A Yodel For The Bear Family label ...

[kenny weir]

Anyone heard of Bob Newman?

Back in the day I used to have and utterly adore this Bear Family vinyl reissue of his King recordings:

For the past few years, as my interest in such things has been reignited, the wish that the label would do the business on Newman has been nagging away at me.

Little did I know that in 1995 a label simply called The Hound - one of those labels, no address, email, or any other indicators of origin etc etc - had done just that business.

Gosh, it's just a dream to have this back in my daily soundtrack.

I've looked fairly widely and there's not a lot to be found out about Bob.

Bass player - who plays on at least some of these cuts I don't know.

In a band called the Georgia Crackers with brother Hank.

Most of this stuff recorded for King using the usual suspects, although the CD has later tracks that are also pretty good.

Available pics make him look like a humble bank teller or some such.

Boozer who came to a non-descript end.

Outstanding songwriter.

GENIUS singer.

No kidding ...

This is almost all hot-as-blazes hillybilly boogie - like King-era Delmores on crack.

The inclusion of Lonesome Truck Driver's Blues and Haulin' Freight mark Bob as a pioneer in this significant country genre. On the former he pays homage to fellow King artist Moon Mullican.

Hangover Boogie, Quanrantined Love, Sand Boogie, It Hurts Me, the quasi-raunchy Baby Take Me Home With and Tonight's The Night (suck on THIS, Rod Stewart), and many more - all classics.

Buckets of humour here - including a take on Heehaw's Phftt! You Were Gone - pretty much his main claim to fame outside collector circles, as far as I can tell.

But the singing's the thing.

Bob is pure country, but more in the suave Hawkshaw Hakins/Johnny Mercer manner.

But what sets him apart and above just anybody I've heard do this kind of stuff is the phrasing, delivery and swing. Newman pushes his voice in a way unique, in my hearing, to country.

Instead of the usual influences - Bing Crosby, Jimmie Rodgers and so on - one can easily imagine him channeling Roy Brown or Wynonie Harris.

That would make not so much a country crooner as a country shouter!

Unreservedly recommended if you can find it.

And I wouldn't be surprised to see Bear Family eventually get around to this again.

Best source of info on Newman I've found: http://www.bopping.org/eng/?p=23&cpage=2

Edited January 24, 2010 by kenny weir

[Big Beat Steve]

Agreed 100%, Kenny, though I guess I'll never understand how somebody can let go of something he really likes just because it is on good ol' vinyl and not on thoe little silver platters. I for one do keep and cherish my Bob Newman LP on Bear Family I bought way back when. (But then again I am a vinyl nut anyway )

"Country shouter" really is the word!

The "Hound" label was fairly common for quite a while through the 90s at the usual suspects' (sellers) record stalls present at the corresponding "subculture" (e.g. rockabilly) concerts. I do guess it is of European origin (Dutch, in fact); was unaware of this Bob Newman compilation but I have the Wade Ray and Billy Jack Wills compilations from that label. If you look closer on that CD you will find a record number code headed off by "TRG". And in more recent times a "TRG" label (certainly of the same origin) has been resurrecting similar pre-rockabilly hillbilly/"Western Bop" stuff too. Even U.S. sellers (through one well-known auction site, for instance) handle it.

Edited January 24, 2010 by Big Beat Steve

[skeith]

From the stuff you mentioned, I like Merle Haggard the best. One of the best voices in country music and a good songwriter. Before I took the plunge, I was familiar with "Okie From Muskogee" and "The Bottle Let Me Down" and probably "today I started Loving you again". I jumped in with the boxed set "Down Every Road" and then got the Capitol twofers of the first 8 or 10 releases - I'm partial to the earlier stuff.

[kenny weir]

From the stuff you mentioned, I like Merle Haggard the best. One of the best voices in country music and a good songwriter.

No, no, no! Wrong, wrong, wrong! IMHO!

Hag has one of the GREAT voices, not just in country but anywhere, anytime.

