The latest episode of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries is now up on Mixcloud, with an hour of all-vinyl tunes sourced from car boot sales and charity shops. Featured artists include Sylvester, The B52s, Wings, Isaac Hayes, Harry Stoneham and loads more.
Use the player below or follow the link to the show page.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-vinyl-diaries-episode-19/
Car Boot Vinyl Diaries
Showing posts with label 60s. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 60s. Show all posts
Tuesday, 4 July 2017
Saturday, 6 May 2017
CBVD Episode 18
The newest episode of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries is now online, with tunes from The Bodines, Frank Sidebottom, The Fall, Nina Simone, Londonbeat, Syreeta, and loads more, including Barbra Streisand covering David Bowie.
Use the player below or click the link to go to the page. Happy listening!
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-vinyl-diaries-episode-18/
Use the player below or click the link to go to the page. Happy listening!
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-vinyl-diaries-episode-18/
Friday, 21 April 2017
Good Morning Good Morning
One sunny morning over the Easter hols this year I was pleased to find this record at a midweek car boot sale, still in great condition and costing just a pound.
Sgt. Pepper Knew My Father was organised by the New Musical Express and put out on their own record label in order to raise money for the charity Childline, founded two years before. The NME managed to persuade a variety of artists to record covers of songs from this most beloved Fabs album, and it resulted in quite the mixed bag.
Low points are Hue & Cry's irritating jazz-funk Fixing A Hole, the two renditions of the title track by UK hip hop act The Three Wize Men, and UK no.1 single by Wet Wet Wet With A Little Help From My Friends. I've just learned that the latter was in fact a double a-side with Billy Bragg's She's Leaving Home, which as far as I remember got none of the TV or radio plays, which is a shame as it's pretty good, especially in comparison with the inescapable Pellow smugfest on the flip.
Highlights include Sonic Youth's feedback-laden Within You Without You, Michelle Shocked's rather lovely Lovely Rita, and Frank Sidebottom's bonkers cover of Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite. Top prize goes to The Fall, however, for an excellent effort on closer A Day In The Life, complete with runout groove gobbledegook. All in all a good quid's worth and an odd little sort of time capsule from when the original Pepper was just 21 years old.
Also costing £1 was B.W. Goes C&W by Bobby Womack.
With Bobby's soulful takes on Charlie Rich's Behind Closed Doors (from the charity shop classic album of the same name), Eddy Arnold's Bouquet Of Roses, and an absolutely charming duet with his father Friendly Womack Sr. on Tarnished Rings, BW Goes C&W is something of a hidden gem, and a must-listen for country soul fans. Only Big Bayou jars a little, but that's due more to the comparative tone than its execution.
You can hear three tracks from the album on the latest installment of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries, since it was this episode's Featured Album.
I spotted this great record sleeve in a local hospice shop recently, so naturally had to take a closer look.
The term 'surprise partie' in France once meant much the same as it did elsewhere, but from around the 1950s it came to mean any impromptu get-together by young people, paticularly teenagers, with the "surprise" part no longer relevant. Of course the record industry made the most of this trend, in particular Disque Vogue who really embraced the concept, putting out loads of albums on this theme in the 1960s:
Surprise Partie - Tous Les Jeunes, which cost me a pound, plunders Disques Vogue's '60s vaults for recordings by a variety of pop singers and instrumental groups. François Hardy and Petula Clark are well represented with three songs each, including a wonderful vocal version of The Shadows' Foot Tapper by Pet, called Mon Bonheur Danse ('My Dancing Happiness', according to Google translate) and of course François' hardy perennial Tous Les Garçons Et Les Filles.
Others artists include guitar-wielding duo Les "Faux" Frères, who sound like they modelled themselves on the Everly Brothers; rock 'n' roll / surf 4-piece The "Octopus"; and a handful of solo artists, such as Stella, a teen pop singer whose songs have been described as "parodies of the Yé-yé style" and "engagingly sarcastic". (These days she's a vocalist with French proggers and Steve Davis favourites Magma, after wedding drummer and founder Christian Vander.)
You can hear the Petula Clark track mentioned above on the latest Car Boot Vinyl Diaries, alongside those from Bobby Womack, plus lots more car boot and charity shop vinyl. But first, here are The "Octopus" with their track Hurricane, played from the original EP on a tasty looking Dansette.
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| Various Artists - Sgt. Pepper Knew My Father (1988) |
Sgt. Pepper Knew My Father was organised by the New Musical Express and put out on their own record label in order to raise money for the charity Childline, founded two years before. The NME managed to persuade a variety of artists to record covers of songs from this most beloved Fabs album, and it resulted in quite the mixed bag.
Low points are Hue & Cry's irritating jazz-funk Fixing A Hole, the two renditions of the title track by UK hip hop act The Three Wize Men, and UK no.1 single by Wet Wet Wet With A Little Help From My Friends. I've just learned that the latter was in fact a double a-side with Billy Bragg's She's Leaving Home, which as far as I remember got none of the TV or radio plays, which is a shame as it's pretty good, especially in comparison with the inescapable Pellow smugfest on the flip.
Highlights include Sonic Youth's feedback-laden Within You Without You, Michelle Shocked's rather lovely Lovely Rita, and Frank Sidebottom's bonkers cover of Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite. Top prize goes to The Fall, however, for an excellent effort on closer A Day In The Life, complete with runout groove gobbledegook. All in all a good quid's worth and an odd little sort of time capsule from when the original Pepper was just 21 years old.
Also costing £1 was B.W. Goes C&W by Bobby Womack.
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| Bobby Womack - BW Goes C&W (1976) |
United Artists weren't happy about soul singer Womack's desire to make an album of country covers, particularly in '76 when a move into disco would have been the obvious career move. But when Bobby told them he wanted to call it "Step Aside Charley Pride, Give Another Nigger A Try", they let him go ahead with the project under the condition the title was changed to something more, er... commercial. It sold poorly anyway, so I knew nothing about it until I spied it on a blanket on the ground at a chilly car boot sale in February. As a lover of country soul I wasn't going to leave it there in the pile of Jim Reeves and Don Williams, especially with the wonderful front cover image, plus Bobby looking cool-as-heck on the back:
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| Photo from rear cover. A cropped version of this image was also used on the country soul compilation Dirty Laundry: The Soul Of Black Country. |
With Bobby's soulful takes on Charlie Rich's Behind Closed Doors (from the charity shop classic album of the same name), Eddy Arnold's Bouquet Of Roses, and an absolutely charming duet with his father Friendly Womack Sr. on Tarnished Rings, BW Goes C&W is something of a hidden gem, and a must-listen for country soul fans. Only Big Bayou jars a little, but that's due more to the comparative tone than its execution.
