Sunday, January 13, 2013

Xmas Gift

Ellen Marty


Marty Records #102 (45)

Quite obscure and odd.  "X-Mas Gift" isn't on her "Mixing and Making" LP ( picture above from a recent Tefteller auction : MB $300 ), an album arranged and conducted by Joe Leahy. According to Tefteller, Hal Blaine plays on it.

Ellen Marty is also a prolific songwriter.and owns Lycklig Music Pub.  ( last address : 1216 Cole Avenue Hollywood )

She had records issued on her own Marty label and on Rain Coat Records.  Her songs were recorded by herself or by a group named Buttons on Rain Coat.

Rain Coat Records ( on Raincoat ) was probably owned by Joe Leahy, bandleader, arranger, conductor, record producer and trumpeter, native of Boston, Massachusetts.

Tone-deaf and misinformed Anonymous added her "Bobby Died Today"(lyrics by Sammy Reese)  to a Ken Levine list of "The Worst Songs of All-Time"  :
I would have to say the worst is "Bobby Died Today" by Ellen somebody (I'll have to dig it out) on Raincoat records. It's a bright happy song about death which has the added unintentional bad taste bonus of coming out summer of 1968, right after the assassination of Robert Kennedy.  
Well, anonymous, NO unintentional bad taste from Miss Marty : the song was copyrighted in 1966, two years before the death of Robert Kennedy.

For Raincoat, she also recorded "Billy Back" a song penned by Michael Gordon, leader of The Routers, a studio band produced by Joe Saraceno. ("Let's Go", Warner-Bros)

Finally, if you want a bit more of Ellen Marty, and I'm sure you do, you can hear clips of This Time Of Year & Don't Ask Me on ebay  here (dead link)



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