And he's a FANTASTIC songwriter.

As well, he's a good player who taught himself to become a pretty fair fiddler for the Bob Wills project, has great, diverse tastes and a real feel for the various traditions in American music.

Hag's achievements should see him lauded in the same way Dylan is, rather than compared with other country artists.

Edited January 25, 2010 by kenny weir

[skeith]

From the stuff you mentioned, I like Merle Haggard the best. One of the best voices in country music and a good songwriter.

No, no, no! Wrong, wrong, wrong! IMHO!

Hag has one of the GREAT voices, not just in country but anywhere, anytime.

And he's a FANTASTIC songwriter.

As well, he's a good player who taught himself to become a pretty fair fiddler for the Bob Wills project, has great, diverse tastes and a real feel for the various traditions in American music.

Hag's achievements should see him lauded in the same way Dylan is, rather than compared with other country artists.

Yes, Kenny I really think you are right!! I just thought people would think I am nuts if I said it. You put it well

[L-P]

Dear Kenny Weir,

I need to get hold of you reg Bear Family.

Please contact me off list at royal.beat@telia.com

Best

L-P Anderson

International Representative

Bear Family Records

+46 736 293434

+46 302 43545

royal.beat@telia.com

www.bear-family.de

"It's not even out of question that some artists would be more flattered to have their own Bear Family boxed set than a Grammy."

LOS ANGELES TIMES

[Tjazz]

Yes, those BEAR FAMILY box sets are addictive.

They are releasing a 2nd Buck Owens BEAR FAMILY box set. 1965-1968 (7CD)

[AllenLowe]

"Dear Kenny Weir,

I need to get hold of you reg Bear Family.

Please contact me off list at royal.beat@telia.com"

uh oh, Kenny's in trouble now - I always wondered why he had an Andorra address.

Edited February 25, 2010 by AllenLowe

[kenny weir]

"Dear Kenny Weir,

I need to get hold of you reg Bear Family.

Please contact me off list at royal.beat@telia.com"

uh oh, Kenny's in trouble now - I always wondered why he had an Andorra address.

No, it's all good. I think. Ongoing but amicable.

[kenny weir]

Having become involved in a series of emails with the label's L-P Anderson, I couldn't resist the urge to fire off a couple of questions - just out of journalistic and musical nosiness.

Not big on detail, but here are their responses:

******

Dear Kenny,

Here’s some answers from me and Richard

Best

L-P

1. How did you find out about the organissimo forum and its Bear Family thread? Do you or others actively look for BF topics on the web?

L-P Anderson: As responsible for much of the marketing and promotion, part of my job is to be updated about what’s said and written about Bear Family. I stumbled on the organissimo thread by co-incidence. We all love your “The Fun Way To Poverty”-slogan…

2. Do you know of other bulletin boards or the like where BF-style music is discussed? BF is discussed somewhat at the Steve Hoffman BB, but it's hardly a priority nor very precise. The blues and country forums I've found are, alternatively, pretty limited in scope (blues) or horribly modern-mainstream (country). Hence, the best place to discuss this broad swathe of roots music I've found is a jazz forum!

L-P Anderson: There’s many good forums on internet. I usually stumble upon them when searching for reviews of our records (that’s how I found organissimo)

3. What are BF's top box set sellers?

Richard Weize: WE NEVER FOLLOWED THAT UP OVER THE YEARS, BUT PROBABLY THE BEST IS A GERMAN SET: GUENTER NEUMANN. OTHERS ARE MOSTLY OKAY, SINCE WE NEVER SOLD VAST AMOUNTS, IT GOES SORT UP TO 3000 UNITS.

4. What are the worst? (I know you won't tell me this, but I gotta ask anyway ...)

Richard Weize: THE WORST ARE ALSO GERMAN SETS BY KONSTANTIN WECKER:

5. Have any of your box sets have sold out? (My Melbourne guy once told me that one of the Duane Eddy boxes was gone.) Do you let the box sets sell out? Do you make more if one sells out?

