You can go earlier if you want. I was out of town, sorry about the delay! We'll see what we can come up with.

If you want to do compilations that focus on this time period, that's probably acceptable as well, as there weren't many LPs at this time that weren't jazz.

Louis Armstrong: Satch Plays Fats

Talk about one legend saluting another. This is a fantastic album. Armstrong gathers together a crack band and runs through the highlights of Fats Waller's astounding catalog of classic material. This album is especially necessary considering how old and poor many of the original Fats Waller recordings are. Here you get a great talent playing faithful renditions of classic material. A really hard one not to like from 1955.

Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely

In 1958, Sinatra put out what many consider his best ballads album. I honestly couldn't necessarily say this is really any better than other albums he put out around the same time frame with In the Wee Small Hours being another great one from a year or two before. Still this is a stunning album and worth it if for nothing else than his version of One For My Baby (And One More for the Road). Also, the creepy sad clown Sinatra on the cover is just bizarre.

Bo Diddley

And to dispel the notion there aren't a shit ton of rock albums from 55-59, here's one fantastic one from 1957. Bo Diddley's self titled debut features about half a dozen songs that include his name and half a dozen that don't, a pretty impressive feat in and of itself if it weren't for some amazing guitar parts and a rhythm track that was eventually copied over and over. So yeah, just this for now...but this is the whole birth of rock and roll era and all, so there's plenty of good non-jazz albums from this era.

1958 debut from these hugely influential brothers- originals and covers here, and yes they got better as they developed, but there are no two-part harmonies done better by anyone ever.



Debut album from The Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem- Liam Clancy was as monstrous as any debauched rock and roll star could even aspire to.

Just gotta reiterate, this is an era with debuts by Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Bo Diddley, Little Richard, Bill Haley, Fats Domino, classic stuff from the likes of Johnny Cash, Gene Vincent...I mean, rock and roll albums are all over this era. I think people tend toward picking up compilations because albums then were short, with maybe 10-12 songs all under 3 and often closer to 2 minutes each and CDs and even alter vinyl collections could cherry pick off a decade's output, but that doesn't mean there weren't some really solid albums being made.

Did it all, said it all, white boys followed.

Johnny Ace - Memorial Album

You should probably know the legend that Johnny Ace's career was cut very short by a game of russian roullette backstage at a show in Houston in front of Big Mama Thorton of Hound Dog fame. He only recorded 21 songs in his lifetime. 12 of them were released posthumously in 1955 on this album. Pledging My Love reached #1 on Billboard's chart after his death and it is a great fucking song. This album was very influential on Rock'n'roll and maybe somewhat surprisingly on Swamp Pop. I don't think I've ever not seen a cajun band cover at least one of his songs. These songs have also been covered by Elvis, Dylan, and David Allen Coe. Beast of an album.

Belongs in any discussion of the best albums of the 50's.

The ultimate in class, cool, and impossible-to-pigeonhole talent. An excellent late Saturday night choice for going to bed after too much scotch and too many Camels.

Hank Thompson - Songs for Rounders

The first country album recorded in stereo and a real controversial album for its time filled with songs about drinking, gambling, and outlaws. It features Cocaine Blues, Drunkard's Blues, Deep Elem, Teach 'Em to Swim



Joe Williams - A Man Ain't Supposed to Cry

Crossover album from jazz vocal great Joe Williams performing torch ballads backed by lushly orchestrated strings.

And a whole ton of Hard Bop Records.

This whole collection was of major importance to me...

And this (21 of 28 are from the 50's) which falls into the "if you don't like this, I don't like you" category

I'm not sure what all I have from this period in terms of comps... Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Johnny Cash, Bo Diddley, Howlin' Wolf... and I used to have a Jerry Lee one that I got rid of because it went too far into the later years for my taste.

Anyway, here's the number of albums (not counting those comps) that I have cataloged in RYM from each of these years:

1955: 1 (In the Wee Small Hours)
1956: 3 (including Elvis Presley)
1957: 7 (all jazz)
1958: 4 (jazz)
1959: 9 (and more jazz)

So all but 2 of albums I have from this period are jazz, but what's wrong with talking about jazz?

Avoiding the more obvious choices, how about:


Horace Silver - Finger Poppin' (1959)

Every single Horace Silver album I've heard (well, OK, all three of them) is excellent. Just really fun and engaging hard bop. I love how Silver always keeps things lively. I need to get more of his stuff.

Spade Cooley: Spadella - The Essential Spade Cooley

Well, since we can go even earlier and include comps, I'm tossing this one out there, a compilation of tracks from the 40s. I'm sure I've blathered on about this one before, but it's one of my favorites. A ton of top notch western swing gathered up here by my favorite artist of the genre. If you have any interest in western swing, get this now.