You can hear three tracks from the album on the latest installment of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries, since it was this episode's Featured Album.
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| Various Artists - Surprise Partie - Tous Les Jeunes (1973) "Putting young people in the spotlight", according to translation of the sleeve notes. |
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| Promotional sticker by Hennessy. |
The term 'surprise partie' in France once meant much the same as it did elsewhere, but from around the 1950s it came to mean any impromptu get-together by young people, paticularly teenagers, with the "surprise" part no longer relevant. Of course the record industry made the most of this trend, in particular Disque Vogue who really embraced the concept, putting out loads of albums on this theme in the 1960s:
 |
| A small selection of 'surprise partie' themed LPs from Disque Vogue. I've no idea what the Guinea pig and penguin logos represent. |
Surprise Partie - Tous Les Jeunes, which cost me a pound, plunders Disques Vogue's '60s vaults for recordings by a variety of pop singers and instrumental groups. François Hardy and Petula Clark are well represented with three songs each, including a wonderful vocal version of The Shadows' Foot Tapper by Pet, called Mon Bonheur Danse ('My Dancing Happiness', according to Google translate) and of course François' hardy perennial Tous Les Garçons Et Les Filles.
Others artists include guitar-wielding duo Les "Faux" Frères, who sound like they modelled themselves on the Everly Brothers; rock 'n' roll / surf 4-piece The "Octopus"; and a handful of solo artists, such as Stella, a teen pop singer whose songs have been described as "parodies of the Yé-yé style" and "engagingly sarcastic". (These days she's a vocalist with French proggers and Steve Davis favourites Magma, after wedding drummer and founder Christian Vander.)
You can hear the Petula Clark track mentioned above on the latest Car Boot Vinyl Diaries, alongside those from Bobby Womack, plus lots more car boot and charity shop vinyl. But first, here are The "Octopus" with their track Hurricane, played from the original EP on a tasty looking Dansette.
Thursday, 13 April 2017
Cloudcast Episode17
Episode 17 of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries is now on Mixcloud for your listening pleasure, with tunes freshly plucked from the fields of Suffolk. With a country soul gem for the Featured Album, a double bill for Novelty Island and a great long song for The Boot Of Loot, there's probably something for everyone.
Listen using the player below, or click the link to go to the show page. And have a great Easter weekend!
Listen using the player below, or click the link to go to the show page. And have a great Easter weekend!
Thursday, 9 March 2017
CBVD Cloudcast 16
The latest episode of Car Boot Vinyl Diaries is now on Mixcloud, with all sorts of car boot bangers and chazza choons. The Featured Album is a collection of BBC Sporting Themes, there's a a great French-language Kinks cover from Petula Clark, and the rest of it runs the gamut from Tom Waits to Tweety Pie.
Use the player below or visit the CBVD Mixcloud page https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/
Use the player below or visit the CBVD Mixcloud page https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/
Friday, 3 February 2017
5x7
As I've mentioned before, I don't always have the patience to look through boxes of 7" singles, but when albums are thin on the ground I sometimes have a rummage, and somehow over the past 12 months I've amassed quite a few. Here's a somewhat random selection.
Bought for 50p at a car boot sale last August was this well-known record from British vocal trio The Avons.
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| The Avons - Seven Little Girls Sitting In The Back Seat b/w Alone At Eight (1959) |
After an inauspicious start, sister-in-law duo The Avon Sisters (stepsisters Valerie and Elaine Murtagh) dropped the "Sister" part of their name and teamed up with singer Ray Adams. Seven Little Girls Sitting In The Back Seat was their debut single and their biggest hit, topping out at no.3 in the UK. The song was first recorded earlier that year by US singer Paul Evans, who took it to no.9 in his home country.
I'm very fond of this cheeky but wholesome pop song about a frustrated motorist (driving what must be a fair sized vehicle considering the passenger load) and his polyamorous pal, especially the pleasing "de-doody-doom-doom" backing vox.
From the same seller and also costing 50p was another old favourite on Columbia, this time from Bobby Vinton.
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| Bobby Vinton - Blue Velvet b/w Is There A Place (Where I Can Go) (1963) |
Blue Velvet was a top 20 hit for Tony Bennett in 1951, then The Clovers in 1955 and The Statues in '59. Vinton had the most success with it, his piningly nostalgic rendition bagging two weeks at the top spot in the US in 1963. Although it didn't dent the UK chart, it eventually achieved a no.2 placing in 1990 when it was re-released, four years after it had been heavily featured in David Lynch's noir of the same name inspired by the song. The most recent version was Lana Del Ray's brooding interpretation, used in a TV ad for H&M in 2012.
Car boot season isn't up and running in my part of the world just yet, so I've been relying on the local charity shops for second hand music fixes. This has meant mostly CDs, but a couple of weeks ago I bought the first lot of chazza vinyl of 2017; a handful of 50p singles including this on Disques Vogue from Pet Clark.
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| Petula Clark - Il Faut Revenir (You'd Better Come Home) b/w Un Jeun Home Bien (1965) |
Founded in 1947, Disques Vogue began by releasing jazz by American and French artists, expanding into pop towards the end of the '50s. Petula Clark signed with the label in 1957 and started having French-language hits in Europe as well as continuing to chart at home in the UK on Pye Records with songs sung in English. She also recorded material in Italian, Spanish and German, and her worldwide smash Downtown was released in four different languages.
Il Faut Revenir (You'd Better Come Home) came out in 1965, and the b-side is a very tasty French-language cover of A Well Respected Man by label-mates the Kinks. This cover was also released as an a-side the same year on the Vogue Productions imprint, with a song called Las Vegas on the flip.
Also on Disques Vogue is this by François Hardy, bought at a boot sale last summer (another 50p-er).
Parisienne swoon-inducing pop singer Hardy joined Vogue in 1961, and like Clark sings in Italian and German as well as French and English. This single (the titles translate as If This Is It and I'll Be There For You) was a British release, made in England and distributed by Pye. Both sides are lovely; Si C'est Ca features just minimal guitar behind Hardy's enchanting vocal, but the slightly more produced b-side Je Serai La Pour Toi just edges it for me.