Richard Weize: SOMETIMES WE DELETE, DUE TO BAD SALES IN RECENT YEARS. IT IS OFTEN NOT WORTH IT: DUANE EDDY ONLY THE FIRST BOX IS DELETED, DUE TO CONTRACTS:

6. Are all your colleagues music nuts? Or do some start musically ambivalent and then gradually get the bug?

Richard Weize: SOME ARE, SOME ARE NOT, I WORK MOSTLY WITH OUTSIDE FREAKS & EXPERTS.

7. Outside of Germany and the US, what are BF's best countries?

Richard Weize: MOSTLY EUROPE, AND EUROPEAN COMPANIES EXPORT TO THE STATES.

Edited March 2, 2010 by kenny weir

[ghost of miles]

I've got their Carter Family box, but none of the other country sets--though two of my buddies here in B-town are waaaaayyy into the country sets. I'd like to eventually pick up the Johnny Cash conceptual-album Come Along and Ride This Train box... on the non-country side, would love to see a third Nat King Cole set that covered 1950-54, but I understand that's unlikely at this point.

[gmonahan]

I've got their Carter Family box, but none of the other country sets--though two of my buddies here in B-town are waaaaayyy into the country sets. I'd like to eventually pick up the Johnny Cash conceptual-album Come Along and Ride This Train box... on the non-country side, would love to see a third Nat King Cole set that covered 1950-54, but I understand that's unlikely at this point.

Oh, so would I. The two Cole boxes Bear has put out are really magnificent--complete and with incredible, beautiful books to go with them. A '50-'54 box, even in a smaller format, would be way, way cool.

gregmo

[Dave James]

Not too deep into Bear Family releases. I have some early Chet Atkins and all four Dean Martin boxes. They do a nice job. A guy could get lost in there. I've made it a point no to.

[kenny weir]

an email I got this morning:

*****

On July the 2nd, 2010 a very special Bear Family box set will be released.

”Next Stop is Vietnam – The War on Record 1961-2008”

13 cds in a 12”x12” slipcase accompanied by a 304 page hardcover book.

Foreword by Country Joe McDonald.

Artists include; The Doors, Fugs, Joan Baez, Grand Funk Railroad, Ernest Tubb, Jimmy Holiday, John & Yoko and The Plastic Ono Band, Marvin Gaye, Roger Mcguinn, 10,000 Maniacs, R.E.M, Bellamy Brothers, Steve Earle, Dead Milkmen, Bob Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, William Bell, Eric Burden & The Animals, John Lee Hooker, Flying Burrito Brothers, Beach Boys, Merle Haggard, Jimmy Cliff, Donovan and many, many, many more…

A music historical documentation of the Vietnam war like no other.

*****

Wow, looks like a killing set - whew, 13 discs, though!

I wonder if they've done any research to see whether there's a likely market for this? It's a bit like their atomic age set, simultaneously wide-ranging AND very specific.

I'm rapt to see Aussie rockers Cold Chisel's immortal classic Khe Sanh is on there!

[paul secor]

I lived through that stuff the first time around. No desire to revisit it.

[kenny weir]

Roy Lee Johnson – When A Guitar Plays The Blues

I got this one just before Christmas, and was subsequently underwhelmed.

Lately, however, I’ve been enjoying it a lot.

A little while and a few threads back, I recall having disagreed with at least one of my venerable co-forumites:

His belief was that ‘60s soul was pretty much a wholly new thing.

Mine was that ‘60s soul – while having characteristics, engendered by the the civil rights movement and so on, that were new – was and is R&B. And as such, a continuation of a tradition and sound.

Well, to my ears, this music makes it absolutely clearcut. And, of course, it’s damn fine, too!

There’s a few tracks that were recorded at Fame with the usual suspects – so they’re straight-up ‘60s soul, pretty good, but in some ways just more of the same.

The real interest for me is the rest of it – recorded in a raw sound with varying combos, including Roy’s own bands and even Piano Red.

