc are unidentified.

 "Lord's Prayer" by Barbara Redden on a 78rpm acetate. The backside of this

record is blank.

Further reading on Do-Ra-Me, see here.

Down Yonder

"Down Yonder" by L. Wolfe Gilbert 

Another bobsluckycat post presented by Mellow's Log Cabin!

Recently, while rummageing through the collection, I came across the 45 EP on Republic Records by Del Wood from 1953 which contained the original version by her hit record of "Down Yonder" from 1951-52. I played the record and got to wondering about it since it was now a very old and in the public domain standard. So I did some research and here's what I now know.

L. Wolfe Gilbert was a Russian born, American raised songwriter who found early success in 1912 with "Waiting For The Robert E. Lee", which became a hit and stardard. In 1921, he did a follow-up of sorts in "Down Yonder". By this time he was already an established songwriter of note. Gilbert would go on to write a wide variety of hit songs and well known pieces including "Ramona", "Green Eyes', and even the theme for the Hopalong Cassidy TV Show in the early '50's and the list goes on. This was to be, in his mind anyway, a minstrel show type song and perfect for the vaudville of its day. It had a very short lyric set and the melody was simple enough that Rag Time and Old Time Country musicians could learn it by ear fairly quickly. Which they did. Unfortunately, I have no early recordings to show this, but it was a favorite dance piece as an instrumental as well.


Gid Tanner and his Skillet Lickers - Down Yonder (Bluebird BB-5562), 1934

Gid Tanner

In late March of 1934, A very popular rural group reformed for a lengthy recording session in San Antonio Texas, they were Gid Tanner And The Skillet Lickers which had been on Columbia Records for many years previous to this and now were cutting records for RCA Victor. The group was known for rural music, fiddle tunes and heavy doses of comedy as well. The group consisted of Gid Tanner, fiddle and occasionally banjo, his son Gordon Tanner on fiddle (actually a better fiddler than Gid), Riley Puckett a blind guitarist and well known in his own right and Ted Hawkins on mandolin. Their recording of "Down Yonder" (RCA Bluebird 5562, recorded on 03-29-1934) was the biggest seller the group had and was quite probably the record used by many later musicians to learn the tune.

In 1951, a rag time piano player named Del Wood prefessionally (Polly Hazelwood) was playing on studio sessions and was signed to Tennessee Records. The A&R men at Tennessee wanted Del to record another piece of music which she did not know, so "Down Yonder" was chosen instead and with the addition of some rhythm accompanyment became an instant hit record on both the Pop music and Country music charts on Billboard. It entered the charts on 08-24-1951 and stayed in the charts for 25 weeks, well into 1952. Her version peaked at number 4 on the Pop charts and it was the preferred version by radio deejays and jukebox operators across the nation. Several cover versions in several different styles came out by late fall and stayed for varying lengths of time in the Billboard charts, but none touched Del Woods' version. Cashbox for the week of 12-15-1951 gave the the song the #1 position on its charts based on the aggregate totals of the original and cover versions of the song. Del wood would eventually sell over a million copies and earn a "Gold Record" which was an unheard of feat in 1951.


Del Wood - Down Yonder (Tennessee 775), 1951

Spade Cooley

One week after the Del Wood version went on the charts, Spade Cooley recorded a cover version for Decca Records in Hollywood CA on 07-31-1951. This was a very well done version in the popular Western Swing style of the day, but Decca A&R decided against releasing it until much later on an album. It still is, however, a very good version. Cooley had a large band with many well known musicians and a large California following via his long running TV show, not too well known outside the area. After leaving Columbia Records and splitting with Tex Williams, his recording output which included backing such stars as Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, The Sons Of The Pioneers and others on both RCA Victor and then Decca was not the stuff hit records were made of.

In 1960, an early "garage" band, Johnny & The Hurricanes out of Toledo Ohio, having had hits with Warwick Records in 1958 and 1959, signed with Big Top Records, a division of Hill And Range Publishing Company and their first release was "Down Yonder" (Big Top 3036 May 1960) and with the addition of a typmpany for accent had a hit record that went to the top 15 in the USA in June and #9 in the U.K. at the same time. It was a raw rock-n-roll record to be sure with solos by sax, guitar and organ at full speed. Now a well received oldie after 50 years.


Red Foley - Down Yonder (Decca LP Dear Hearts and Gentle People), 1962

Red Foley

In 1961-62, In Nashville a trend was emerging called "town and country' which had a heavy dose of pop music to it and the biggest stars at the time gravitated to it. Red Foley did a version of "Down Yonder" for a 1962 album with a full chorus which gives us the only vocal version in this mix and it is about as "town and country" as it gets.

To further illustrate the popularity of "Down Yonder" in the 1960's, I've chosen two recordings from 1967 which are vastly different but both probably are under the umbrella of Country music. The first version is by Wade Ray on fiddle, Sonny Osborne on banjo, "Jethro" Burns on mandolin and probably Buddy Spicher on second fiddle and other unamed players, and is a very good version in Bluegrass which was on an RCA Camden budget label release, later re-released on Pickwick.

The second 1967 version is by guitarist Jimmy Bryant which was recorded in Los Angeles for an Imperial Records LP #12360. This version has a jazz sound to it by the addition of a flute and some different percussion, but still "country" don't you think?

All seven versions can be downloaded here