Il Faut Revenir (You'd Better Come Home) came out in 1965, and the b-side is a very tasty French-language cover of A Well Respected Man by label-mates the Kinks. This cover was also released as an a-side the same year on the Vogue Productions imprint, with a song called Las Vegas on the flip.
Also on Disques Vogue is this by François Hardy, bought at a boot sale last summer (another 50p-er).
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| François Hardy - Si C'est Ca b/w Je Serai La Pour Toi (1966) |
Parisienne swoon-inducing pop singer Hardy joined Vogue in 1961, and like Clark sings in Italian and German as well as French and English. This single (the titles translate as If This Is It and I'll Be There For You) was a British release, made in England and distributed by Pye. Both sides are lovely; Si C'est Ca features just minimal guitar behind Hardy's enchanting vocal, but the slightly more produced b-side Je Serai La Pour Toi just edges it for me.
Pye's association with Disques Vogue meant that they put out this next single on both imprints. I bought a copy in a local E.A.C.H. (East Anglian Children's Hospice) shop at the very end of December last year for a pound. (Sadly mine is the UK Pye version, not the rather sought-after French release.)
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| The Honeycombs - Have I The Right? b/w Please Don't Pretend Again (1964) |
The Honeycombs were a squareish sixties London beat group, and were unusual for their time in having a female drummer; Ann 'Honey' Lantree, an ex-salon assistant to founding member and former hairdresser Martin Murray (rhythm guitar). Have I The Right? was written by Ken Howard and Alan Blaikely, who'd later go on to write for many other artists, including Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky Mick & Tich, Pet Clark, Lulu and, er, Rolf Harris. Produced by Joe Meek, the thumping beat of HITR? was bolstered by band members stomping on the stairs to the studio, to which Meek had attached a series of microphones using bicycle clips. This beefy stomp plus the novelty of a big-haired girl drummer helped propel the single to the top of the charts in the UK plus three other countries, with worldwide sales estimated at a million. Pye's canny practise of putting out multi-lingual releases was employed, with the German-language version reaching the same place in the German chart a month after the English original, and the label's penchant for artistic cross-pollination resulted in the band's fourth single being a cover of a Kinks song. It was called Something Better Beginning, and it flopped. Here they are with their smash hit to see us out.
You can keep up with all of my car boot and chazza finds by clicking the Twitter follow button at the top of the page, and hear me playing some of them on the all-vinyl cloudcast here: https://www.mixcloud.com/carbootvinyldiaries/
Saturday, 24 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 10
It's Day 10 of the 2016 Car Boot Christmas Countdown, which means it's also Christmas Eve, and today is the turn of the Christmas crooners. Let's begin with the King Of Cool, and a record I nabbed for a pound at a car boot sale on this year's May Bank Holiday weekend.
The Dean Martin Christmas Album was Dino's second festive offering, the first being 1959's Winter Wonderland, which shares a few tracks including the tenuous inclusion of The Things We Did Last Summer. Aside from this, many of the old chestnuts are here, such as a delightful Marshmallow World, a Blue Christmas to rival that of Elvis, and of course everyone's favourite, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, as so memorably used in Die Hard.
On the making of the album the sleeve notes state,
Less uplifting, despite the title, is A Jolly Christmas From Frank Sinatra, which I bought for 50p in August 2015.
First released in 1957, my copy is a slightly later US issue with Capitol's "rainbow" label. Assisted by the "orchestra and chorus of Gordon Jenkins" (the chorus being the Ralph Brewster Singers), like many before and after him Frank brings us one side of popular Christmas songs and one of carols.
I found the album to be rather leaden and samey, and in particular Frank's delivery isn't suited to the carols, which for me fall flattest. But as a nice bit of background music it's pleasant enough, and no doubt could act effectively as a soothing accompaniment to that post-Christmas dinner booze-snooze in the armchair.
In the '60s the album was briefly issued as "The Sinatra Christmas Album" with a different cover image. When it was reissued on vinyl in 2010, the original title and artwork were restored.
Last but by no means least is A Jack Jones Christmas, which cost me a pound in March 2015.
Like Dean Martin, this RCA release was Jack's second Christmas album, coming after 1964's equally imaginatively titled "The Jack Jones Christmas Album" on Kapp Records. After Frank 'n' Dino's Burgundy baritones, Jack's easygoing tenor makes for a nice change, and as well as the usual parade of suspects he throws in some curveballs like gospel number Little Altar Boy, Bacharach and David's Christmas Day from the Broadway musical Promises Promises, and a look at the different ways Jesus is perceived around the world in Some Children See Him. There's also the inexplicable inclusion of Oh Happy Day; an odd choice, but it fits in quite well.
The highlights for me are his a cappella version of Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, the aforementioned Little Altar Boy, and best of all his absolutely winning rendition of Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, the latter making the perfect signing-off track for Car Boot Christmas 2016, which you can listen to using the player below.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Thanks for joining me; I hope you've enjoyed this year's countdown and the accompanying cloudcast, and I also hope you can pop back in the new year to see and hear what other records I've been liberating from car boot sales and charity shops here on the Suffolk coast.
Wishing you a happy and peaceful Christmas, whatever it is you're up to.
 |
| The Dean Martin Christmas Album (1966) |
The Dean Martin Christmas Album was Dino's second festive offering, the first being 1959's Winter Wonderland, which shares a few tracks including the tenuous inclusion of The Things We Did Last Summer. Aside from this, many of the old chestnuts are here, such as a delightful Marshmallow World, a Blue Christmas to rival that of Elvis, and of course everyone's favourite, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, as so memorably used in Die Hard.
On the making of the album the sleeve notes state,
"'Twas the ninth of September, a very warm night, and we were in California. And on this hot desert night, not a sleigh or a jingle bell in sight.... Dean Martin sauntered into his friendly neighbourhood recording studio and made himself an album of song. Christmas song."His vocals must have been dubbed separately, as there are plenty of bells here, as well as tinkling xylophone, jaunty strings and sweet backing vocals. The combination of these with Dino's laid back, nonchalant style results in a seemingly effortless, gently swinging, warm and breezy record that's completely uplifting and a joy from start to finish.
Less uplifting, despite the title, is A Jolly Christmas From Frank Sinatra, which I bought for 50p in August 2015.
 |
| A Jolly Christmas From Frank Sinatra (1957) |
 |
| Alternative cover and title |
First released in 1957, my copy is a slightly later US issue with Capitol's "rainbow" label. Assisted by the "orchestra and chorus of Gordon Jenkins" (the chorus being the Ralph Brewster Singers), like many before and after him Frank brings us one side of popular Christmas songs and one of carols.
