Happy Birthday, Sweet 16

Greg Gifford : Happy Birthday, Sweet 16

A cover on a Discount Disc EP, a subsidiary of Pickwick International.  Perhaps their most obscure label (among others : Bravo, Hurrah, International Award, Grand Prix, etc.)

Milk Cow Blues

Milk Cow Blues

Here is Bob Cox on his own Magnet label.  Under the sticker, original printed credit is probably The 32 Bar Ranch Hands; which was his own band. Date unknown (early sixties?)

Bob Cox, a popular singer and musician in the Prescott, Arizona area for many years, grew up in Sweetwater, Texas before settled in Arizona where he  began working farm labor and performing. Cox performed on local radio with Marty Robbins in several talent contests and also with Jimmy Wakely and Dub Taylor.  He played in the many bars and watering holes along Prescott's famous Whiskey Row, including the historic Palace Saloon.

He passed away in 2012.

Swing Little Carmella

Two curiously similar instrumentals.  Both from the early sixties.

"Swing Little Carol" by The Renegades, a Butte, Montana band produced in Spokane Washington at Sound Recording Company. Lead Guitar – Cliff Champeau.

"Carmella" by the Tommy Scott band with Gaines (Jr.) Blevins on guitar on the Katona label out of Hollywood in the Starday custom series.

The Renegades


Tommy Scott Band

Welcome Heartache

Green Mountain 1130
"Starday custom" from Glens Falls, New York

late '65 or early '66?

Bernadette Williams has been a regular with Pete Williams and the Ranchers on WRGB-TV in the mid-sixties and has sung on radio stations in Schenectady. She also has shared the stage with Hank Snow, Dottie West, and Ernie Tubbs,   Inducted into The New York State Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in 2002.

Welcome Heartache

Freddie's Marilyn

Here is Freddie Dino backed by his Fabulous Jerrels on Star Artists, a Rochester label, pressed by the Capitol Records custom division in 1965.  This is the last of three singles on Star Artists, soon renamed Capitol Star Artists, owned by Don Redanz assisted by Tony Powlowski (the Tony of The Don & Tony Show)

Is this the same Freddie Dino on the Queen label? I don't known

Freddie's Marilyn

A Gruntin' And A Groanin' (The Wrestlers Song)

Maurice Tillet "The French Angel"

Scat Man Crothers's  recording of “A-Gruntin’ And A-Groanin’ (The Wrestlers Song)" backed by the Red Callender Sextet, combined R&B with professional wrestling, which was just getting some high profile popularity on TV out of the Olympic Auditorium in L.A.   It was issued on Intro in 1951, a subsidiary of Aladdin Records. The Billboard's reviewer wasn't that impressed by this side : "Another case of a good performance and flimsy material, here some nonsense about the wrestling matches" (Billboard, May 26, 1951)

The French Angel (picture above) was one of these wrestlers who appeared in L.A. at that time. Maurice Tillet (The French Angel's real name) is widely believed to have been the inspiration for the cartoon character "Shrek", although DreamWorks has never confirmed precisely from where Shrek's inspiration arose.

A Gruntin' And A Groanin' (The Wrestlers Song)

Twist And Shout

Candice Aull
with

Dick Holler's Holidays

Vital 64 V-107
1965

This is probably Candice Aull Ralston born in 1948 who graduated from Batesburg Leesville High Class in 1966. In 1973, Candice founded the Stepping Out Dance Studio in Lexington, South Carolina. That's the sum of my knowledge regarding Candice Aull.

On Dick Holler and the Holidays, see That'll Be The Day

Twist And Shout

Rock And Roll King

Rock And Roll King

Carl Jones pays tribute to Elvis, the King of Rock & Roll (1977)

Morris “Carl” Jones (1913-1985)

Musician and Chicago-based record producer, Carl Jones was born in Waxahachie, Texas.  As a teenager he took up the banjo and eventually addet trumpet and trombone to his instrumental repertoire. He got a show on the local radio station, WXA, singing and playing. Jones soon joined the Carolina Cotton Pickers, the first of many groups to which he belonged.  He moved to Chicago in 1937 and in 1945 recorded two sides for Mercury.  He founded the C.J. label in the late fities, eventually followed by two more, the Colt and Firma labels.  He is best known for his output in the blues field, having recorded Earl Hooker, Mack Simmons, Hound Dog Taylor, Homesick James and Detroit Junior.

Jones's record company was never more than a boutique operation, and he maintained his nine-to-five job in the liquor distribution business and worked on Sundays as a bartender at a famed South Side blues bar, Theresa's.

When Jones died in 1985 he was still operating his record company.


[Info above from Robert Pruter]

Cumberland Spoons

Joe Jones known to many as "Mr. Spoons" made his living off tips for many decades by playing the spoons.  He described himself as an "ignorant" man but as usual explains it away with a wise thought.  "If you're intelligent, you've got to work 'cause you owe it to the world.  If you're stupid, they put you to work to keep your hands busy and out of trouble.  But if you're just ignorant... well then no one much wants ya, so they leave ya alone."

His brother-in-law had four degrees and has to borrow money from him  all the time.  Think about that before taking your law boards!

See him live here at the Kentucky Horse Park Bluegrass Festival in 1991

Cumberland Spoons

Matchbox

Hit Records was a Nashville-based label founded in 1962 by producer William Beasley which specialized in releasing cover versions on 45 RPM singles usually sold for a list price of 39 cents (less than half the price of the major label originals) in five-and-dime stores and supermarkets.

Here on lead vocal is probably Bobby Russell fronting The Jalopy Five

Follow this link and be ready for a really nice surprise, courtesy of the tireless Drunken Hobo (a/k/a Apes Ville)

Matchbox