A little on the music: It's a "big band" track for sure, but I'm taken by how low-key the whole affair is. For sure, it kicks off with a rousing trumpet trumpet line, but it quickly settles into a less-is-more space, with just a few parts - the horns, a slight swelling in the background, the bass, and the vocals. Once the keys come in for a solo they're left alone with the bass more often than not, excepting for short little horn riff. It's just a very pretty little song, and you can almost hear it playing on a hot summer day in New York.
OK so for today we're going to break the rules and post two songs - in the middle of Erskine Hawkin's 3+ month run at #1 there was a two week break where Duke Ellington snuck in and got the A and then B side of a single a week each, a little propaganda ditty and it's b-side instrumental. September 25: "A Slip of the Lip (Can Sink a Ship)" — Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra (1 week) - VICTOR 20-1528 October 2: "Sentimental Lady" — Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra (1 week) - VICTOR 20-1528
Another 'rateyourmusic.com' review for this single does a fine job telling us what we're hearing, from user "fixbutte": "A Slip of the Lip", the first successful composition of Duke's son Mercer, is a wartime novelty song in order to remind the Americans to talk not too much in public "to trick those nasty Nazi spies". Aside from its dated lyrics it is a very good rhythmic song with a terrific arrangement by Billy Strayhorn and a good-humored vocal by Ray Nance who also has a fine trumpet solo. On top of this, the melodic flipside "Sentimental Lady", composed by the Duke and feyturing a beautiful sax solo by Johnny Hodges, is easily as good. Both songs were hits and reached #19 on the charts each.
Hear 'em: A Slip of the Lip (Can Sink a Ship) - 1999 Remastered » Sentimental Lady - 1999 Remastered - Take 1 »
Duke Ellington & His Famous Orch. Sentimental Lady (RCA Victor 20-1528, 1942) » The first one with the vocal makes me think a little of the hip delivery of 1950s performers like Babs Gonzales. I have a cd Time-Life 'Your Hit Parade - The War Years' and I don't think any of the tunes in the thread so far appear on it.
I've been looking up some of the Harlem Hit Parade #1 songs in my Billboard Pop Hits 1940-1954 Joel Whitburn book, and already there is a disconnect between this chart and the pop chart. Many of these songs didn't even make the pop chart. In those days, the charts sometimes consisted of as few as 10 songs at a time, which is a partial explanation. But it doesn't account for all of it.
Good info, thanks! The overlap is truly hard to predict - the Erskine Hawkins track was a phenomenon on the Harlem Hit Parade chart - 3 months! Never cracks the top ten on the pop charts!
By this time, you may have noticed that the Victor labels had started to use the famous two-digit prefixes on its singles, a system that RCA would continue to use into 1973. I have a book called Numerical Listing of Victor and Bluebird Records, which was first issued in June 1941. It's actually a loose-leaf binder, and each month, Victor sent subscribers to the service some new three-hole-punched pages to insert in the book, either to add to or replace already existing pages. I have no idea when Victor stopped doing this, but the newest pages in my copy are from November 1942. (If anyone else remembers those giant Phonolog guides that used to be in record stores, it's sort of the same thing except smaller and dedicated to one label.) Because of the information in this book, it's easy to see when Victor started using the two-digit prefixes for classical records - May 1942. It's also easy to see that, by November '42, it had not yet started using them in their other lines. The earliest prefixes in use: 10- for Red Seal classical 10-inch 78s (the first number was 10-1000) 11- for Red Seal classical 12-inch 78s (the first number was 11-8100) 20- for black label 10-inch 78s (this hadn't started by November 1942, as the newest record in the book is 27975; the first in this series was 20-1500) 30- for blue-label Bluebird 10-inch 78s (again, this didn't start until after November 1942, as the newest Bluebird in the book is B-11589; the first in this series was 30-0800) Naturally, other prefixes followed, but based on the original ones, the plan appears to have been to group the prefixes under 1x for Red Seal, 2x for black-label Victor and 3x for Bluebird.
Looks to me like today's hit is the first full-band recording recorded since the strike began - Capitol were the second label to capitulate and they had the newly-signed King Cole Trio knock this one out within a month of opening their doors again. It's probably thanks to this early settlement that Decca and Capitol will dominate the #1s in 1944, with all but two hits from one of the two labels.
Actually, "All for You" was recorded on October 11, 1942 for the tiny Excelsior label in Los Angeles. I can't find any conclusive reason why or how the King Cole Trio managed to get around the recording ban. After Cole's contract with Decca expired, Capitol signed the trio, but the label hadn't yet settled with the AFM. In the interim, "All for You" and "Vom Vim Veedle" were licensed from Excelsior and served as his first Capitol single.
Good info, thanks! It looks like it was issued as a v-disc, too, in December 1943. After I read your post I spent maybe 20 minutes trying to find out how they got around the ban, but there's no info on it really. Maybe Excelsior was just so small no-one noticed...
It looks to me like Nat King Cole and Louis Jordan are two sides of the sort of possible success performers could find with the aid of the Harlem Hit Parade - both found themselves gaining attention through sustained success in these charts, which would crossover to success in the pop charts as well. I say two sides because of their trajectory after their initial successes - Louis Jordan shows up on the Harlem Hit Parade and dominates those charts for the next decade, his success on the r&b charts always parallel to his success in general. Nat King Cole showed up earlier in 1943 and he'll find even more success in 1944, after which he'll disappear entirely for these charts and for the rest of his career his success will live and die with his pop audience. Interesting little stories you can find highlighted by the numbers in here - that's one of the fun things about charts, in baseball or in music! And the song is nice, too, even though I didn't say much about it...
Today's hit brings Ella Mae Morse back, who we saw back in the very first post in this thread: December 18: "Shoo Shoo Baby" — Ella Mae Morse (2 weeks)* - CAPITOL 143
This song was made famous by the Andrew Sisters in the movie Three Cheers for the Boy, but only Ella's version would hit #1 on any charts. I'm more familiar with the Andrew Sisters than Ella Mae Morse, truth by told, though primarily through Bette Midler's cover of their "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" - in my opinion Midler's Live At Last is one of the great live albums of all time but enough of that... The Andrew Sisters are known as early adopters of an 'r&b' style, and their take on this song is all upbeat and dance-worthy. Ella Mae Morse's is decidedly a more 'bluesy' take, to my ears. Hear it: Ella Mae Morse - Shoo-Shoo Baby » and if you're curious, The Andrew Sisters - Shoo, Shoo, Baby »
This is one I've never heard before, but I like it. An early Blue Navy Blue. There is a Choo Choo Boogie song isn't there?
Looks like you're right there was, a massive r&b hit, and we'll see it in a little less than a month!
Oh neat, I was looking at the Choo Choo Ch'Boogie page and I was thinking "I know I've heard these lyrics before," but I'd never heard the Louis Jordan song - turns out I've heard the Asleep at the Wheel cover of it.