I found the album to be rather leaden and samey, and in particular Frank's delivery isn't suited to the carols, which for me fall flattest. But as a nice bit of background music it's pleasant enough, and no doubt could act effectively as a soothing accompaniment to that post-Christmas dinner booze-snooze in the armchair.
In the '60s the album was briefly issued as "The Sinatra Christmas Album" with a different cover image. When it was reissued on vinyl in 2010, the original title and artwork were restored.
Last but by no means least is A Jack Jones Christmas, which cost me a pound in March 2015.
 |
| A Jack Jones Christmas (1969) |
Like Dean Martin, this RCA release was Jack's second Christmas album, coming after 1964's equally imaginatively titled "The Jack Jones Christmas Album" on Kapp Records. After Frank 'n' Dino's Burgundy baritones, Jack's easygoing tenor makes for a nice change, and as well as the usual parade of suspects he throws in some curveballs like gospel number Little Altar Boy, Bacharach and David's Christmas Day from the Broadway musical Promises Promises, and a look at the different ways Jesus is perceived around the world in Some Children See Him. There's also the inexplicable inclusion of Oh Happy Day; an odd choice, but it fits in quite well.
The highlights for me are his a cappella version of Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, the aforementioned Little Altar Boy, and best of all his absolutely winning rendition of Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, the latter making the perfect signing-off track for Car Boot Christmas 2016, which you can listen to using the player below.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Thanks for joining me; I hope you've enjoyed this year's countdown and the accompanying cloudcast, and I also hope you can pop back in the new year to see and hear what other records I've been liberating from car boot sales and charity shops here on the Suffolk coast.
Wishing you a happy and peaceful Christmas, whatever it is you're up to.
Minibreakfast xxx
Friday, 23 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 9
Welcome to Day 9 of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016. On this penultimate festive blog post we're looking at two LPs that are both over 50 years old. Both are in remarkable condition despite their age and the fact that they were found languishing at car boot sales.
First up is Ray Conniff and the Ray Conniff Singers - We Wish You A Merry Christmas, which cost 50p last October.
Born Joseph Raymond Conniff in Massachusetts in 1916, Ray was a prolific bandleader and arranger, having 28 albums in the US Top 40 between 1957 and 1968. His most successful output was that with his "Ray Conniff Singers", numbering 13 men and 12 women at any one time.
Here they present all the Yuletide favourites you'd expect, plus a couple of other less commonly covered numbers; for instance Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep) from the film White Christmas appears as part of a medley. In fact the album is mainly composed of medleys, with just two standalone songs; Ring Christmas Bells (aka Carol of the Bells) and a surprisingly enjoyable version of the normally tedious The Twelve Days of Christmas.
Conniff was renowned for his vocal arrangements, and the harmonies here are unmatched, the highlight for me being O Holy Night, where the soaring layers of voice give me genuine tingles. Unsurprisingly the album went gold in 1963, and it continued to chart year after year in the 1960s. It remains a bona fide Christmas classic, and for those who grew up with it playing in their home, a veritable time machine.
Track list.
Side 1.
1. Medley: Jolly Old St. Nicholas; The Little Drummer Boy.
2. Medley: O Holy Night; We Three Kings of Orient Are; Deck The Halls With Boughs of Holly.
3. Ring Christmas Bells.
Side 2.
1. Medley: Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!; Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep); We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
2. The Twelve Days of Christmas.
3. Medley: The First Noel; Hark! The Herald Angels Sing; O Come, All Ye Faithful; We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
I paid £1.50 for a copy of Harry Belafonte's To Wish You A Merry Christmas in April this year.
Compared to the cheery sound of the Ray Conniff Singers this album comes as a bit of a downer. Although Belafonte tackled all kinds of folk music, he's best known for hits such as Jump In The Line and Island In The Sun, but if you were expecting this album to deliver a calypso Christmas you'd be in for a disappointment. That's not to say it has nothing to offer; if you like your carols delivered solemnly with traditional, sparse instrumentation, then you'll enjoy this low-key collection. As well as the well-worn carols there are others less familiar, such as A Star In The East and Jehovah the Lord Will Provide. Harry's soft voice is matched by the gentle playing of guitar virtuoso Laurindro Almeida, and the most upbeat the album gets is the marching pipe and drums on Christmas Is Coming. Verdict: tender and mild.
Track list.
Side 1.
1. A Star In The East.
2. The Gifts They Gave.
3. The Son of Mary*.
4. The Twelve Days of Christmas.
5. Where The Little Jesus Sleeps.
6. Medley: The Joys of Christmas; O Little Town of Bethlehem; Deck The Halls; The First Noel.
Side 2.
1. Mary, Mary.
2. Jehovah the Lord Will Provide.
3. Silent Night.
4. Christmas Is Coming.
5. Medley: We Wish You A Merry Christmas; God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen; O Come All Ye Faithful; Joy To The World.
6. I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day.
Be sure to come back tomorrow - Christmas Eve! - for the final installment of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, with three great albums by some beloved crooners. You can hear me playing the best selections from my festive record boxes on the family-friendly Car Boot Christmas 2016 cloudcast. Use the player below or follow the link to Mixcloud.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
First up is Ray Conniff and the Ray Conniff Singers - We Wish You A Merry Christmas, which cost 50p last October.
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| Ray Conniff and the Ray Conniff Singers - We Wish You A Merry Christmas (1962) |
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| 1970s reissue with cropped image, also found last year. |
Here they present all the Yuletide favourites you'd expect, plus a couple of other less commonly covered numbers; for instance Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep) from the film White Christmas appears as part of a medley. In fact the album is mainly composed of medleys, with just two standalone songs; Ring Christmas Bells (aka Carol of the Bells) and a surprisingly enjoyable version of the normally tedious The Twelve Days of Christmas.
Conniff was renowned for his vocal arrangements, and the harmonies here are unmatched, the highlight for me being O Holy Night, where the soaring layers of voice give me genuine tingles. Unsurprisingly the album went gold in 1963, and it continued to chart year after year in the 1960s. It remains a bona fide Christmas classic, and for those who grew up with it playing in their home, a veritable time machine.
Track list.
Side 1.
1. Medley: Jolly Old St. Nicholas; The Little Drummer Boy.
2. Medley: O Holy Night; We Three Kings of Orient Are; Deck The Halls With Boughs of Holly.
3. Ring Christmas Bells.
Side 2.
