I suppose I should be filing this under "V" for that bestselling tunesmith "Various Artists" but since those words appear nowhere on this disc, I ain't gonna. Compilations is as compilations do, and this one...well.
I bought it at Starbucks. Yeah. I'm that guy. If you want to know why Starbucks keeps selling music to the phony hip and the crazy pampered, look no further. Because every now and again I see one of their bizarre choices and decide I have to have it. Because a corporation that earns so much hatred for the vile sin of selling coffee well has to have something going for it. And because, as I've mentioned before, I dig 50's stuff.
So obviously I'm going to dig something that starts off with "Marie, Marie" by the Blasters and takes us through all the old Great Ones: Gene Vincent, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, Eddie Cochrane, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens all step up and take a bow, and aside from "Be-Bop-a-Lula," and "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On," they're all lesser-known tracks. Little Richard howls out "Rip it Up"; Carl picks his first Sun hit "Gone, Gone, Gone"; Eddie rumbles through "Nervous Breakdown," and so on. All exactly what you'd want, and not a disappointment among them.
Two songs actually made me reconsider artists previously consigned to "meh" territory. Ricky Nelson's "Believe What You Say" is all business, with a beat so thick it could support a house, and a damn fine vocal performance by Ozzie & Harriet's boy: swaggering but not overwhelming, not at all affected. And then Patsy Damn Cline throws down "Got a Lot of Rhythmn (in My Soul)" and if you don't want to shake your ass, it's because you don't know how. It's a frankly astonishing, joyous expression of Redneck R&B, all clapped hands and guitar echoing from the bottom of a mine shaft. Country music needs to sound like this more, and less like "Achey Breaky Woman" or whatever.
A few tunes don't work. All respect to Ray Campi, who was apparently present at the creation of rockabilly, but rock songs about rock very rarely work, and this one dates from the Rockabilly Revival of the late 70's. Sure the Blasters do too, but they have the good sense to cover an old Dave Alvin song instead. By the same token, Welsh pub-rocker Dave Edmunds' cover of Elvis Costello's "Girls Talk" seems out of place and way too New-Wavey. Ain't no thang if there ain't no twang, as Duane Eddy might put it.
One song confuses me. The supposed Queen of Rockabilly and recent Jack White makeover subject Wanda Jackson, has a down-home, "Shake'n'Bake, and I Helped!" Oklahoma accent that does not disappear when she sings. I enjoy most of "I Gotta Know," with it's wiggly bass line, snappy drums, and twangy guitar. But on every chorus, the song shudders to a halt, so Wanda can belt "If our love's the Real THAYNG, Where is MAH weddin' RAYNG" while a country fiddle drone escapes from the end of every Hank Williams, Sr. song to claim the whole track for the 1930's. I honestly can't tell if Wanda's nodding to the Western Swing she started with, or being ironic, or both, and I still can't figure out if I like it.
This, on the other hand, kicks ass.
Two unknowns from 50's earn critical nods. Boogie-Woogie purveyor Sonny Burgess doesn't quite try to be Elvis on "Ain't Got a Thing," but he doesn't quite try not to be, either, and it works. Better still is "The Way I Walk" a Top 40 hit in 1959 for Jack Scott, a fine moody grumble that the Cramps covered for their debut EP Gravest Hits.
So there you go. If you've heard of rockabilly but don't really know if you like it, this here disc will tell you.
Grade: LL
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