Showing posts with label 1957. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1957. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

The Homer & Jethro Project #36


I'm still not feeling up to snuff, but shit needs to happen.
Other projects and things are getting set aside while I work on this.

How sad is that?

#36




June 1957 - RCA 47-6954 - Ramblin' Rose / Gone

A side is a song called "Ramblin' Rose" that is not the one by that spicy as a nursing home potato salad singer Perry Como in 1948. It's also not the one that Nat King Cole sang in 1962.  Neither is it the one that the MC5 kicked out the jams on in in 1969. (There's also a Grateful Dead song with that name that may or may not be one of the other ones mentioned. It's the Dead. I won't listen to the Dead. I don't want to get angry tonight.)

So as far as you or anyone else knows it's an original for our boys.

B side "Gone" was a dreary ballad hit for Ferlin Husky who has a lot of other stuff to recommend him, but certainly not that tune. An abysmal turd of a song.

H & J cut it down into palatable bite size chunks while mocking it. A noble effort for a song that was already a mockery of itself by existing.

Did I mention, I don't like the Ferlin Husky original?








September 1957 - RCA-47030 - My Dog Likes Your Dog / Kentucky



 "My Dog Loves Your Dog" is from the 1934 edition of George White's Scandals and was introduced on screen in the movie version by Alice Faye and Jimmy  Durante (who like Abe Vigoda looked ancient even as a young person). This isn't really that song.

It looks like another enterprising couple of songwriters were perhaps *cough* inspired *cough* by that 1934 song to write this little number 23 years later when one or more copyright holders might have died and or forgotten their investment.

Their totally original and not the least bit plagarized song was a jumping rhythm and blues song recorded by the Cupids as "My Dog Likes Your Dog".

In the updated song the dog really likes to spend time with the other dog, but just isn't ready to commit to a full time relationship right now. You know, they like, just got out of something heavy which didn't end well and, you know,  they're not really ready yet for a monogamous deal. There's stuff they need to work out first. You understand. Maybe just, like,  just a dog park with benefits kind of deal. See where it goes from there. You know?



B side "Kentucky" was originally written and sung by Karl & Harty in 1941. There doesn't seem to be a version I can link to so I'll link you to them fawning over the Atomic Annihilation of Japan to end WWII.

In 1958 the Everly Brothers recorded their really sweet version of "Kentucky" on the lp "Songs Our Daddy Taught Us". (Presumably the Elder Everly didn't know enough songs about Nuclear Destruction for a full album so they went with this one.)

Homer & Jethro do a fairly straight rendition interspersed with by a backup singer interjecting some musical asides using a familiar tune that I'm currently blanking on. My own tottering steps to senility starting to kick in..

Monday, April 23, 2018

The Homer & Jethro Project #35


#35

Little did I realize how time consuming I'd make this project when I started...

But here we are at last.

1957 and the beginning of the Lp era.

Life is good with your monophonic Hi-Fi set up.








April 1957 - LPM-1412 - Barefoot Ballads

Here it is. The first full length long playing 33 1/3 rpm 12" record for Homer and Jethro. It sets the pattern for pretty much every one to follow barring the live ones. Twelve songs. Six per side. No waiting. No muss. No fuss.

And as I'm not feeling so up to snuff today, I'll leave it to you, dear reader, to do all the leg work if you're interested in tracking down the origins of some of these tunes. Google is your friend.
(They also reprise earlier tunes "Boll Weevil" & "Ground Hog" for this set, so you can always refer back to previous posts to refresh your memory.)

the track listing is:


Cigareetes, Whusky and Wild, Wild Women
The West Virginny Hills
Sweet Fern
I'll Go Chasin' Women
The Frozen Logger
Ground Hog
Keep Them Cold Icy Fingers Off of Me
Boll Weevil No. 2
High Geared Daddy
Dig Me a Grave in Missouri
Tennessee, Tennessee
Down Where the Watermelons Grow


Go to town.

They bring their A Game on this first one. Lots of good material to enjoy.