1. Medley: Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!; Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep); We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
2. The Twelve Days of Christmas.
3. Medley: The First Noel; Hark! The Herald Angels Sing; O Come, All Ye Faithful; We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
I paid £1.50 for a copy of Harry Belafonte's To Wish You A Merry Christmas in April this year.
 |
| Harry Belafonte - To Wish You A Merry Christmas (1958) |
Compared to the cheery sound of the Ray Conniff Singers this album comes as a bit of a downer. Although Belafonte tackled all kinds of folk music, he's best known for hits such as Jump In The Line and Island In The Sun, but if you were expecting this album to deliver a calypso Christmas you'd be in for a disappointment. That's not to say it has nothing to offer; if you like your carols delivered solemnly with traditional, sparse instrumentation, then you'll enjoy this low-key collection. As well as the well-worn carols there are others less familiar, such as A Star In The East and Jehovah the Lord Will Provide. Harry's soft voice is matched by the gentle playing of guitar virtuoso Laurindro Almeida, and the most upbeat the album gets is the marching pipe and drums on Christmas Is Coming. Verdict: tender and mild.
Track list.
Side 1.
1. A Star In The East.
2. The Gifts They Gave.
3. The Son of Mary*.
4. The Twelve Days of Christmas.
5. Where The Little Jesus Sleeps.
6. Medley: The Joys of Christmas; O Little Town of Bethlehem; Deck The Halls; The First Noel.
Side 2.
1. Mary, Mary.
2. Jehovah the Lord Will Provide.
3. Silent Night.
4. Christmas Is Coming.
5. Medley: We Wish You A Merry Christmas; God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen; O Come All Ye Faithful; Joy To The World.
6. I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day.
Be sure to come back tomorrow - Christmas Eve! - for the final installment of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, with three great albums by some beloved crooners. You can hear me playing the best selections from my festive record boxes on the family-friendly Car Boot Christmas 2016 cloudcast. Use the player below or follow the link to Mixcloud.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Thursday, 22 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 8
It's Day 8 of this year's Car Boot Christmas Countdown, and today it's the turn of the ladies of country. Let's begin with the First Lady Of Country, Tammy Wynette, whose Christmas album I picked up for a pound at a car boot sale back in April.
Like fellow pioneering country artist Charlie Pride, Tammy was also from Mississippi and a successful sportsperson before moving into music, having been a top basketball player in her high school year. Like several of the Christmas albums covered in these pages, this one is split in to two distinct sides. The first consists of reverently delivered carols including Gentle Shepherd and O Little Town Of Bethlehem, and with the Jordanaires swooning behind Tammy as she sings "no criyyb for his beyyd", Away In A Manger never sounded more Nashville.
Side 2 is my favourite, however, where backed by The Nashville Edition Tammy lets loose the heartache on popular songs such as Blue Christmas, before eventually perking up when her man returns home for the festivities on One Happy Christmas. But he's dun left her agin by next song Lovely Christmas Call where she pleads with him to return for the sake of the children. He doesn't, but the reverence does for final number Let's Put The Christ Back Into Christmas.
In October last year I spent 50p on a copy of Christmas Day With Kitty Wells.
Also featuring backing vocals by The Jordanaires, this 1962 release by Nashville native Wells (born Ellen Muriel Deason) is a cheerier affair than Tammy's, opening with Dasher With The Light Upon His Tail, C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S and a sleigh bell laden Santa's On His Way. As well as a great cover of Gene Autrey's Here Comes Santa Claus there are a couple of carols, plus the seemingly compulsory Blue Christmas and White Christmas. Wells throws in a little heartbreak with Christmas Ain't Like Christmas Anymore, but jollity is immediately restored with a chirpy cowgirl rendition of Jingle Bells.
As far as I can tell the album wasn't released outside the US, but these days UK folks can buy it as download.
On a freezing Sunday morning in February 2015 I splurged five pounds (now approximately half a Euro) on a copy of something I'd been hoping to spot in the wild for ages: Light Of The Stable by Emmylou Harris.
This 1979 release was named after the title track, which had come out as a single four years earlier with Bluebird Wine on the b-side. A prolific collaborator, Emmylou is joined on this song by Neil Young and Trio partners Linda Ronstadt and Dolly Parton on harmony vocals. Other contributors include Willie Nelson and Ricky Skaggs providing vocals on Angel Eyes (Angel Eyes) and singer-songwriter Nancy Ahern duetting with Emmylou on Away In A Manger. Among the musicians contributing to the largely acoustic backing are Rodney Crowell, Albert Lee and autoharpist Bryan Bowers (misspelled as 'Brian' on the sleeve notes).
Emmylou's incredible voice shines particularly brightly on the a cappella The First Noel, but my favourites are bluegrass opener Christmas Time's A-Coming, an absolutely beautiful Little Drummer Boy, and of course the title track. The album has been reissued many times over the years on both CD and vinyl, with a few alternative covers.
You can hear tracks from many of the albums featured in the countdown, plus lots more, on the all-vinyl Car Boot Christmas 2016 cloudcast. Use the player below or click the link to go to Mixcloud. Do come back tomorrow, Friday the 23rd of December, for the penultimate day of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown and two great festive records from the 1950s and '60s.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
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| Christmas With Tammy Wynette (this edition 1982, original release was 1970) |
Like fellow pioneering country artist Charlie Pride, Tammy was also from Mississippi and a successful sportsperson before moving into music, having been a top basketball player in her high school year. Like several of the Christmas albums covered in these pages, this one is split in to two distinct sides. The first consists of reverently delivered carols including Gentle Shepherd and O Little Town Of Bethlehem, and with the Jordanaires swooning behind Tammy as she sings "no criyyb for his beyyd", Away In A Manger never sounded more Nashville.
Side 2 is my favourite, however, where backed by The Nashville Edition Tammy lets loose the heartache on popular songs such as Blue Christmas, before eventually perking up when her man returns home for the festivities on One Happy Christmas. But he's dun left her agin by next song Lovely Christmas Call where she pleads with him to return for the sake of the children. He doesn't, but the reverence does for final number Let's Put The Christ Back Into Christmas.
In October last year I spent 50p on a copy of Christmas Day With Kitty Wells.
