Customer Reviews

The Golden Age Of American Rock & Roll, Vol. 4

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A bit of a drop off in song selection in ACE's volume 4 of this terrific pre-British Invasion (1954-1963) series of American pop/rock music. Each of the first three volumes included several songs that failed to reach the Top 40, but this time it's almost a third of the total--nine to be exact. And in a couple instances (Nappy Brown and the Royalteens), the artist's only Top 40 hit was overlooked in favor of the song included on this anthology. [Although in the case of Brown, his No. 25 hit "Don't Be Angry" does show up on volume 8.] So you're going to get a number of unfamiliar songs like Don French's "Lonely Saturday Night," the Lafayettes "Life's Too Short," and the Roommates' "The Glory of Love."

But as with the other volumes in this series, it's the joy of getting to hear infrequently anthologized gems like Little Caesar's "Those Oldies But Goodies," the Dubs' "This Could Be Magic" and Billie & Lillie's "Lucky Ladybug"; as well as the more familiar hits like Dion's "Drip Drop," Buddy Knox's "Party Doll," and Little Anthony & the Imperials' "Tears on My Pillow." When you add it all up into one generous 30-track CD, you get a more accurate picture of the American popular music landscape of the era than if all you got were the same big hits available on numerous collections.

Almost as much fun as listening to these golden oldies, is reading the 20-plus pages of information about each of the artists and songs. Did you know the Edsels released "Rama Lama Ding Dong" three years before it became a hit in 1961 as "Lama Rama Ding Dong"? [What a difference a title makes!] Atlantic Records released 28 separate versions of Tommy Facenda's 1959 hit "High School USA," each one mentioning actual high schools by name in a specific geographic location throughout the United States. Duane Eddy plays acoustic guitar on Donnie Owens' 1958 hit "Need You." The Rocky Fellers consist of a father and his four sons from the Philippines--their surname is Feller. The Regents first recorded "Barbara Ann" as a demo in 1958. When the song became a hit in 1961, the group had disbanded.

This is fascinating music, and there are intriguing stories behind each song and artist. If this set is a little weaker than its three predecessors, it still is an amazing collection and this series as a whole is unmatched. RECOMMENDED

The CD is an excellent example of the songs from this period. While many of the titles were unfamiliar to me, (and they should have been as this was the time of my youth) the ones I knew were well presented. All tracks were clean, clear music - no unwanted noise. I purchased this CD to get a new copy of a specific title and the cost was equivalent to finding this title on a used record. I got everything else as a bonus and am very pleased.

I am a enthousiastic collector, and have almost all the Time Life rock n roll stuff, as well as Eric Records cds of this era. Although they are essential to any 50s 60s collection, nothing can top ACE series.
I could comment like this on all the 50s remasters of this fabulous record label, not only their other editions, but especially the Golden Age of American Rock n roll. I can not add anything to the positive reviews than simply summing up my personal view:
30 tracks per cd! (Time life is also excellent, but you get 15 per cd!)
excellent booklets with background info (not surpassed by any label).
not the same old songs over again, but many rare and still excellent tracks!
last but not least amazing sound quality.
So although you might have some songs there on other collections, it is for above mentioned points alone worth it to always have an ACE copy as well.

Eight if the tracks presented here made it into the lucrative Billboard Pop Top 10 (5, 8, 9, 17 - the only # 1 - 22, 24 and 30), joined by another five that found their way into the Top 20 (6, 10, 19, 23 and 29), seven more that finished Top 30 (3, 13, 15, 16, 18, 20 and 21), and one that just made the Top 40 (track 11). That's 21 out of the 30 tracks which were solid hits by any standard, so I would hardly describe this volume as a "drop-off" in that regard.

Many were also R&B chart cross-overs, and most of the songs presented here were distributed by the small independent labels springing up all across the U.S. in the period covered (1954 - 1963). Most simply did not have the funds for publicity and promotion at the disposal of giants like Columbia (and their Okeh and Epic subsidiaries) and RCA, the mid-range outfits like Atlantic, Roulette and Scepter, or even some of the better-known small operations such as Swan, Guyden and Josie.

So, when you look at the rankings of these non Top 40 offerings you have to keep that in mind, as well as the fact that, for every song that made it into the Top/Hot 100 in any given year, there were upwards of four that did not (indeed, in 1959 Billboard introduced a Hot 100 "Bubbling Under" charts to chronicle those that finished from # 101 to # 125): Linda Lu by Ray Sharpe (# 11 R&B and # 46 Hot 100 in summer 1959 on Jamie); Flamingo Express by The Royaltones )# 82 Hot 100 in January 1961 on Goldisc); Lonely Saturday Night by Don French (# 72 Hot 100 in June 1959 on Lancer); The Hlory Of Love by The Roommates (# 49 Hot 100 in May 1961 on Valmor); (Do The) Mashed Potatoes (Part 1) by Nat Kendrick & The Swans (# 9 R&B and # 84 Hot 100 in spring 1960 on Dade); and Why Don't You Write Me? by The Jacks (# 3 R&B and # 82 Top 100 in summer 1955 on Gee).

