CD - VA - Great RandB Instrumentals

Tracks
Lee Allen & His Band - Boppin' At The Hop,Jimmy Forrest & His All Star Combo - Night Train,Larry Dale - Keep Getting Up,Wild Jimmy Spruill - Hard Grind,Googie Rene & His Band - Side-Track,Plas Johnson & His Orchestra - Hoppin' Mad,Irving Ashby - Big Guitar,Joe Liggins And His Honeydrippers - The Honeydripper,Lloyd Glenn & His Band - Southbound Special,Big Bob Dougherty & His Band - Honky,Pee Wee Crayton - Blues After Hours,Paul Williams & His Hucklebuckers - The Hucklebuck,Little Jessie - Huggin' Ernie Freeman - Jivin' Around (Part 1),Ernie Freeman - Jivin' Around (Part 2),Joe Houston - All Night Long,Maxwell Davis And His Orchestra - Boogie Cocktails,Roy Milton & His Solid Senders - T-Town Twist,Ernie Fields Orchestra - The Happy Whistler,Jimmy Beck And His Orchestra - Pipe Dreams,Buddy Lucas - Deacon John,Rene Hall - Thunderbird,Bobby Peterson Quintet - The Hunch,The Mar-Keys - Whot's Happenin'!,Booker T & The Mgs - Red Beans And Rice.
When The First Of The Instrumentals On This Cd Came Out I Was But Five Years Old. Yet Pee Wee Crayton's Blues After Hours Is Nevertheless Lodged In My Memory Bank As One Of The Great 'Finds' Of My Teenage Record-Collecting Years. In Many Ways, The Biggest Buzz In Record Collecting Is Coming Across Great Tracks That You Never Knew Existed. Many Of The Tracks On This Cd Once Fell Into That Category For Me.
The "Teen Beat" Series On Ace Tended To Concentrate On The Rock Instrumental Genre, And In Between That Series And This Release (Possibly Sub-Titled "Grown-Up Beat"?) Came The Wonderful "Honky Tonk!" (Cdchd 761) That Showcased The King/Federal R&B Instrumental Titles. I Guess The R&B Instros Are Closer To My Heart, Since There Is Always More Emphasis On The Horns, Rather Than Banks Of Guitar Players. In My Own Case, The Instrumental That Really Caught My Attention Was Dave 'Baby' Cortez's The Happy Organ, From Whence I Went Backwards In Time - Record-Collecting Wise - To Discover Other Sounds Related To The Hit I Had Fallen In Love With.
This Led Me To The Phenomenon Of The Kansas City Influenced 'Jump' Bands, And The Hard-Pumped Sax Players Like Joe Houston And Big Jay Mcneely. Like Others Of My Generation, We Had Often Thought At The Time That Some Of The Names Included On This Cd Were More Jazz, But On Dipping Our Toes In The Water It Often Turned Out That They Were Surprisingly Close To The R&B Sounds We Were Buying. It Was To Be Much Later Before I Was Able To Work Out That After World War Ii The Big Bands That Had Existed Gradually Got Whittled Down To Smaller Conglomerations. The Economics Of Keeping 10 Or 12 Pieces On The Road For Personal Appearances Stopped Adding Up, As The 45rpm Record And The Round-The-Clock Music Based Radio Stations Ate Into The Live Ballroom Scene. Venues Became Bars Or Small Clubs, Where Often A Big Band Couldn't Physically Fit, And A Catchy Simplified Riff Put On Vinyl Could Garner More Cash For A Combo Leader With Four Sidemen Than He Was Getting For Five Or Six Nights Work With A Larger Group.
As John Broven Observes In His Introductory Note, The Pivotal Moment Probably Occurred With Bill Doggett's Honky Tonk In 195
6. Every Burgeoning White Rock 'N' Group Probably Had A Stab At Putting The Ostensibly Simple Riff Into Their Repertoire, Even Though Most Of Them Didn't Contain Musicians Of The Calibre Of Guitarist Billy Butler Or Tenor Sax Man Clifford Scott.
The Names On This Cd Are Exclusively Superior Musicians: These Are Emphatically Not Your Average Garage Bands - The Like Of Which Was To Come In Later Years Amongst The Predominantly Guitar-Led Rock'n'roll Instrumental Groups, Some Of Whom Have Appeared In The "Teen Beat" Series. No, These Guys Had A History - Just Work Your Way Through Stuart Colman's Annotated Jottings To Each Track, And You'll See That Very Few Were Wet Behind The Ears In The Music Business. These Were Men Who Had Often Come Up Through Jazz, And Indeed, In Some Cases Felt They Were Going Downmarket By Playing The R&B Way. Lee Allen, Jimmy Forrest And Plas Johnson Are Three Who Went Back To Jazz Whenever An Opportunity Presented Itself. Others Had Come From More Of A Cocktail Lounge Environment, But Added A Harder Edge - Check Out Lloyd Glenn And Pee Wee Crayton For Instance. But All In All These Guys Knew Their Instruments Inside Out, And Their Experience Enabled Them To Produce Records Of Great Quality, So Listeners Today Can Marvel At What Sounds Could Be Created On A 2-Track Tape Recorder, Without The Technology Available Some 50 Years Later.
Many Of The Recordings Were Undoubtedly Worked Out In The Studio As 'Head' Arrangements - This Was Not The Era Of Six Months Of Overdubs And Edits To Get A Perfect Finished Result. All The More Remarkable, Then, That No-One In These Groups Plays A Duff Note Or Wanders Off The Beat...At Least, Not If They Wanted To Keep Their Jobs!
It Would Be Unfair Of Me To Pick Out My Own Favourites From These 25 Great Tracks, So I Won't. But Knowing My Predilection For Sax Players In General, You Will Know That This Is A Treat Of A Cd For Me.
I Wish I Was Only 16 Again, Coming Across Some Of This Stuff For The First Time. But Coming Across These Tracks Afresh 40 Years Later Is A Pretty Damn Good Experience, Too.