NEVER HEARD OF HER.

I'm posting these for a few reasons. I never heard of Charline Arthur until a few hours ago. I'm reading a bland book about early rock 'n' roll. The stuff in it is the same stuff most of us know backwards and forwards. It a $1 used book and it's just holding me over until I get to the library. I've been tempted to put it down but have been holding out hope that there'd be some nugget of early rock trivia that I's missed, in this most basic book. There, mentioned between Janis Martin and Barbara Pttman was the name Charline Arthur. The book considers her rockabilly but, eh, it's really more country or hillbilly. But another reason I'm posting these is that, whether country, hillbilly or rockabilly, I knew Rocky 52 would have something. That he did. Five songs and a bio. Three of the songs are below and there's a link to the page at Rocky 52. Bookmark Rocky's site. It's invaluable when it comes to anything country, western, hillbilly, rockabilly, bluegrass or early rock 'n' roll. That's another reason for this post, props for Rocky 52.

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Listen:
Charline Arthur - I Heard About You mp3 at Rocky 52
Charline Arthur - Hello Baby mp3 at Rocky 52
Charline Arthur - Burn That Candle mp3 at Rocky 52
Charline Arthur - Two more, bio and discography at Rocky 52

REGIONABILLY

Okay, "Rockaphilly" might be a stretch, the pair of compilations titled that are way closer to the hillbilly side of rockabilly. Regardless they're worth a listen. It's third tier stuff, not necessary in any way, but very cool if you happen to like things a little tweaked, productions on the cheap, notes missed and miscellaneous stuff that is just a little off.

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Listen:
Bill Moss - You Look Like Something That The Cat Drug In mp3 at Tapewrecks Dig the drums.
Curly Herdman - Buck Fever Boogie mp3 at Tapewrecks The guitar solo on this, at 1:24, sounds promising for five seconds and then just falls apart.
The whole shootin' match:
Rockaphilly amd Return of Rockaphilly at Tapewrecks 36 songs

LET'S CRAWL BABY

I heard this one in the car today, and had to lay it on you. It's a solid hillbilly party jam by Little Jimmy Dickens, and if the lyrics are any indication, Dickens would give youngster Andrew W.K. a run for his money. Dude wants to wiggle with the worm, crawl with the snake, wear out fourteen pairs of shoes, and he threatens to climb the wall. And that's just in the first verse. "I'm on the prowl, it's my night to howl, turn out the lights and let's crawl along." Hell yeah, I'm on board!

I don't usually recommend specific albums, but the one I got this from is an unbelievable deal. It's titled "Rock 'n' Roll Box", and even though the generic title is a misnomer, if you're into the roots of rock 'n' roll, and know to expect some nascent stuff, you'll dig it. The bait is a handful of cuts by Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Bill Haley and the Comets. For anyone expecting the rest to be classic rock 'n' roll cuts, that would be where the whiners take over. But if you're into the ingredients that made up the earliest rock 'n' roll, particularly hillbilly and boogie in this set, it's a bargain. It's ten CD's, 180 songs, most of which will be new to even the most extreme of fiends. The hook? It's only about fifteen bucks. That's about eight cents a song. With that generic of a title it would be almost impossible to find, but just do a search of "Membran/Documents B000AAP7J4" and a number of online dealers should pop up. The fidelity isn't good by modern recording standards, but some of the songs were ripped from extremely rare vinyl copies. Dig it, or cry alone.

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Listen:
Little Jimmy Dickens - Hey Worm mp3 at Internet Archive
Song listing:
Rock 'n' Roll box track listing
Visit:
More Jimmy Dickens here

THE TIRELESS GEEK

Deke Dickerson is one guy I don't even try to keep up with. His catalog is too vast, talent too tight, and he just doesn't slow down. I don't care how hard working you think you are, he'll make you feel lazy. Really, check the discography on his site. Plus he's a guitar geek extraordinaire, and you know how guitar geeks are, particularly those who can back up the vintage mumbo jumbo with expert picking. Dickerson took it one step further and hosted guitar geek festivals for ten or so years running. Just before you throw in the towel, add record collector and music historian. And he had a record label. And he's a writer. A good writer. Besides liner notes and bios, his blog, though seldom updated, is some good reading. By the time you finish one of his posts, you'll swear that you know him. It's that aw shucks.