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| Christmas Day With Kitty Wells (1962) |
Also featuring backing vocals by The Jordanaires, this 1962 release by Nashville native Wells (born Ellen Muriel Deason) is a cheerier affair than Tammy's, opening with Dasher With The Light Upon His Tail, C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S and a sleigh bell laden Santa's On His Way. As well as a great cover of Gene Autrey's Here Comes Santa Claus there are a couple of carols, plus the seemingly compulsory Blue Christmas and White Christmas. Wells throws in a little heartbreak with Christmas Ain't Like Christmas Anymore, but jollity is immediately restored with a chirpy cowgirl rendition of Jingle Bells.
As far as I can tell the album wasn't released outside the US, but these days UK folks can buy it as download.
On a freezing Sunday morning in February 2015 I splurged five pounds (now approximately half a Euro) on a copy of something I'd been hoping to spot in the wild for ages: Light Of The Stable by Emmylou Harris.
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| Emmylou Harris - Light of the Stable (1979) |
This 1979 release was named after the title track, which had come out as a single four years earlier with Bluebird Wine on the b-side. A prolific collaborator, Emmylou is joined on this song by Neil Young and Trio partners Linda Ronstadt and Dolly Parton on harmony vocals. Other contributors include Willie Nelson and Ricky Skaggs providing vocals on Angel Eyes (Angel Eyes) and singer-songwriter Nancy Ahern duetting with Emmylou on Away In A Manger. Among the musicians contributing to the largely acoustic backing are Rodney Crowell, Albert Lee and autoharpist Bryan Bowers (misspelled as 'Brian' on the sleeve notes).
 |
| Alternative cover art |
Emmylou's incredible voice shines particularly brightly on the a cappella The First Noel, but my favourites are bluegrass opener Christmas Time's A-Coming, an absolutely beautiful Little Drummer Boy, and of course the title track. The album has been reissued many times over the years on both CD and vinyl, with a few alternative covers.
You can hear tracks from many of the albums featured in the countdown, plus lots more, on the all-vinyl Car Boot Christmas 2016 cloudcast. Use the player below or click the link to go to Mixcloud. Do come back tomorrow, Friday the 23rd of December, for the penultimate day of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown and two great festive records from the 1950s and '60s.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Tuesday, 20 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 6
Welcome to Day 6 of this year's Car Boot Christmas Countdown. After yesterday's parp-fest it's time to look at a couple of different seasonal albums, starting with Merry Christmas Baby, bought in June 2015 for £2.
Stanley Lewis worked as a record distributor and jukebox operator, until in 1963, encouraged by none other than Leonard Chess, he founded Jewel Records in Shreveport, Lousiana, recording gospel, blues and jazz. Six artists in all are featured on this 1985 compilation.
Jazz pianist Ronnie Kole was born in Chicago and found success in New Orleans, eventually opening the now famous club Kole's Korner. Here with his Trio he provides two great instrumentals in Winter Wonderland and Silent Night, Holy Night. Louisiana-born singer and pianist Bobby Powell moved from playing gospel in the 1950s, through blues in the '60s to soul and R&B in the '70s. Here he's represented by two versions of the same piece, a Deep Soul vocal ballad called The Bells, and the instrumental version called Bing Bong that graced the b-side of the 1971 single release.
The star of the show is Charles Brown, a blues singer and pianist from Texas City whose hit Merry Christmas Baby lends its title to the album. This R&B Christmas standard was first recorded in 1947 by Johnny Moore's The Blazes, and featured a young Charles Brown on piano. Perhaps the best known version today is that by Bruce Springsteen, as heard on the 2014 Car Boot Christmas cloudcast. Brown's million-selling Please Come Home For Christmas is here too, as well as his sublime Christmas In Heaven.
Merry Christmas Baby has been reissued on CD in various guises since 1985 with later re-recordings and additional tracks, although I gather that they don't add much to the original US-only LP, which is all killer and no filler.
Costing £1 in October of 2015 was Noël by Joan Baez.
Arranged by Peter Schickele a.k.a. PDQ Bach, here Joan delivers a dozen songs, her crystal clear soprano taking centre stage. Rather than her usual folky style the orchestration is classical with a medieval feel in parts, thanks to instruments like harpsichord, recorder, lute, baroque organ and a "consort of viols". With delicate enunciation she sings Ave Maria in German and an absolutely gorgeous Cantique de Noël in French, as well as the English translation of Catalan traditional Carol of the Birds. Other seldom-heard traditionals include Down In Yon Forest and Mary's Wandering. A handful of instrumentals are slotted in; three as short intervals, and Angels We Have Heard On High as a standalone piece.
The material suits her bell-like voice well, and though the album feels a little staid in places it's still very enjoyable, especially when compared to some other artists' more syrupy Christmas output. It's quite a common sight at car boot sales and charity shops, and certainly worth picking up next time you see it. You may also be able to find the 2001 CD remaster, issued in 2001 with 6 extra tracks.
You can hear picks from both of these albums and lots more on Car Boot Christmas 2016; listen to the cloudcast on the player below or click the link to go to the Mixcloud page. Shares, comments and likes will be most welcome. Be sure to come back tomorrow, Wednesday the 21st of December, where I'll be looking a couple of very special charity shop finds!
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
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| Various Artists - Merry Christmas Baby (1985) |
Stanley Lewis worked as a record distributor and jukebox operator, until in 1963, encouraged by none other than Leonard Chess, he founded Jewel Records in Shreveport, Lousiana, recording gospel, blues and jazz. Six artists in all are featured on this 1985 compilation.
Jazz pianist Ronnie Kole was born in Chicago and found success in New Orleans, eventually opening the now famous club Kole's Korner. Here with his Trio he provides two great instrumentals in Winter Wonderland and Silent Night, Holy Night. Louisiana-born singer and pianist Bobby Powell moved from playing gospel in the 1950s, through blues in the '60s to soul and R&B in the '70s. Here he's represented by two versions of the same piece, a Deep Soul vocal ballad called The Bells, and the instrumental version called Bing Bong that graced the b-side of the 1971 single release.
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| Rear sleeve with tracklist |
The star of the show is Charles Brown, a blues singer and pianist from Texas City whose hit Merry Christmas Baby lends its title to the album. This R&B Christmas standard was first recorded in 1947 by Johnny Moore's The Blazes, and featured a young Charles Brown on piano. Perhaps the best known version today is that by Bruce Springsteen, as heard on the 2014 Car Boot Christmas cloudcast. Brown's million-selling Please Come Home For Christmas is here too, as well as his sublime Christmas In Heaven.
Merry Christmas Baby has been reissued on CD in various guises since 1985 with later re-recordings and additional tracks, although I gather that they don't add much to the original US-only LP, which is all killer and no filler.
