People these days forget that at one time, “rock and roll music” was simply a genre, like jazz, pop, R&B and C&W. It wasn’t a given that rock would last beyond just being a fad after Elvis went into the army and became a bored movie star. Lots of white pretty boys didn’t want to go the pop route with versions of “My Funny Valentine”, so they tried the rock bandwagon.
One such gent was Jimmy Clanton (b 1938), whose early career is covered her on this 2 disc , 62 song collection. What’s fascinating about this anthology is that his two big hits, “Venus In Blue Jeans” and “Just A Dream” are sort of outliers for the Bobby Vee/Bobby Vinton/Fabian crowd. Yes, they are excellent teen pop hits, but Clanton was much deeper than that.
Swamp deep, to be specific. His earliest pieces from 1957, such as “I Trusted You” and “A Part Of Me” and R&B pumpers, while he shows how to boogaloo on “Go, Jimmy, Go”. His rocking moments as on “Don’t Look At Me” and “What Am I Gonna Do” are strong, as are his mature crooning ballads such as “Another Sleepless Night”.
The real tectonic shift occurs during 1960, when he goes from adolescent tunes to music for adults, with a bluesy “Angel Face”, a swinging “Over The Rainbow” and “You’re An Old Smoothie” and a mix of soul and pop on “A Kiss TO Build A Dream On”. Then, you get a one-off ringer with some deep blues as he takes on the Charles Brown songbook with convincing reads of “Love Me Tonight” and “I Wanna Go Home”. Why this wasn’t carried on, I’d love to know!
The set ends up with Clanton doing teen pop material again a la Neil Sedaka, but if Clanton reads this, let us know if he ever went the jazz route, or if he still records. Lots of intriguing questions arise here, besides simple nostalgia.