I know that it’s hard to believe, but at one time people actually played music at parties that was NOT for background atmosphere. People actually danced in their homes to songs! Sometimes it was a birthday party, for graduation from something or your dad just got out on parole, but something was a reason to get together and dance the latest moves. Here are two albums that show how your parents or grandparents were much cooler than you. Well, at least you can imagine it…
Twist-A-Rama puts together 28 songs that were part of the dance craze “The Twist” in the early 60s. Chubby Checker gets credit for starting the fad, but Hank Ballard actually beat him by a few years in 1958, and you get the original “The Twist” here. Essentially, everybody got into the act, even Muddy Waters with “Muddy Waters Twist” and King Curtis blowing up a storm with “The Arthur Murray Twist”. Gary US Bonds’ classic “New Orleans is here and even Checker himself pops in with pop star Bobby Rydell for “My Baby Cares For Me”. Take off your shows and start movin’!
R&B Goes R&R is a little bit of a different spin, with the white boys catching up with the black kids on the other side of the tracks, stealing their songs, bowdlerizing up the sound and presenting it to kids of the Eisenhower years. Think Elvis Presley without Colonel Parker and you get the idea. In fact, Elvis shows up for “I Got A Woman” as does fellow Memphis-ites Jerry Lee Lewis for “Hit The Road, Jack” and Texan Buddy Holly for 15“Reddy Teddy”. Most fun are Elvis impersonator Conway Twitty on “Realin and Rockin’” and Ronnie Hawkins (is he with The Band?) on a smoking “My Girl Is Read Hot”. We won’t even discuss the pre-Kingsman “Louie, Loie” by Rockin Robin Roberts”, but Jerry Duane is convincing on “Keep A Knockin’”. Even watered down, these drinks go down stronger than anything today.