Two that might be regarded as "drop offs" since both were released by major labels and failed ro climb very high in spite of that backing were Life's Too Short by The Lafayettes (# 87 in summer 1962 on RCA Victor), and Here I Stand by The Rip Chords (# 51 in spring 1963 on Columbia).

As always with an Ace Records production it's sometimes difficult to decide which feature you like best - the music, much of it never before heard on CD and certainly never with this superb sound quality, or the wonderful trivia-filled artist-by-artist liner notes [here 12 pages written by noted U.K. music historian Rob Finnis in 1994], complete with vintage poster/label reproductions, and photographs. In that regard you get The Temptation (NOT the 1960s/1970s Motown group, but the original Temptations, a One-Hit Wonder white doo-wop quartet from Flushing, New York), The Dubs, Little Anthony & The Imperials, Tommy Facenda, Gene Vincent, Little Joe (Cook), another One-Hit Wonder and lead of The Thrillers, The Lafayettes, Sal Mineo, Barbara Lynn, The Rocky Fellers, and Billy And Lillie.

On the reverse of the jewel case is a listing of the contents showing original label numbers as well as Billboard Pop Top/Hot 100 performances in North America and, where applicable, the U.K. (just 3 charted there - tracks 5, 8 and 17).

The Golden Age of American Rock 'n' Roll, Vol. 4

1. Linda Lu / Ray Sharpe 2:09
2. Little by Little / Nappy Brown 2:36
3. Rama Lama Ding Dong / The Edsels 2:28
4. Flamingo Express / The Royaltones 1:59
5. New Orleans / Gary "U.S." Bonds 2:50
6. Maybe / The Chantels 2:55
7. Drip Drop / Dion 2:34
8. Start Movin' (In My Direction) / Sal Mineo 2:33
9. Lonely Saturday Night / Don French 2:41
10. Don't Let Go / Roy Hamilton 2:38
11. Pop Pop Pie / The Sherrys 2:10
12. Life's Too Short / Lafayettes 2:21
13. High School U.S.A. / Tommy Facenda 2:11
14. Glory of Love / Roomates 2:07
15. Peanuts / Little Joe & the Thrillers 2:28
16. Need You / Donnie Owens 2:19
17. Party Doll / Buddy Knox 2:13
18. Could This Be Magic / The Dubs 2:18
19. Killer Joe / The Rocky Fellers 2:23
20. Barbara / The Temptations 2:48
21. Peek-A-Boo / The Cadillacs 2:16
22. You'll Lose a Good Thing / Barbara Lynn 2:40
23. Lucky Ladybug / Billy & Lillie 2:35
24. Tears on My Pillow / Little Anthony & the Imperials 2:19
25. Baby Talk / Jan & Dean 2:34
26. Here I Stand / The Rip Chords 2:05
27. (Do the) Mashed Potatoes, Pt. 1 / The Swans 1:50
28. Why Don't You Write Me / The Jacks 2:50
29. Barbara Ann / The Regents 2:16
30. Those Oldies But Goodies (Remind Me of You) / The Romans 3:27

Has Ace gone off the deep end with this volume in their series that resurrects the lost and found hits of early American rock and roll? Not at all. While only 7 of the 30 tracks here were top-10, there's enough familiar music to hum along with while getting acquainted or reacquainted with lots of forgotten gems and how-did-that-ever-get-into-the-top-100 songs.

To keep the repertoire fresh and comprehensive, Ace has now started to mine the vaults of the majors with sides from the likes of the Columbia-Epic-Okeh family, Atlantic and RCA in this volume. Now we get memory-stirring tunes like "High School USA", the jumping energy of "Don't Let Go" and the long-forgotten "Life's Too Short".

And while Ace continues to pursue the vaults for the best available tape sources, they do offer a challange in this volume. There is one cut that was dubbed from disc by the renowned Little Walter DeVenne and they dare you to determine which one it is. And as with previous volumes, the 16-page liner notes booklet is loaded with musical backround notes, pics and promo reproductions. With apologies to the British TV series, this new collection is absolutely fabulous.

Scene: Prompted by the cover photograph, the memory cover photograph, which grace each CD in this The Golden Age Of American Rock `n' Roll series. The photo on this CD, as might be expected, shows a girl, a pony-tailed, starch-bloused, woolen-sweatered, wide, flouncy skirt-wearing, Penny Parker, all grown up almost, as the good teen D.J., a.k.a. hostess, that she is, doing her chore of spinning platters, okay, okay, putting records on her portable 45s record player for the guests at her sweet sixteen party, her very first house teen be-bop hop.

