Harold "Popeye" Broussard

 

According to the Early Cajun Music blog, Harold "Popeye" Broussard was one of Harry Choates's more colorful musician companions. 

Broussard by all accounts was an excellent piano man and singer.  His specialty was his rendition of the dance hall favorite "How Would You Like To Be The Old Ice Man".  Harry's fiddle and Broussard's piano complimented each other at times.  Other times, Harry and Popeye at times appeared to be in competition with each other to see who could raise the most hell.

Eventually Harry went on his way, leaving Broussard to his own devices in the Lake Charles musical scene.   Without Harry, Broussard left and started a family.  According to author Tim Knight: They were companions in deliquent behavior. If one was hired, both had to be hired; they were a matched set.

In 1940 , there was a ten-track recording session for Bluebird Records at the Jefferson Hotel, Dallas, Texas, . With Harry Choates on fiddle and Popeye Broussard on piano, their group consisted of Sandy Lormand on guitar, Pee Wee Broussard on banjo, Ray Clark on steel, and Happy Fats Leblanc on bass. The voice of Harold Broussard (uncredited) is heard only on "The Old Ice Man".  Issued on Bluebird 8537 in 1941, the single is credited to Happy Fats and His Rayne-Bo Ramblers, String band with singing.

Fifteen years later, Harold's voice is heard again on the Amos Como and His Tune Toppers' Starday release (Hole In The Wall / Heartbroken Lips), allegedly scheduled to be issued on the Goldband's subsidiary Folk-Star Records. Harold Broussard is still uncredited, instead the label states "Vocal by Amos Como".  From the same session recorded in 1955, a third song, "Baby Walk The Line", was issued much later on Goldband (#1036) as Harold Bee featuring Wm. Floyd, lead guitar. (Late 40's "Rock & Roll" Vocal, says the label.) backed with "Love Me Mary Ann" by Don Mooring with The Yellow Jackets.

More than fifteen years later (again), a Goldband single (#1258) backing "Talk That Trash Drink That Mash" with "No Longer Care For Me" was issued as by Harold Bee with the Blue Velvet Country.

More tracks were recorded by Eddie Shuler in the seventies, among them "Hobo Man" (added to zipped file), but all were left in the can.

Old Ice Man + 6

Chuck Tillman Trio, vocal Helyne Stewart

Chuck Tillman Trio
Vocal Helyne Stewart

A) A Smile Will Drive You Frown Away
B)  I Want To Met Santa At Home

Nu-Tune Records; 11292
George Wood Productions
4346 McPherson  St Louis 8, Mo

1954

Born in East St. Louis, Illinois, Helyne started singing popular songs with an a cappella choir at the Lincoln High School. In a higher grade at the same school was another youngster with an interest in music, a dentist's son who played in the high school band, his name was Miles Davis.

Read more below (excerpt from the liner notes of her album issued on Contemporary Records in 1962)

Helyne Stewart discography
https://www.discogs.com/fr/artist/2151887-Helyne-Stewart

As Helen Stewart, member of The Caldwells, see :
https://www.vocalgroupharmony.com/4ROWNEW/ItsLikeTaking.htm

 http://www.uncamarvy.com/Caldwells/caldwells.html

 

 

Vicki Young (Capitol 1-593 EP)

 

Capitol 1-593
(1955)

Vicki Young was born Wanda Cleo Stegall on June 26, 1925, in Vinson, Oklahoma, the first of four talented children born to Loda and Mintie Stegall. Descended from an early American family dating back to 1736, the Stegall family had a long history of birthing "Methodist preachers or musicians." In Vicki's case, her parents were musicians and had one of the first professionally performing family western style bands, "The Stegalls."

By the time she was four, little Wanda was singing and already playing the banjo, ukulele and drums. For seven years, the youngster and her family band could be heard live over station KASA (AM 1210) in Elk City, Oklahoma.

Read more

 

 

Strontium 90

 

Bobbie Warren
Strontium 90
Ann & Marty Cleary, Candell Pub. (ASCAP)
Pamco-1501 A

1960

Marti Cleary (University High School Yearbook, 1958)

"Strontium 90" was originally written by Ann and Marty Cleary. It expresses concern about the quantity of Strontium 90 , a highly poisonous element , released by exploding atomic bombs. Like the song on the flip, "Strontium 90" was a prize winner at a college contest (Stanford University).

Ann and Marty Cleary were the daughters of Ed Cleary, a law professor in Urbana, Illinois. It is not known if they recorded the song themselves but they performed it at musical reunions in colleges or universities around their hometown in 1960 and 1961.

The song was also recorded by Jerry Silverman, Ethel Ralm & Pete Seeger (Sing Out LP), Inman and Ira, Singing Spokesmen from the New Generation (Mercury LP) and The Johnson Boys (Bethlehem Records). These three songs plus the Pamco track can be found in this zipped file.

Lyrics

Last night I went to a party,
Danced so I just about passed out;
But just when the party was gayest
Some crazy guy began to shout:

Chorus:
Strontium, Strontium, Strontium Ninety fall-out
Will get you even underground;
Now if you want some Strontium, Strontium Ninety,
There's plenty enough to go around.

What will we get from radiation?
No necks, two necks or maybe three;
Each one will have his own mutation;
Nobody else will look like me! (chorus)

So drink to the course of evolution;
The next one may very well be you;
Clouding the air with pollution,
And we'll see you next year at the zoo! (Chorus)

Walking In A Daze

 

Billie McAllister
with Bernard Hardison's Band

Walking In A Daze

Tennessee 112

Billie McAllister as Fertilizer in 1968

 

See https://www.queermusicheritage.com/drag-mcallister.html