The Champs & The Fabulous Cyclones

RE-UPPED! And since writing this article I HAVE heard a cover of the Champs' Lowdown: by the Surfin' Gorillas (great album too!)

Probably not going to re-up those other songs, but the album link has been updated

This post is going to be easy. While I'm not going to kid myself, most people checking out this blog have some interest in the forgotten art of Rock & Roll and have some sort of savvy, often more than I do, but I explain the albums all the same. The Champs, however.... I think anybody can sing along to Tequila. 

This here's a split LP, though you can hardly tell by the cover. And honestly, the cover is sort of correct in doing so; The Cyclones side is far less fun, but we'll get to that later. Aside from Too Much Tequila, which got a proper 45 single treatment and was on their album Tequila these songs don't really appear anywhere else except for a rarities collection called Wing Ding (in the case of the last three songs) and a Greatest Hits collection which features Streamliner. However, these are excellent tracks, all with the signature Champs sound and with a healthy dose of humor. Club House was the immediate standout to me, and it apparently had some affect on Quintron as well since he did a loose cover on his album "These Hands of Mine". Quintron, why are you so great?

I haven't heard a direct cover of Lowdown myself, but it's got a great slow and dirty vibe to it that reminds me of this Eddie Angel song that I'd might as well throw on here

As for the Fabulous Cyclones, whose name got an even smaller typeface than their song titles on the cover, they're up against some hard competition but the LP is still worth flipping over. It's simple rock & roll instrumentals, reminding me of Joe Houston. If you wanna dance, The Cyclones will provide and you'll have a great time, but if you want something to whistle while walking down the street I'd stick with the A side. The real disappointment here is that the song Moon Journey has no sci-fi tone to it, because with the Quintron mention I would have another rare post fulfilling the Louisiana, Rock & Roll, Sci-fi trifecta in this blog's mission statement. 

this album isn't the cleanest one I've got but the songs are about 97% listenable, the only pops that I found were as one song faded out. Otherwise there's sort of a fuzz going on, but the music prevails. I don't have a back cover included since it says nothign about the album, just other albums on the label. The tracklist looks like:

Side A (The Champs):

1. Too Much Tequila
2. Streamliner
3. Wing Ding
4. Club House
5. Lowdown

Side B (The Fabulous Cyclones):

1. Boogie Guitar
2. Rocking & Picking
3. Moon Journey
4. Blue & Mean
5. Gone & Out

Re-Upped! go get it here

I wanna see you dance

If I haven't made this clear enough already, a lot of the stuff on this blog is way past my era,  so while I love songs that tell me to do the watussi etc., I wouldn't know a watussi if I saw it. I spent a lot of time scrutinizing details of the surfer's stomp to no avail, I need a visual representation.

My friend's dad (and music enthusiast) reminded me that this is why youtube exists

but even then there's a lot of misinformation with lots of little girls dancing the mashed potato they saw in the Hairspray movie

The Mashed Potato is pretty basic (and DeeDee Sharp provided a video as well, though there are backup dancers that might confuse as to what the dance really is). But what about The Jerk? The Watussi? The Surfer's Stomp? 

James Brown tries to show off a few, but ends up really just showing off with no room for education

What I'm saying here is that if you know this stuff and want to go stick it on youtube,  you've done us all a service and you might achieve internet celebrity status! I know, that may not sound horribly attractive, but if you're not going to do it, who will?

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If you demand more complicated dances than these provide, I came across something the other day that's pretty cool. A local thrift store was selling 45s in little plastic grab bags, 5 for 5. You could only see what was on the outside, but I noticed a Champs single I didn't have on one side, so I bought it. Turns out San Juan \ Jalisco is a pretty boring single from later in their career, turning a little more Latin than rock & roll with less-than-exciting results. It's since been put on one of their compilations, so here's that version
The Champs - San Juan

But more excitingly, it came with somebody's instructions for what looks like a pretty complicated dance. I doubt any of you would go through the effort of performing this, but it's a cool little artifact.

click for the readable version (I'll get a scanner one day)

H.B. Barnum - Tia Juana \ Blue Mood

Don't be dissuaded if the name reminds you of PT Barnum and you're expecting some sort of circus music. Despite a less than eventful solo career, he was extremely successful as an arranger. To copy and paste from wikipedia, he has become most widely known as an arranger, for a very wide range of performers including Count Basie, O.C. Smith, Frank Sinatra, The Supremes, Aretha Franklin, Little Richard, Gladys Knight, Al Wilson, and the Pump Girls. This doesn't really sound like any of those, it's a straight up sax-fueled rock & roll instrumentals from (like most of these 45s) 1958.

Tia Juana (yeah, that's how it's spelled on the 45) is a blast. Raunchy, fast and crude. Tequila came out in the same year and I wouldn't be surprised if that had something to do with this track, but melody-wise it's completely its own song.
Tia Juana

Blue Mood isn't nearly as fun. Why do they always have to pair up a good, fast single with a slower number? MORE POWER PLEASE. I mean, it's a good song, but you just go ahead and listen, I don't really have any actual knowledge to spread here.
Blue Mood