Obscure recording artists

I was digging thru a stack of records I got recently and came upon recordings by a couple artists with whom I was not familiar. Johnny Nace and Jana Jae. Johnny Nace was a singer/songwriter and also program director and disc jockey for KDRO radio in Sedalia, Missouri. KDRO is now a flea power AM station that has about a five mile range. It was the bomb back in the '70's when the record I have was recorded. The record I have is titled "In The Country With Johnny Nace". It is on the Nova label, stereo and has some pretty good material on it. Jana Jae was a name I thought I had heard somewhere before, but just could not place exactly where. I Googled her and found that she was a fiddle player with the Buck Owens band "The Buckaroos" and appeared with the band on "HEE HAW" while it was on tv. I have two of her albums, "By Request" and "The Devil You Say!", both from (I'm guessing) the middle '70's. She records on the Lark label, and has some big name Nashville studio musicians as well as The Buckaroos appearing with her. She is a pretty good fiddle player. She was born in 1942, so that would make her 71 now. Wonder if she is still fiddling? I love finding the more obscure artists. Sometimes I get a pleasant surprise!

Regards

WC

I had mentioned finding this site before, I thought I'd give it a try on at least one of the artists you mentioned. Possibly the resource might be of use to you. Your knowledge of the artists may be of use to them. A lot of web history is woven from different folks' memories.

I ran across another obscure artist. Rusty Harris "A Tribute To Hank Williams" on the Diplomat label, DS 2252, Stereo. There is a good reason why Rusty Harris is not a household name for his singing abilities. The music on the album is pretty good. I am guessing that this album is from the middle '60's. Diplomat Records were made by the Synthetic Plastics Co., Newark, NJ. This label was found in dime stores and drug stores on a rack by the checkout stand. This one still has the plastic on it and there is a price tag, from Rexall Drugs marked $1.49.

Regards

WC

I used to get Christmas lp's from my hardware store, and, the records were marked True Value on the label of the jacket. Every year they would come out with a new record . They used some of the popular artists. Alot of the cheerful music was very good, actually. They originally sold for 1.98. They were all stereo, and, had fine sound.

I remember the Goodyear, Goodrich, Firestone and Western Auto stores would have an annual Christmas album, too.

Yes. I have some of those Firestone christmas records, etc.... Some of the music was actually very good.

I'll bet they also helped sell some of those consoles the customers looked over and thought about during the year.

Well, not my hardware store...
But, who knows. I know firestone stuff was sometimes sold by Monkey Ward.

I have a stack of Firestone Christmas records. Grandpa bought most of them. He used Firestone tires almost exclusively, and was considered a good customer by the local Firestone store. He probably got most of them gratis. Those records were always too high tone for my taste. I really don't get into longhair music or opera. Gordon McRae, Robert Goulet, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Italian tenors were regular contributors to Firestone Christmas records. No Kitty Wells or Red Foley, so they were not my cup of tea.

I have a collection of RCA, Magnavox, Zenith and Admiral demonstration records. The ones you got when you bought a new console stereo. They may make your stereo sound good, but there are a bunch of strange artists on them as well. Peter Nero, Marty Gold, Hugo & Luigi, Dick Shory, Sid Ramin, Erich Leinsdorf, Robert Shaw, Charles Munch, Leontyne Price. Them ain't country artists! Maybe not obscure, but certainly not any that I would buy on purpose. Only two artists on those records I ever heard of. Frankie Carle and Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra. I like Frankie Carle.

Regards

WC

I've heard of Peter Nero. Hugo & Luigi, The Robert Shaw Chorale and Leontyne Price. There were a few of their recordings around the house growing up. I guess it wasn't until the early '70's that C&W Christmas and general promo collections started coming out.

Hugo & Luigi produced records for Perry Como. I am the original "bah humbug" on Christmas music. If it were up to me, Christmas music would only be played on Christmas Day. "Holly Jolly Christmas", "Twelve Days Of Christmas", and "The Little Drummer Boy" would not be played at all!

Regards

WC

I just re-discovered my Moon Mullican CD "Seven Nights to Rock". Moon Mullican has been known to me for several years, but may not be familiar to others.

Moon Mullican was born in 1909 and died New Years Day, 1967. A hard-drinking and notoriously unreliable performer, he was born Aubrey Mullican to a preacher and his wife in Texas. His main claim to fame was that he was one of the first "rockabilly" artists to introduce electrically amplified instruments to country music. His early influence were the black honky tonks of the south and his music exhibited this influence. He got his nickname "Moon" from his affinity for drinking white liquor. He was a three-finger piano player much like Del Wood, and, later, Jerry Lee Lewis and Mickey Gilley. He actually recorded "Mona Lisa" in 1950, several years before Nat King Cole who had the hit on the song in 1955. He also recorded "Wanted" in 1952, a song made famous by the late great Perry Como, in 1957. The Mullican version of both these songs are done to a western swing beat and Moon's three-finger piano. Mullican was known to be in the middle of a performance and suddenly just get up and leave! He would disappear for a time, then return and take up where he left off. This activity earned him a well-deserved reputation for unreliability that would plague him as time went on. Although singers like Red Foley, Jimmy Davis and Hank Williams were also hard drinkers, their reputations were more established and so weathered this better. By the early 1960's, Mullican's musical career was pretty much done and his health, due to hard drinking and life on the road, was rapidly deteriorating. "I'll Sail My Ship Alone", "Pipeliner", and "Jole Blon" were three of Mullican's more famous recordings. "Sugar Beet" is actually my personal favorite Moon Mullican recording.

Regards

WC

Wildcat445: "There is a good reason why Rusty Harris is not a household name for his singing abilities."

What is it?

My polite way of saying that, in my opinion, Mr. Harris was not much of a singer.

Regards

WC