Monday, November 28, 2011

Back To School Again Blues



Quinn Gets Decca Pact :
Decca Records has signed Andy Quinn, a 25-year- old warbler-cleffer to an exclusive pact. With his first releases next week, Quinn will leave on a seven-city promotion trip (BILLBOARD, September 2, 1957)
Andy Quinn performed the flip side, "Rock-A-Boogie" on The Ed Sullivan Show" on October 27, 1957. He had three releases on Decca Records, all listed in Rockin' Country Style.

That's all I can't find on this "warbler-cleffer".


Post-Scriptum : "Rock-A-Boogie", that's a song I would like to hear!


-

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Wrong Line


Gene Barnett

Wrong Line

Wheel Records

1971



Gene Barnett
started his musical career playing bass for Bobby Lee Trammell shortly after Trammell's hit record, “Arkansas Twist” was recorded. Barnett moved-on to play with Kenny Owens, a local singer who had a large following in the Jonesboro area. Barnett appeared on Owens' TV variety show on KAIT Jonesboro in the late 60's.

Gene Barnett is now member of The RetroRadio Band, a four-piece Jonesboro-based musical group that plays a variety of music to include 50's and 60's, R&B, Mototown, Country Rock, and Disco.

G. Barnett (recent) picture is from MySpace Retro Radio Band



.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Oh Well-A-Watcha-Gonna Do


Gerry Granahan

Oh Well-A-Watcha-Gonna Do

Mark Records

1958

This is perhaps his best rocker. Written by Jack Hammer, the song was previously recorded by Harry Douglass and the Deep River Boys (RCA 47-7195, Billboard March 24, 1958). You can hear the RCA version HERE.

The Granahan story is told by various websites. I've tried to resume his story but the various sources are showing a lot of discrepancies. there is no mention of his (first?) record on Eldorado Records in 1956, a label owned by Buchanan and Goodman. The Eldorado record is only mentionned by Terry Gordon on his Rockin' Country Style, but no flipside is shown and no label scan found.

When the Mark record was released (April or May 58), Gerry Granahan had already records out on Atco Records (as Jerry Grant) and, as a member of Dicky Doo and the Don'ts, on Swan Records, one of the first release on the label.




.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Tick Tock Rock

Eddie L. Davis & The Bureaucats

Tick Tock Rock
(Wayne Corps-Davis)

Fable Records 637



Edward LouisDavis had been a child actor. He did a lot of films. Then he became a restaurant owner in 1953. It was called the Eddie Davis Parkway Grill. He became very financially secure. From there he bought another restaurant, the Eddie Davis Steakhouse Supper Club. Then he got into music.

He decided to cut his own records :

On Vita 170 : Heart Of Ice / To Be Or Not To Be (57)
On Fable 637: Eddie L. Davis & The Bureaucats : Teen Age Brain Surgeon / Tick Tock Rock ('58)

and on Faro 596 ('59) : Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea / Love Me As Though There Were No Tomorrow (duet with Connie Stevens, as by Ed Davis)
He realized he didn't have the talent to make it as a singer and decided to move into record production and label ownership. In 1958, by selling his restaurants and other businesses, Davis accumulated the necessary capital to incorporate his own record firm, Faro Productions.

As a producer and owner of the Faro, Linda, Rampart, Valhalla, Prospect, Boomerang, and Gordo labels, Eddie Davis was a major figure in the East Los Angeles rock scene of the 1960s and early '70s. (He was dubbed "the Barry Gordy of East L.A.").

Davis produced and released records by a bunch of Mexican-American East L.A. bands, including the Romancers, Cannibal & the Headhunters, the Blendells, and the Premiers. ..

He died in 1994.





Eddie Davis (circa 1958) Parkway Grill Restaurant, Hollywood


Eddie quote :

"If anybody thinks I got rich over my East Los Angeles music, they're wrong. I cooked a lot of hamburgers to make those records."


Further reading: Eddie Davis bio by Richie Unterberger.

Fable label shot : Terry Gordon (Rockin' Country Style)



.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Go Devil Go


Al Corsal
Music by the Regal-Airs

Go Devil Go

Star-X Records




Sight and sound courtesy of colnel (e-bay)




-