Costing £1 in October of 2015 was Noël by Joan Baez.
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| Joan Baez - Noël (1966) |
Arranged by Peter Schickele a.k.a. PDQ Bach, here Joan delivers a dozen songs, her crystal clear soprano taking centre stage. Rather than her usual folky style the orchestration is classical with a medieval feel in parts, thanks to instruments like harpsichord, recorder, lute, baroque organ and a "consort of viols". With delicate enunciation she sings Ave Maria in German and an absolutely gorgeous Cantique de Noël in French, as well as the English translation of Catalan traditional Carol of the Birds. Other seldom-heard traditionals include Down In Yon Forest and Mary's Wandering. A handful of instrumentals are slotted in; three as short intervals, and Angels We Have Heard On High as a standalone piece.
The material suits her bell-like voice well, and though the album feels a little staid in places it's still very enjoyable, especially when compared to some other artists' more syrupy Christmas output. It's quite a common sight at car boot sales and charity shops, and certainly worth picking up next time you see it. You may also be able to find the 2001 CD remaster, issued in 2001 with 6 extra tracks.
You can hear picks from both of these albums and lots more on Car Boot Christmas 2016; listen to the cloudcast on the player below or click the link to go to the Mixcloud page. Shares, comments and likes will be most welcome. Be sure to come back tomorrow, Wednesday the 21st of December, where I'll be looking a couple of very special charity shop finds!
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Monday, 19 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 5
It's Day 5 of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, which means that we're halfway to Christmas Eve already. As promised, today we're going Totally Tijuana with a trio of budget label Yuletide parp-fests.
Let's start with this, bought at a car boot sale during the summer of 2015 for a pound.
Released on Hallmark the same year as Herb Alpert's festive offering, Tijuana Christmas by The Border Brass & Singers is a fun collection of twelve familiar tunes in a pseudo-Mariachi style. The title track that opens Side 1 is not especially Christmassy, but it's very jaunty, with clip-clop percussion, a neighing horse (obviously) and some breathy "pah-pah-pah" female vocals. In fact the clean cut chorus of guys and girls provide a slew of pah-pah-pahs, da-da-das and even some bum-bum-bums to go with the fa-la-la-la-las; and with all the bells, chimes, maracas, and of course that twin trumpet sound, this record is a kitsch delight. Deck The Halls features strident harpsichord, as does the rattling arrangement of We Wish You A Merry Christmas. Angels We Have Heard On High incorporates ringing barrelhouse piano, and the clip-clopping reappears for the one-horse open sleigh in Jingle Bells.
The album was released without the overlaid vocals as by just 'The Border Brass' in the US and 'La Nouvelle Génération' in Canada:
The voice and string arrangements on this mixture of mostly secular standards are by Shorty Rogers, with brass arrangements by Alpert, and include Winter Wonderland, Sleigh Ride and Jingle Bells, along with Herb giving voice to The Bell That Couldn't Jingle and Christmas Song. More unusual are Las Mañanitas (a traditional Mexican birthday song that translates as "The Little Mornings"), Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desire, and the rather odd choice of My Favourite Things from The Sound Of Music.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Let's start with this, bought at a car boot sale during the summer of 2015 for a pound.
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| The Border Brass & Singers - Tijuana Christmas (1968) |
Released on Hallmark the same year as Herb Alpert's festive offering, Tijuana Christmas by The Border Brass & Singers is a fun collection of twelve familiar tunes in a pseudo-Mariachi style. The title track that opens Side 1 is not especially Christmassy, but it's very jaunty, with clip-clop percussion, a neighing horse (obviously) and some breathy "pah-pah-pah" female vocals. In fact the clean cut chorus of guys and girls provide a slew of pah-pah-pahs, da-da-das and even some bum-bum-bums to go with the fa-la-la-la-las; and with all the bells, chimes, maracas, and of course that twin trumpet sound, this record is a kitsch delight. Deck The Halls features strident harpsichord, as does the rattling arrangement of We Wish You A Merry Christmas. Angels We Have Heard On High incorporates ringing barrelhouse piano, and the clip-clopping reappears for the one-horse open sleigh in Jingle Bells.
The album was released without the overlaid vocals as by just 'The Border Brass' in the US and 'La Nouvelle Génération' in Canada:
In addition, there are a couple of other versions the same as the UK release i.e. with vocals, but with variations of title, band name and cover art. These are a US release called 'Tijuana Voices With Brass Sing Merry Christmas' and an Australian one named 'Jingle Bells Tijuana Style':
Bought last summer for 50p is another album called Tijuana Brass, this time by Louis Gomez Mexican Brass.
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| Louis Gomez Mexican Brass - Tijuana Christmas (1979) |
It was released on Chevron Records, a UK budget label exclusively licensed to the Woolworth's chain. There was no Loius Gomez of course; the arranger was one Pete Winslow, who also played trumpet, and he's accompanied here by session musicians on Hammond organ, marimba, twangy guitar and jazzy percussion.
Although the sleeve notes claim "Louis Gomez and his Mexican Brass play some of those songs that will always be associated with Christmas", there are quite a lot you wouldn't, including ones called Snowbird, Post Horn Rock, Londonderry Air a.k.a. 'Danny Boy', and There Is A Tavern In The Town which you'd most likely recognise as 'Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes'.
Some are perky and some mellow, but they're all groovesome and the jazziest of the Tijuana cohort, especially their arrangement of the perennial Winter Wonderland. If you see it hanging around in a charity shop try not to let the cover put you off buying it, as it's a really fun, swingin' record.
Not quite as swingin' is the album by the genre's originator, Christmas With Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass, sent to me last December by dear pal and fellow car boot botherer Beany.
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| Christmas With Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass (1968) |
This 1971 reissue of what was originally titled "Christmas Album" is on the Mayfair imprint, a budget series belonging to Herb's own label A&M. It was distributed by Pye, and when held up to strong light the otherwise black-looking vinyl disc becomes red and translucent, like much of Pye's output in the 1970s.
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| Original US cover |
It's a pleasant enough record but a little too... well... tasteful for my tastes; far more restrained and even muted in comparison to his usual Tijuana Brass albums, and often not even very Christmassy. But it still reached no.1 on the US album chart every year between 1968 and 1970, so it clearly hit the spot for many.