His last post, which is over a year old, is titled "Why I Am Not A Punk Rocker" and runs down how he was into punk rock in high school and decided he wasn't cut out for it. The bonus of that post was a twenty minute movie he did while in still in school that is, okay, corny and lame, like most high school films are. But it's Deke Dickerson and he's a guitar geek's guitar geek, and it's him cutting his teeth, so it's worth watching. (The link on his blog is gone, but it's still up at YouTube.) There's a few other things down there too, including a video of his first band, Untamed Youth, on a public access TV show in the eighties, notable because it's got fellow fiend Ron Silva (Crawdaddys, Nashville Ramblers, etc) filling in on drums (Playing standing up. The nut!).

There's a tour diary down there two, in two parts. There are live music sequences and total fiend minutiae. Old sites of record studios, regional tidbits, plus the table that Merle Travis died while seated at, still in use in a guitar shop. Now that I think about it, that might just be why I've yet to fully dive in. Every time I put a toe in this Dickerson pool, I get totally distracted. Before I know it, I'm in amateur geek mode, wandering aimlessly through surf, hillbilly, multi-necked guitars, and aw shucks all over the place. That's why I like this guy. He makes me want to learn.

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Listen:
Untamed Youth - Pabst Blue Ribbon mp3 at Beware of the Blog
Dave and Deke Combo - Deke's Hot Guitar mp3 at Beware of the Blog
Dave and Deke Combo - Chew Tobacco Rag mp3 at Beware of the Blog
Deke Dickerson - Muleskinner Blues mp3 at Beware of the Blog
Deke Dickerson and the Ecco-fonics - Tons of live stuff at Internet Archive
Video:
Deke Dickerson - Rock 'n' Roll High School at YouTube The high school film
Untamed Youth - Hey Elly Mae at YouTube Ron Silva on drums
Deke Dickerson - 2013 Tour Diary, Part 1 at YouTube
Deke Dickerson - 2013 Tour Diary, Part 2 at YouTube
Visit:
Why I'm Not a Punk Rocker - Deke Dickerson at Musings of a Mule Skinner His blog
Deke Dickerson - Official site Don't miss his gallery of bizarre LPs

SAVE YOUR CHEAP PUN

Hot dog! It's Rose Maddox month at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban! They sure know how to pick 'em over there. Scroll down the home page. Every two or three posts has some of her stuff. Here's just a couple. If you don't know who she is, just read the first paragraph at Wikipedia. If that doesn't wet your whistle, just get the hell out of the way.

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Listen:
Rose Maddox - Move It On Over mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
Rose Maddox - Wild Wild Young Men mp3 at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban
Visit:
Rose Maddox Month at Rock 'n' Soul Ichiban Interspersed with other goodies.
Rose Maddox at Wikipedia

IT'S ALL GOOD

Fu-huck yeah, been a while.  Hillbilly boogie stuff.  I've no clue how many, or how few, of you guys get off on a lot of different types of music.  It might seem that I do, but, really, it's not about that. Around here, it's not necessarily about musical genres. It's really about how it hits me, the feel and funk, and as close as I can discern, in this house that usually means raw, honest, authentic, and rough around the edges. That's my genre. Sometimes it's loud, sometimes danceable, and sometimes just aw-shucks-where's-my-kerchief? When I'm in the mood for the latter, you can find me at Rocky's.

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Listen:
Jack Guthrie - Oakie Boogie mp3 at Rocky 52 
Bill Browning - Washing Machine Boogie mp3 at Rocky 52
Visit: 
Rocky 52 It's not the most stylin' or easy to navigate site, but Rocky has several shitloads of country and western related stuff. You'll want to get that place wired. 
Hillbilly Researcher Lots of good stuff here too. On the DivDhare streaming widgets, clich on "share" to reveal download button. Worth the hassle.

DOC WATSON CHECKED OUT

It's not been a good year for fans of bluegrass and hillbilly music. Just a couple months ago, Earl Scruggs passed away. Now, Doc Watson. I'm not going to sit here and pretend like I know much of anything about Watson. I do know that he's been around a long time, is highly respected, and that I've never heard anything by him that I didn't like. Even with just that, he's a few notches above most of the hacks in my collection.

