I'm cheap enough that paying $15 for this 1959 stereo release gave me serious pause at the LP bins of an Old Market antique emporium.
On one hand, I'd rather find a gem for a song at an estate sale or something.
On the other hand, the records from this vendor are usually in marvelous playing condition.
On the third hand, a stereo rock 'n' roll record from 1959 -- the mono version of Bobby Freeman's Do You Wanna Dance album came out the previous year -- and from an indie label, no less. That's likely on the rare side, making the $15 price not a rip-off.
I'll say!
BEFORE LISTENING to this early-rock classic this evening, I did a little Internet price checking for the stereo version of Do You Wanna Dance . . . Jubilee 1086 for all you record geeks out there. And the low price I found it being sold for was something like $29.95. The high price (on eBay, of course) was . . . was . . . gulp! . . . $110. I understand a mint first pressing goes for $200.
Mine seems to be a second pressing. Sigh. I coulda been rich.
Now note that amid all this "What's it wurf???" nerd-o-mania, not a word was written about the actual music, which was great despite following the rock-album convention of the day for a hot act. That would be:
SIDE A
- Cover something.
- Cover something.
- Cover something.
- Original that'll never be released as a single.
- Cover something.
- Hit record we named the LP for.
SIDE B
- Cover something.
- Cover something.
- Original that you'll hear nowhere else. Ever.
- Cover something.
- Original that sounds exactly like the big hit on Side 1.
- Cover something inspiring. Or something.
That is all. Good night, and good listening.
Was anybody better than Billy Eckstine?
Several were as good but none better, I don't think. And this 1959 stereo version of Eckstine's 1958 Billy's Best album makes for fine listening on a hot, steamy Midwestern eve.
Hell, it would be just as wonderful on a frigid winter's night on the Plains, too.
So this was tonight's musical selection here in the Revolution 21 studio here in Omaha, by God, Nebraska, deep into the dog days of summer, with state-fair season still a month away and college football a little further out than that.
UNLIKE many vinyl aficionados, I have nothing in particular against compact discs or good-quality digital audio files. But, damn, there's really nothing like putting an old LP on the turntable, basking in that particular smell of aged cardboard and paper. Nothing like holding the record sleeve in your hands and dreaming of your lost youth . . . or the days when jazz ruled the western world and you were yet a glimmer in your mama and daddy's eyes.
Maybe you can't hold this '50s classic of American popular music in your own two hands, but you can always listen to 3 Chords & the Truth and dream sweet dreams about a culture at its zenith that's just showing off.
Because it could.
Here's a glimpse at my vintage listening for last night -- Billy Vaughn and his orchestra goes Hawaiian back in 1959.
Well, contrary to Dot Record's sloganeering, this LP represents not "the greatest sound on records!" but rather, "Really great, but still no RCA Victor release from the same era."
I know this because I'm a nerd.
A vintage record nerd, with geek tendencies.
ACTUALLY, this LP was amazingly clean and unworn, despite its vintage. It sounded new, even after all these decades.
The vinyl itself was a little warped but still played flawlessly. And the album still was in the Sears and Roebuck plastic wrap.
I can almost see, a half century and six years past, the music going 'round and 'round on something like this . . . right out of Sears' 1959 Christmas catalog. Musical satisfaction guaranteed.
Aloha.
