Jerry Rainwater and the Blue Rockets, Snyder

JERRY RAINWATER and THE BLUE ROCKETS -Petite Fillette (Blue Diamond No#)

According to a single testimonial on the interwebs Jerry Rainwater was a rock n' roller from Snyder, Texas who on a few occasions performed at the theater in Colorado City. The address on the Blue Diamond label places him, or at the very least the label, in Snyder as well.

What Jerry left behind is an interesting record to say the very least. It's country, but it's a little bit rock n' roll too. There's an Elvis vibe. Some Jack Scott as well. And the subject matter? Well... odd, odd, odd.

There would be a late-70s lp release by Rainwater on an Odessa label as well. Big Jerry Reed (country dude, not blues guy) flavor on that album.

And as mentioned below Jerry died in November of 2011.

Royce Porter, Sweetwater

Major thank you to Little Danny of the greatly missed Office Naps who sent this disc on to me just this week... muchly appreciated!


ROYCE PORTER - Yes I Do (Look 1001)

Located an hour west of Abilene and just beyond the foothills of the Edwards Plateau Sweetwater is probably most noteworthy as the site of the infamous Rattlesnake Roundup held each spring as well as its growing importance in the production of wind power. Personally I've always enjoyed the town's red brick paved streets and laid back 'good ol' days' feel. La familia Westex has actually put it on our list of summer vacation "to do's". Don't know that I'd necessarily want to live there, but it's certainly an a-ok place to spend an afternoon.

The number of artists to have come out of Sweetwater is slim. It might or might not include Starday hillbilly Buddy Shaw ("Don't Sweep That Dirt On Me", "No More"... both high on the Westex want list). But the short list definitely includes the prolific Elmer Ray Doggett and Royce Porter.

While Porter is a busy man these days, reaping the rewards and fruits of songwriting in Music City he certainly had to dig some pretty deep trenches to get there. His story originally appeared in a Goldmine article from 1983 by Adriaan Sturm titled "Rockabilly Turned Nashville Songwriter" and Strum retold the story on the Redita release Rockabilly Meeting. The Goldmine article included the following quote, which also appeared in Vol. 11 of Bear Family's That'll Flat... Git It! series:

"Rock n' roll didn't start happening for most white people, especially in Texas, until Elvis broke loose." -Royce Porter

Like so many other kids Royce Porter tuned in to the Louisiana Hayride Saturday after Saturday to get an earful of Elvis. In June of 1955 Elvis played his first and only gig in the town of Sweetwater and I have little doubt that Royce and his buddy Ray were both there, mesmerized by the greasy headed kid from Memphis. And not too long after graduating high school, inspired by the success of the new star Louisiana Hayride the pair of Sweetwater boys lit out for the Houston area where they quickly got caught up with the infamous Bennie Hess. Doggett cut a couple of singles for Bennie's new rock n' roll label Spade, debuting in 1956 with the rocker "Go Go Heart". Royce followed a few months later with the moody hiccupin' shuffler "A Woman Can Make You Blue" on Spade 1931. It was while touring Texas radio stations and promoting their own Spade releases that they met Mr. Pappy Dailey of Starday records.

Porter was placed in a Fort Worth studio in mid-'57. History just reports the back-up as being Slim Willet's right hand man Dean Beard on piano and a local group, renamed the Kounts, performing back up vocals. Dailey took publishing on both "Yes I Do" (written by Doggett) and "Our Perfect Romance" and had the songs placed on a new Mercury label tie-in called Look. "Yes I Do" is busy bopper that has a lot to look at, if you dig. There's so much going that ol' Dean Beard is almost nowhere to be found until halfway through the break. But who was that guitarist?

Though panned in Billboard the disc did develop into some type of minor hit. The Kounts became a de facto Jordanaires and they and Porter got around just a bit off the 45's short success. It was enough to get Porter placed on Mercury proper for his next release. And then he was back with Dailey on the D label for one last release, "Lookin'". For whatever reason, Dailey released the single while Royce Porter was navy'd up with Uncle Sam meaning the effort stood little chance at success.

After serving out his tour Royce returned to Sweetwater to preach for a few years but by the mid-60s he was at again. While he didn't find a hit for himself on either Houston based FED records or as part of the Tear Drop label duo The Brothers-In-Law (produced by Ray Doggett) he did find his groove as songwriter.

Since the 70s Royce Porter has racked up a nice string of hits for himself. Most famous of the bunch is the huge 80s classic "Ocean Front Property", on which Porter carries a third of the songwriting. Thirty-three percent of a George Strait tune is a nice chunka change.

More info about Royce Porter, as well pictures, can be found on Marijn Raaijmakers' excellent Black Cat Rockabilly website HERE.

Bobby Fuller Four , El Paso

Though originally written by Sonny Curtis and first performed by the post-Holly Crickets in 1959, "I Fought The Law" will always be THE Bobby Fuller Four tune. The pounding hit version on Mustang truly defines the sound of Southwest rock n' roll.





What is there too say really?