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Listen:
Doc Watson - Little Maggie mp3 at The Rising Storm Note: May disable direct linking on this one. If so, that's too bad, because it's a good one.
Doc Watson - Crawdad Hole mp3 at Tiny Cat Pants
Doc Watson and David Grisman - Bluegrass Stomp mp3 at Sober Musicians
Doc Watson - Freight Train Boogie mp3 at TommyMarkham.com
Doc Watson - Deep River Blues mp3 at TommyMarkham.com
Read:
Doc Watson dies at 89 - Obituary and profile at Los Angeles Times

HOW HIGH THE MOON

Hank Williams dug him.  Jerry Lee Lewis dug him.  That there is all that you should need to give Moon Mullican a listen.  He was capable of all sorts of styles, from rockabilly to swing, but hillbilly boogie was his bread and butter.  Listen to the songs below and tell me you don't hear the missing link between Hank Williams and Jerry Lee Lewis.  If you need another reason to dig into his stuff, there's this quote: " "We gotta play music that'll make them goddamn beer bottles bounce on the table."  Amen!

Stick around until :37 and try to resist a "holy fuck!"

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Listen:

Moon Mullican - Seven Nights to Rock at mp3 at Rocky-52.net

Moon Mullican - Cherokee Boogie mp3 at Rocky-52.net

Moon Mullican - I'll Sail My Ship Alone mp3 at Pretty Goes With Pretty

Moon Mullican - Rocket to the Moon mp3 at Probe Is Turning-On the People

Visit:

Moon Mullican at the Rockabilly Hall of Fame

Moon Mullican at Wikipedia

Moon Mullican Discography at Rockin' Country Style

HERE'S YOUR HILLBILLY FIX

When it comes to hillbilly music, Webb Pierce is as good as any. That is not to say he's not good, in fact that's saying the very opposite. As good as any, in terms of hillbilly music, is a complement. By virtue of the fact it's hillbilly music in the first place makes it red hot, and entirely listenable. Of course, I've heard comparatively little, so I'm totally unqualified to make a sweeping critique like that, but I'm just callin' 'em like I see 'em. And I see red hot, and entirely listenable. It fills a hole that nothing else really can. We can start with Webb Pierce. He's as red hot and entirely listenable as any.

I should've known, as soon as I saw the clip above and started to poke around online, that two places I'd find Webb Pierce stuff would be the Hound Blog, and Rocky-52, both red hot, and entirely visitable sites. If you're a regular, you know that I hold them both in high regard. So, I'll just defer to them on this whole Webb Pierce red hot certification nonsense. If they like him, I know enough to listen.

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Listen:
Webb Pierce - Teenage Boogie (alt. take) mp3 at The Hound Blog
Webb Pierce - In the Jailhouse Now mp3 at Rocky-52.net
Webb Pierce & Red Sovine - Why Baby Why mp3 at Rocky-52.net
Webb Pierce - There Stands the Glass mp3 at Rocky-52.net
Webb Pierce & Red Sovine - Little Rosa mp3 at The Hound Blog
T Rex - I Love To Boogie mp3 at The Hound Blog Tribute, or epic fail?
Mixes:
Hayseed Paydirt, past post with links to ten Rockin' Hillbilly mixes
Video:
Webb Pierce - Here Stands the Glass at YouTube
Webb Pierce & Red Sovine - In the Jailhouse Now at YouTube
Visit:
Webb Pierce at Wikipedia
Webb Pierce post at The Hound Blog
Rocky-52.net

HAYSEED PAYDIRT

So, what to pick up for that retro roots fiend on your list? You know, the one who thinks they have everything sewn up. They have their cowboy shirts, Levis, pomade, boots, vintage ride and a few Hank Williams and Gene Vincent records. They've spent so much time covering the bases, getting all the required accessories, they've now considered their job finished, and retired to the bathroom mirror. Here's what you do: send them to school. Run down to your local drug store and pick up a couple packs of blank CD-Rs. Then head over to Western & Bop for the motherlode. The amount of genre specific stuff they've got is mindblowing. Really, they have all the bases covered. Hillbilly, rockin' hillbilly, obscure rockabilly, western swing, trucker favorites and more; and much of it obscure.

It will take a little bit of effort. The music they've posted is all in album length RAR files, which, if you're technically inclined, is no big deal. If you don't have experience with RAR files, or don't have a converter, it's easy enough to find one online (for Windows, try WinRAR at C.net). Look, if I can figure it out, you can. The payoff is huge. Here's direct links to their posts with "Rockin' Hillbilly" compilations, but do browse. If you're into anything affiliated with old country & western music, bookmarking should be a reflex. Now tell your greaser to get back to work!

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Rockin' Hillbilly - Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4, Volume 5, Volume 6, Volume 7, Volume 8, Volume 9, Volume 10 at Western & Bop

More country & western, hillbilly, western swing, trucker's favorites, and rockabilly compilations at Western & Bop