We all wish her well, right? And hope she plays a couple of Elvis, Chuck, and Jerry Lee things and not too many slow dances since some of the guys still have not got the hang of that yet. Oh yes, for the clueless, a record player was a machine to put records on in order to hear those guys just mentioned. And records, for the really clueless, were grooved, vinyl plate-like objects that kept the blues away in the 1950s teen night. Just like iPOD, texting, yahoo messaging, etc. keep the blues away from the hip-hop nation teen night.
******

"Don't come back before one," Penny Parker, now sweet sixteen party-crowned Penny Parker, as she shouted to her parents leaving out the breezeway door to the garage to take off to places unknown, maybe unknowable, until at least that one o`clock hour. Peter Parker, Penny proud without showing it, muttered under his breath that he damn well would not be back before one, come hell or high water, while that rock and roll music was infesting, and that was the word that he used, his house. Or at least the downstairs part, rock and roll previously being limited to the Penny upstairs netherworld, and kept away from his ears, well, mainly away form his ears. "Now, Peter," was all that Delores Parker at first could come up with, and that was usually enough. Tonight however she added, and told him so in no uncertain terms, that her husband was being an old fogy seeing that this was Penny's sweet sixteen party, she had baby-sat to perdition in order to fund the party (with a little Parker parent help, Delores mainly), had done mostly what they had asked of her, as much as one could expect from a rock-addled post World War II teenager from what she had read in the women's magazines that she was addicted to reading.

Most importantly tonight was, and here is where woman-girl- female whatever solidarity came in, Penny was going to "coax" Zack Smith into giving her his class ring, the universal teen sign of "going steady," hands off, and a 180 degree turn in their sometimes stormy relationship since back in about junior high school. If he showed. At least, Delores, thought, she had given that Jimmy Kelly the air, although he was invited, invited tonight for old times sake since Jimmy had been there the night Penny played her first record, Could This Be Magic by the Dubs on her brand new, slave wages-bought record player. But enough of Parker parents, tonight is Penny's night.

Penny night or not, Miss Parker is already starting to fret that Zack will be a no-show. See they had had an argument last week about that "going steady" thing, that eternal love class ring- signifying thing, and Zack for the twenty-third, at least, time stormed off. And Penny for the twenty-second time made peace over the telephone, the midnight blues telephone. But you never knew with Zack. All Penny knew was she wanted him, wanted him bad, and wanted him here tonight to share her sweet sixteen-ness.

So as the couples, maybe a dozen or so of their close friends, started filling up the Parker living room Penny, knowing that she was not the only rock-addled teen in the room, played D.J. And revved up the old Sear& Roebuck recorder player with a stack of platters (records, 45 RPM records okay); Ray Sharpe `s Linda Lu; Nappy Brown's Little by Little; Maybe by the Chantels although she always wondered how they could get their voices that high on that one; a tear-jerker but a slow one by request from Pammy and Sue who had boyfriend troubles of their own, Little Anthony and the Imperials' Tears On My Pillow which got even hardened corner boys a little weepy as she found out once when Zack and she were "finished" and king corner boy Frankie Riley had asked her out, and she had accepted. Well, she thought that should last this crowd for a while, for a while until Zack gets here, hopefully.

Later, around ten, ten-thirty, just as she was about to give up the thought of Zack's coming that night, and had resigned herself to playing D.J. putting Buddy Knox's Party Doll on(although she wasn't feeling like any party doll then) for this rock-addled crowd Zack came in kind of sneakily through the side door. And instead of coming over to say thanks to Penny for inviting him or any other kind of social graces recognition he began to get into an animated conversation with Jimmy Kelly. Nothing serious but as Penny found out later Zack was miffed at Jimmy, one of his best friends now that the Zack-Jimmy girl wars, or rather Penny wars were over in Zack's favor, because Jimmy had not told Penny that he was going to be a little late. But that miffed-ness turned into nothing once Zack told the reason for his lateness. See, Penny performing, as it turned out, her last D.J duty for the evening putting on that much requested previously mentioned Could This Be Magic was finally called over by Zack and as the strains of the song echoed through the house he presented her with his class ring, just a while ago engraved with To P.P. Always 10/7/59. Magic.

All songs are original recordings, which is something that you don't always get when you buy a CD of "oldies but goodies". The audio quality is excellent, even though all of the songs are mono rather than stereo. The enclosed brochure is very informative, although it would be more helpful if the descriptions in the brochure were listed in the same order as the songs on the CD.