I'll be back tomorrow (Tuesday the 20th of December) with more festive car bootery, but until then you can listen to me introducing and playing over an hour of all-vinyl Christmas tunes on Car Boot Christmas 2016. It's totally family-friendly, and you can use the player below or click the link to go directly to Mixcloud.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
Saturday, 17 December 2016
Car Boot Christmas Countdown 2016 - Day 3
It's Day 3 of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, and today's albums are from three male country artists. Let's start with this, bought in June of this year for £1.
Charley Pride was born in in Mississippi and enjoyed a successful career as a baseball player before moving on to one in singing, becoming huge in the 1970s, mainly with the nana crowd. A pioneer in the world of African-American country, he remains one of only three black artists (all men) to be inducted into the Grand Ole Opry.
1970's Christmas In My Home Town opens with the tinkling of bells and the cheerful title track, which is among the handful of pop-country Christmas songs here, the others being Happy Christmas Day, and of course Santa And The Kids which featured on Car Boot Christmas 2014. More traditional country style tracks such as The First Christmas Morn and Christmas And Love benefit from the dreamy backing vocals of The Jordinaires, but the carols work less well, his renditions of Deck The Halls and Silent Night falling a bit flat.
The album was reissued on CD in the US in 1998 with a different cover and the title "Happy Christmas Day". It was remastered in 2013 with three bonus tracks and the original cover image restored. Charley is still going strong today at the grand old age of 82.
Sadly no longer with us is the legend that was Johnny Cash, and I picked up his 1963 LP The Christmas Spirit at a boot sale in May of 2015 in a 3-for-a-fiver deal.
This was Cash's first Christmas album and four of the twelve songs are written by the man himself, including the spoken-word title track where over piano and choir Johnny dreams of travelling the world. His journey begins in London where he's greeted by a chestnut seller in Piccadilly, and here Johnny's cockney "Hello mate!" is priceless.
Poverty and Jesus always seem to have gone hand in hand in country music, and there's plenty of both here, the storytelling both sung and narrated in Cash' echoing boom. The Ballad of the Harp Weaver, a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay, is probably the most depressing track amongst a rather downbeat collection. While this isn't exactly a party album, it's still full of Christmas spirit, just not the kind that comes decked in tinsel or slathered in sleigh bells.
I found a slightly battered copy of Gene Autry's Christmas Cracker at a car boot in August of last year, for the princely sum of 25p.
Gene "The Singing Cowboy" Autry hailed from Texas and found fame singing on the radio after being refused a recording contract with RCA Victor in 1928. He eventually signed with Columbia and his career spanned movies and TV as well as the music industry. In all he made some 640 recordings, over 300 of which were self-penned or co-written.
Like many Christmas albums, one side of this consists of secular songs, with the other devoted to carols. His 1949 US no.1 Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer gets Side 1 off to a gallop, followed by other child-friendly favourites such as Up On The House Top written in 1864 by Benjamin Hanby, and an adaptation of the American rhyme 'Ten Little Indians' called Nine Little Reindeer. Like Charley Pride, Autry's country style is better suited to these than the mostly solemn Side 2, at the end of which an uncredited male lead is joined by a choir for What Child Is This?, rounding things off quite nicely even though Autry's sudden disappearance is quite odd. There are short spoken sections between some songs, and it's here that my 25p record really shows its age, but I just close my eyes and pretend the crackles are coming from a nice log fire.
You can hear Gene and a whole host of other artists on this year's Car Boot Christmas cloudcast below. Join me again tomorrow, Sunday the 18th of December, for Day 4 of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, where I'll be taking a look at two very different seasonal records.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
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| Charley Pride - Christmas In My Home Town (1970) |
Charley Pride was born in in Mississippi and enjoyed a successful career as a baseball player before moving on to one in singing, becoming huge in the 1970s, mainly with the nana crowd. A pioneer in the world of African-American country, he remains one of only three black artists (all men) to be inducted into the Grand Ole Opry.
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| 1998 CD cover |
The album was reissued on CD in the US in 1998 with a different cover and the title "Happy Christmas Day". It was remastered in 2013 with three bonus tracks and the original cover image restored. Charley is still going strong today at the grand old age of 82.
Sadly no longer with us is the legend that was Johnny Cash, and I picked up his 1963 LP The Christmas Spirit at a boot sale in May of 2015 in a 3-for-a-fiver deal.
 |
| Johnny Cash - The Christmas Spirit (1963) Mother in law Maybelle Carter plays autoharp |
This was Cash's first Christmas album and four of the twelve songs are written by the man himself, including the spoken-word title track where over piano and choir Johnny dreams of travelling the world. His journey begins in London where he's greeted by a chestnut seller in Piccadilly, and here Johnny's cockney "Hello mate!" is priceless.
Poverty and Jesus always seem to have gone hand in hand in country music, and there's plenty of both here, the storytelling both sung and narrated in Cash' echoing boom. The Ballad of the Harp Weaver, a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay, is probably the most depressing track amongst a rather downbeat collection. While this isn't exactly a party album, it's still full of Christmas spirit, just not the kind that comes decked in tinsel or slathered in sleigh bells.
I found a slightly battered copy of Gene Autry's Christmas Cracker at a car boot in August of last year, for the princely sum of 25p.
 |
| Gene Autry's Christmas Cracker (1966) What a great cover! |
Gene "The Singing Cowboy" Autry hailed from Texas and found fame singing on the radio after being refused a recording contract with RCA Victor in 1928. He eventually signed with Columbia and his career spanned movies and TV as well as the music industry. In all he made some 640 recordings, over 300 of which were self-penned or co-written.
Like many Christmas albums, one side of this consists of secular songs, with the other devoted to carols. His 1949 US no.1 Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer gets Side 1 off to a gallop, followed by other child-friendly favourites such as Up On The House Top written in 1864 by Benjamin Hanby, and an adaptation of the American rhyme 'Ten Little Indians' called Nine Little Reindeer. Like Charley Pride, Autry's country style is better suited to these than the mostly solemn Side 2, at the end of which an uncredited male lead is joined by a choir for What Child Is This?, rounding things off quite nicely even though Autry's sudden disappearance is quite odd. There are short spoken sections between some songs, and it's here that my 25p record really shows its age, but I just close my eyes and pretend the crackles are coming from a nice log fire.
You can hear Gene and a whole host of other artists on this year's Car Boot Christmas cloudcast below. Join me again tomorrow, Sunday the 18th of December, for Day 4 of the Car Boot Christmas Countdown, where I'll be taking a look at two very different seasonal records.
https://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-christmas-2016/
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