SPADE COOLEY & THE WESTERN SWING DANCE BAND "Shame On You"

This album is an excellent collection of radio transcripts from 1944 and early 1945 that are previously unreleased. Spade Cooley's band played a superb brand of Western Swing(California style). The instrumentals are performed with verve and gusto. The Vocals, by Tex Williams, are smooth and exude an earnest sincerity. Bloodshot Records should be commended for releasing this CD. (Amazon)This is one of the hottest western swing aggregations ever put together. You can always tell that if Tex Williams is on the record, because the first big firing had almost all of these guys and gals going into Williams' great first band.
This band was put together specifically to wage big battles of the bands on the Santa Monica and Venice Piers during WWII. They were hired to out play and out improvise and get people dancing longer than any of the other bands. They regularly did battle with Bob Wills' Texas Playboys before thousands and thousands of war workers many of whom had come from Texas Oklahoma and other areas where Western Swing had grown up. During the war years and shortly after both Cooley and Wills were among the most popular performers of any kind in California and the entire country.
If you are really into the music, you will welcome that there are a number of cuts performed by Cooley on his standard releases (get the Spadella collection if you want the same stuff done in the studio). You can listen to the alternate solos and improvs by different band members.
The sound quality here is outstanding for remastered air checks. This is a definite buy. Most people I know who heard Wills and Cooley back in the 1940s tell me that air checks like these and the Tiffany Transcriptions of Wills are the closest thing to the way they actually sounded in live performance. (Country Round Up)trax:
1. One, Two - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 2. Steel Guitar Rag - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 3. South - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 4. Topeka Polka - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 5. Down Home Rag - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 6. Honey Song - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 7. Oklahoma Stomp - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 8. One Sweet Letter From You - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 9. Yodeling Polka - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 10. Forgive Me One More Time - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 11. Silver Bell - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 12. I've Written so Many Tunes - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 13. Swinging The Devils Dream - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 14. The Trouble With Me - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 15. Cowbell Polka - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 16. Better Do It Now - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 17. Rochester Schottische - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 18. There Is No Sunshine - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 19. I Found a New Baby - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 20. Stay Away From My Heart - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 21. Copenhagen - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 22. Then You'll Know what It Means To Be Blue - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 23. Corrine Corrine - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 24. Shame On You - Tex Williams w/Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang 25. Sign Off - Spade Cooley & The Western Swing Dance Gang
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