Also...either add or subtract points for his career going in the toilet after her murdered his wife as you see fit.

When people talk about Sun Ra, most folks tend to focus on the crazy, out-there late-60's and early 70's stuff. The 1950's and early 1960's Sun Ra records are sorely overlooked. Thing is, those early records are really, really great. The compositions are clever, catchy, and very song-oriented. Also, John Gilmore is a freaking great sax player. I love this stuff.

edit: nevermind, found it.

Here is some stuff that I had tagged

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=46329&start=0

and



for some reason, can't easily find a cd pic of vol. 1.

these comps will give you: Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Duane Eddy, Luther and Carl Perkins, Les Paul, Billy Mure, Eddie Cochran, Link Wray, Buddy Holly, Cliff Gallup, Joe Maphis, Roland Baker, Ike Turner, Mickey Baker, Scotty Moore, Santo & Johnny, Richie Valens, Larry Collins and more.

if my laptop cooperates i can upload upon request.

1955:

Tony Bennett - Cloud 7

It's crazy to think that Tony Bennett was 30 years old in 1955. That really seems like eons ago, or certainly too long ago for someone who was already a seasoned veteran in the music industry to still be kickin around today, singing national anthems and the like.

"Cloud 7" is what I believe to be Tony Bennett's true first "album", in the then burgeoning LP format. He had already had numerous hit singles, but for this album he wanted to put out a longer body of work, with somewhat of a focus. It's sexy, it's soft - but it's not entirely slow. Produced by Mitch Miller and arranged by Chuck Wayne, "Cloud 7" has a great jazz club feel to it. It's not retro-lounge lizard style vocal music, it's not quite as dour as "In The Wee Small Hours", and it's definitely not as grandiose as other Sinatra albums at the time, but it sits somewhere in between, more akin to what the more famous and respected female jazz singers were able to accomplish during this time period.

Bennett's smokey voice never really sounds better than it does here, what I would have to consider the likely peak of his ability. It's the sound of a singer realizing what he can do with the music given to him. He sounds mature, fully in control of his voice. Gone is the manic sound that some vocal artists were experiencing at this time before the birth of rock n roll. Bennett sounds calm as anything, yet his vocal power comes through.

It's one of my favorite 50s vocal records, and definitely worth checking out if you're a fan of this sort of music at all or if you've always considered Tony Bennett to be a hack.

1956:

Johnny Burnette & The Rock n Roll Trio - S/T

Admittedly, my collection and knowledge of early rock n roll and mid-50s rockabilly is very limited. Last week was the first time I had listened to "The Chirping Crickets" - one of the seminal early rock n roll albums. I have a couple dozen Elvis compilations and early releases, some larger compilations like "Rockin' Bones", "Born Bad" and the like, some Charlie Feathers, some Gene Vincent, etc. But overall, my collection is lacking - or moreso, it's lacking a record I can turn to and just say "now this is rock n roll and I fucking love it."

The record that came closest to that (apart from Elvis' "Sun Singles"), was Johnny Burnette and The Rock N Roll Trio's first album that I scored off some blog back in 2004. At the time, I was starting my first foray into trying to heavily immerse myself in Blues music and somewhere along the line I got directed to this record - and it hit me hard right away.

I don't know what it is really that makes Johnny Burnette's early work stand out so much in my mind. It's fierce, without being sadistic. He doesn't seem crazy, just like he's having fun. His occasional screams really test the limits of my speakers and the guitars lines would fucking slay even today. It's what we think rockabilly music should be, but with a little more power. It sounds rough, but wouldn't alienate the public. It's just a fucking fantastic collection of songs and definitely something that needs to be in everyone's collection.

Mick Jagger said he ripped this song off a few times

1957:

Ray Price - Ray Price Sings Heart Songs

This album should just add to the title "Or what country music is supposed to sound like."

For his first LP, Ray Price takes a bunch of previously famous sentimental songs and sets the tone for the way we now perceive classic country. Throughout the album is that established 4/4 shuffle beat that brings to mind so much good country music from the 50s all the way up to the Outlaw movement. You have legendary player Floyd Kramer on piano, great pedal steel harmonizing with Price's voice and the voice itself setting the line which many future country stars would try to reach.

The fiddle gives some of the songs a lighter feel, despite the heartbroken subject matter - the slow guitar solos fill the void and create an atmosphere of longing for the listener.

This album was released before Price truly hit it huge, and doesn't really feature any of his hits, but it is most definitely a classic country album at its core. Anyone with a passing interest in good country music should have this.

Certainly like to check this one out. Do you mind posting a link at your convenience?

Little did I know that Tom Armstrong "borrowed" the asthetic for this, his 1999 release.