Just when you’re thinking “yeah, yeah - ‘60s soul”, a riff or a turn of phrase or a whole song will have you thinking Hank Ballard or ‘50s James Brown or Little Willie Littlefield.

As well, there’s some heavy guitar going on here. Roy crossed paths with Robert Ward early in his career, so there’s some of that tremelo madness to be had (there's even a cool version of Love Is Amazing, along with some even snottier guitar sounds.

There’s two versions of a cracker tune called Busybody, the earlier of which (sans horns and with barely audible piano) sounds to me like something that would’ve had pub rock blues bruisers Dr Feelgood leaping around with glee.

A fantastic release of ‘60s southern soul music that comes almost completely free of the house sounds of Stax, Dial or Fame et al.

Hank Snow – The Thesaurus Transcriptions

This five-disc set had been calling to me for a long while, so when I had the chance to secure a promo copy from Bear Family – in return for a small favour – I grabbed the chance with alacrity.

Initial plays found me a little disappointed, sad to say, although I’ve since been enjoying a bunch.

These sides were recorded by Hank under the auspices of his then label, but with – of course – a totally different purpose.

They were recorded with his own band, with a few ring-ins such as Chubby Wise thrown in, and the material ranges far and wide beyond his own official releases.

I really, really dig the idea of these sorts of transcription sides, with a road band in the studio instead of the usual hot shots.

But therein, too, lies the rub. Over this number of tunes (almost 140), there is a sameness. The pickers are fine, but when it comes to instrumentals such as Orange Blossom Special or San Antonio Rose, the results are, ahem, average to mundane. It'd all sound great, no doubt, in a bar or nightclub some where but ... turns out, there’s a reason for recording with hot shots afar all!

But there is an upside to all this: The preponderance of mid-tempo tunes gives the whole set a sort dreamlike quality that is beguiling.

I love Hank’s voice, and hearing him turn to the likes of Trouble In Mind, Peach Pickin’ Time In Georgia, I Almost Lost My Mind and The Wayward Wind is a kick.

It’s for those reasons that I’ll be keeping this handy, even if it isn’t easily recommended for general consumption.

(According to allmusic, BTW, this quite an old set - 1991 - so unsurprisingly, the book and the whole job in general is considerably more modest that we have come to expects from the label in the past decade or so. As well, the recording details provided are by necessity on the slim side ... not that that matters. )

Edited July 12, 2010 by kenny weir

[Quincy]

Leon McAuliffe – Tulsa Straight Ahead (Gonna Shake This Shack Tonight series)

Wow, wow, wow! This has blown me away. Capitol ’50s recordings from Bob Wills’ steel man. Nothing all that original here, but it all swings and rocks. More slick than the Wills recordings on which Leon performed – and more in line with the R&B-tinged cuts available by Billy Jack Wills. Great and hot fiddle, steel guitar and vocals.

I picked this one recently and good stuff as you say. I thought it was running a little long the first time I played it. Not the kindest thing to say, but there are a lot of rags. I popped it into the computer and there's some tricky German engineering going on as it runs 86:49. How'd they do that? (I know, I can Google for an answer.) I still haven't read all the way through the book length booklet. Bear Family just can't release a naked disc, can they.

I appreciate the reviews of the single disc comps especially, as lately I've been trying to dip into more artists, rather than plunging into big boxes.

[kenny weir]

Info on fascinating November release from Bear Family:

Historic Country Music Discovery! Recordings of an Interracial Duo located after 60 Years. -- Sometimes people who make music history have no idea they're doing so at the time. Bear Family Records has uncovered just such a case and will proudly be releasing this rare and previously undocumented piece of country music history in November 2010. - You can count on one hand the number of African American country music performers who recorded prior to the mid-1950s. Early Grand Ole Opry star Deford Bailey comes to mind because of his unique status as an instrumentalist. Indeed, the Country Music Foundation treats him as the historical oddity that he was. Jimmie Rodgers used Louis Armstrong's cornet on a 1930 session, but it's a cinch the two men never sang together. Black and white country duets are as rare as hen's teeth during this period. In fact, they may be altogether unknown. - Now Bear Family Records has found one. In several months we will proudly release the historical recordings of Allerton & Alton, The Cumberland Ridge Runners. They are perhaps the first interracial country music duet. Their performances dating from the late 1940s/early 1950s were broadcast over radio station WLAM in Lewiston, Maine and heard throughout the Northeast and parts of southern Ontario, Canada. The story of how these two country music fans met while browsing old 78s is as fascinating as their recordings. Perhaps the most amazing part of their story is the utterly unself-conscious way with which they approached the racial aspect of who they were and what they were doing. Equally compelling is the story of how the Korean War put an abrupt end to this interracial duo, after Alton returned a changed man, having experienced the cruel realities of a segregated U.S. Army. - This release will present their music in typical Bear Family style: lavishly illustrated with vintage photos, full historical notes and as many digitally restored recordings as we can fit on a CD.

[Tjazz]

Red Simpson is being released on BEAR FAMILY. 5-CD

[mikeweil]

4. What are the worst? (I know you won't tell me this, but I gotta ask anyway ...)

Richard Weize: THE WORST ARE ALSO GERMAN SETS BY KONSTANTIN WECKER:

No surprise, this audience does not include the collectors type like you find in jazz audiences. He's the best of all German politically inclined songwriter-singers, IMHO, a very nice and interesting person that has lived through quite a bit of life, but his fans probably buy all of his albums as soon as they come out. His latest includes a hilarious song about our current chancellor, Miss Merkel, that had me breaking up when I first heard it on the radio; I bought this for my wife as a Christmas gift, and we both spent the evening listening and ROTFL ...

Wecker plays nice piano, btw, and once did a tour with Wolfgang Dauner and Charlie Mariano in the band.

Edited January 7, 2012 by mikeweil

[AllenLowe]

by the way it's a measure of what a dumbass state I live in that the above - about the inter-racial duo recorded in Maine, of all places - has not even registered as a story here. I hate this place. Full of un-curious lame-os and lame-ettes.

[Big Beat Steve]

by the way it's a measure of what a dumbass state I live in that the above - about the inter-racial duo recorded in Maine, of all places - has not even registered as a story here. I hate this place. Full of un-curious lame-os and lame-ettes.

Just being curious:

How many Cumberland Ridge Runners were there after all?

When reading the above post by Kenny Weir (I admit I did not notice it the first time around and have not noticed that release in the recent fat Bear Family catalog either), the name of the group immediately rang a bell. Sure enough, a relatively detailed description of the "Cumberland Ridge Runners" including a photo figured in Bill C. Malone's "Country Music USA", the first history of country music I ever bought (in my teens in the mid-70s). But this was a totally different (earlier, larger and all-white) line-up that (at various times) included the latterly famous duo of Karl & Harty as well as Red Foley. So what's what and who's who?

Maybe the doubling of group (band?) names clouded the history of that duet if they REALLY went under that name at their appearances (the Bear Family release is credited to "Allerton & Alton" only)?

And if they had a regional audience only, maybe contemporary writeups would have appeared in papers such as "Country Song Roundup" (where many local radio favorites were covered) at best?

[JSngry]

Have Bear Family eer done anything on Hovie Lister and The Statesmen Quartet?

[Joe]

Another great Bear Family set...

Ray Price & The Cherokee Cowboys, THE HONKY TONK YEARS 1950 - 1966

[Link to the Bear Family website]

If all you know is the Price of "Make The World Go Away" and "For The Good Times," this set should be a revelation. IMHO, Price is -- questions of genre aside -- one of the great male singers in American pop music history. Just check out what he's able to do with a near-novelty like "Bright Lights and Blonde-Haired Women"...

[jostber]

You also have the new Bear Family Radio:

http://www.bearfamilyradio.de/

Great stuff.