While looking through the archives, I made a comment that the last Madison bargain hunt was the best hunts since the lucky Davenport finds of 3 years ago, hard to believe time has passed that quickly.
Since then I really begin to piece together the record collection that I grew up with, back when my mom had these forty fives in her collection and being brats that me and my brother was didn't take care of the lesser 45s and wore the grooves off the ones we did like.
Looking back upon 50 years of record collecting, I've seen the early days of rock and roll, was too young for Beatlemania and Woodstock but managed to be there at the time punk rock and disco came out, new wave and the Twin Cities outbreak of Husker Du/Replacements and the demise of music as we know it and now too old for Burning Man or whatever New Musical Express touts. There'll still be good music out there but none of it will turn my head around as the early years of Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Everly Brothers and Paul Anka. The record collection discovered going to Grandma Ambrose's house and opening my mind up with lots of rock, lots of pop, some R and B and plenty of instrumental muzak pap as well. And yes, it did open my mind up to more music that my rock and roll friends wouldn't touch. But over time, those records either got too scratchy or broken and I spent many a time searching for them
If I thought last June's Mad City hunts were the second best since Davenport 2014, last weekend topped that, simply of the fact that the old 45s of the past I found were in fairly good shape and not too scratched up. The wide scope of finding records that was part of my mom's collection was beyond belief and while the August 2014 finds still remain the best overall, The October Mad City 45s are a very close second. Memories of my childhood reign in these dusty grooves from the past and if nothing else, brings us full circle. If this is truly is the last or final bargain hunt as always threatened, then it has been a blast. While Mad City Music X had the choicest and more rocking of the songs, The Williamson St Vincent De Paul had some fine country singles too. But the cherry on top was the other St Vincent De Paul on Park St, with the buy them by the pound, to which I found 8 45s for a quarter!
The fun of going to thrift stores and used stores is the never knowing of what I'm going to find till I come across it. Since picking up a turntable a decade and half ago, my 45 collection has grown by leaps and bounds but the nostalgic feeling of finding a record I once had and buying it is euphoric. Kinda like a rush so to speak. Now I'm not so sure if rediscovering everything my mom used to have is cost effective, sometimes it's a quarter wasted. But if it's the right record, it will jog a memory of a forgotten song now playing on the record player.
My mother had a very rough childhood and the only thing that kept her going it seems was a trip to Kresge's and pick up a few singles along the way home from school with her sister. You can make fun of Frankie Avalon or Paul Anka but somehow they shaped the way I listen to music. Certainly there was room for them as well as Chuck Berry or Elvis or The Marcels. The 10 songs picked out, all are not rock, some are instrumental, some are pop and the rest just plain out of the ordinary. But then again my mom always did have an off the wall ear for music, it's a shame she quit buying records and left that up to me. But basically my music collection is an extension of her collection. For better or worse, this is where my music education started.
1). Way Down Yonder In New Orleans-Freddy Cannon (Swan 4043) #3 1959
2). What In The World Come Over You-Jack Scott (Top Rank 2028) #5 1960
3). Diana-Paul Anka (ABC-Paramount 45-9831) #1 1957
4). Sea Of Love-Phil Phillips (Mercury 71465) #2 1959
5) Just Between You And Me-The Chordettes (Cadence 1330) #8 1958
6) Three Little Pigs-Lloyd Price (ABC Paramount 45-10032) 1959
7) The Enchanted Sea-The Islanders (Mayflower M-16) #15 1959
8) Ride!-Dee See Sharp (Cameo 230) #5 1962
9) I'm Walkin'-Ricky Nelson (Verve V-10047) #4 1957
10) Forever-The Little Dippers (University 210) #9 1960
Dee Dee Sharp song Ride! originally came from a cheap best of that came out on Wyconte which Cameo Parkway used for loss leader albums, or the 1.98 special as we call them. The album featured other hits from the likes of Chubby Checker, Bobby Rydell, The Orlons and the Dovells. My mom was a big Ricky Nelson fan, she had a few Imperial singles, but there was an unmarked 45 with the label fallen off, but it may have been this song. The Little Dippers, might be the least of all the songs on this blog, I'm guessing it's some of the finer Nashiville Session players (Buddy Harman, Boots Randolph, Floyd Creamer, and Anita Kerr Singers) and it was produced by Buddy Killen, who later produced Joe Tex and a few others. Randolph blows his sax on Two By Four, the B side. In those days Nashville sessionmen did play on a lot of records and moonlight on occasion (see Spar Records, Tom And Jerry) under alias. The Islanders were a different group, probably a more garage pop band and may wanted to be The Ventures but didn't have quite enough backing to make it more worthwhile. The Enchanted Sea is full of seaside sound effects and I get a smile hearing this all over again. As well as the B side Pollyanna, nothing more than a medium groove with a chant of Pollyanna for words. In this day and age, it's a fading footnote before the Beatles and heavy rock but sometimes innocent rock and roll still makes a fine listen.
The Chordettes have made the Singles Going Steady a few times but it is Just Between You And me, with the carefree call and response singers that this song was a long time looking for. Pervious copies that I have seen were too scratchy to buy. It looks worse for wear but it actually plays pretty good. As for Anka, he may have been a teen idol, and either Mom or her sister were big fans, they had about 4 other Anka forty fives, but of course Diana is his best known outside of the one of the worst all time singles of the 70s You're Having My Baby. The nearest source of Anka's music and persona would be Bobby Darin, but while Anka stayed more to a pop Vegas and MOR sound, Darin discovered his folk roots which made Darin the better of the two stars. Another found forty five of Anka's Hello Young Lovers showed him going for that big band sound of Mack The Knife fame, more about that in the next installment of the Madison Singles next time we meet.
Another teen idol would be Freddy Cannon, which Tallahassee Lassie was the first song that really grabbed my attention. Single number 2 was his Way Down Yonder In NO a very jumpy and rocking number even if Frank Slay's arrangements were a bit more jazzier than rocking. The hope is to find a version of Kookie Hat and I can complete that piece of rock history in my collection. Jack Scott took a bit more getting used to, his songs were more melancholy and darker than Anka or Cannon, but it turns out that What In The World's Come Over You has sounded better over time.
On the other side of the R and B fence, we have Phil Phillips' one hit of Sea Of Love which sounds a bit more New Orleans but more stripped down. Lloyd Price had a hit with I'm Gonna Get Married but B side Three Little Pigs was more fun to hear. Price's ABC years were his better known and best. Sometimes B sides were the better, or least to these ears.
With that, this concludes the first installment of the Madison 45 finds. The next blog deals with songs from that era of 1957-1964 with more country thrown in. Most of those records I'm sure Mom would have bought them had she heard them but if she had the kind of record buying that I do have, I may be born to a different mom. But in typical R S Crabb form, look for a more wider ride of music styles on the next blog.
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