I became a Bobby Fuller fanatic back in the summer of 1998. I was driving up I-10 into El Paso watching storms and showers pop off all across the valley from Texas into Mexico and I could smell it all thru the ever-so-slightly cracked windows of my beloved '66 Mustang... nothing smells like desert rain on a summer afternoon. The tape deck was blasting monster after monster from the INCREDIBLE Del-Fi/Mustang Bobby Fuller box set Never To Be Forgotten and hearing the title tune (WOW!), "Let Her Dance" ("Ohmygawsh" as our 3 year old would say), "She's My Girl", "Saturday Night", "A New Shade of Blue", and "I Fought the Law" while rolling into the Fuller / Fanatics stomping grounds was something akin to magic. It was one of those moments where it - whatever 'it' is- all comes together. And ever since then Bobby Fuller has been, is, and always will be watching summer rains sprinklin' down on little villages like El Porvenir across the Rio (so sad to hear of all of the stuggles that have beset this small village in the past month... damn the cartels).

According Miriam Linna's mucho grande sized Bobby Fuller write up in KICKS #6 Randy Fuller suggested Bobby rework the obscuro-for-nineteensixtyfour-o Crickets number to ride on the backside of the crowd fav "She's My Girl" on Bobby's own Exeter label. While this Fuller House studio production ain't amazing or mind blowing, it is pretty neato to see the birth of a monster. It's also notable for still containing the infamous line "robbing people with a zip-gun", which would be later updated to a more western sounding "six gun". Bobby and the Fanatics were pretty much ruling the roost in El Paso at the time and this song put them at number one down on the border.


Late in in 1964 the band made it into Los Angeles, VERY quickly taking off. By October 1965 the Bobby Fuller Four had released a string of KILLER singles on the Del-Fi imprint Mustang as well as a long player, were steadily gigging around town, and had managed a bit part in "The Ghost In the Invisible Bikini"... a pretty fast jump to the top of the food chain for the Texas boys.

In October Mustang released single 2014, "I Fought The Law" b/w "Little Annie Lou". With the high tech Del-Fi studio powering the production Bobby, Randy, Jim Reese, and DeWayne Quirico turned in an absolutely STORMING version of "I Fought the Law". Normal thinkin' within the community of 50s/60s music worshippers is that a big production is almost akin to some sorta slow death. Wrongo, snot nose. Not here. Keane's knob twiddlin' on "I Fought" is absolute genius. Multi-tracked vocals, workman-like guitar strumming, pumping bass, the steady and powerful drumming, and imagery all came together for one of the truest rock n' roll singles of the era. It wasn't 'garage' or teen beat and neither was it influenced by the British Invasion... quite simply "I Fought the Law" on Mustang is on of the purest and most powerful expressions of American rock n' roll. Sometimes production kills some of the spirit... but not here. It could have only come from this group of Texans at that particular time and in that particular place.

And those suits...

"I Fought The Law" made it to number 9 on the US charts in February of '66 and was soon a hit around the world. On July 18 of the same year Bobby was of course dead. Weirdly dead.

From the summer of 1965 to the summer of 1966 the world had the potential to truly belong to Bobby, Jim, brother Randy, and DeWayne (and later Dalton Powell). Congrats to them for creating THE 60s rock n' roll record. I can't think of anything any better and any more pure. In El Paso Bobby tried so hard to be Buddy. With "I Fought The Law" I think he just might have one-up'd his idol.

**********************************
From NBC's Hullabaloo- March 21st, 1966


I mentioned Miriam Linna of Norton/KICKS above. Miriam is currently working on a Bobby Fuller bio. She just kicked off a blog about the BFF so check it out HERE. Also, dig all of Bobby's El Paso work via the El Paso series from Norton.

Larry Trider, Amarillo

LARRY TRIDER - I'm Comin' Home / Note Upon My Door (Coral 62362)

It's crazy. How could a land so flat, something that appears so utterly rural have ever been a launching pad for rock n' roll? An outsider may not get it... to them it's little more than endless flatlands broken up by farm acreage and feedlots. But by God-- Buddy Holly and his Crickets hit like an atom bomb and showed the world that you didn't have to look bad and dangerous (i.e. Elvis Presley) to know how to rock n' roll. Them Hub City boys basically set the standard for how rock n' roll worked and looked in a small group setting.


And what Buddy, Sonny, Nikki, Joe, Jerry I., Don Webb, Jack Huddles, the Veveteens, the Sparkles, Don Guess, Bob Montgomery, Sonnee West, Jim Solley, KDAV, Waylon Jennings, Bill Mack, Ben Hall, and the Cotton Club started out in Lubbock whipped through the Panhandle like a dust storm. Buddy Knox, Don Lanier, and Jimmy Bowen were up in Canyon. And a hop, skip, and a jump away was Amarillo where you had Rick Tucker and the Turks and the Nighthawks. Back to the south in Plainview the String-A-Longs were working their thing after a false start back up in Hereford as the Rock n' Rollers. And if west Texas was the launching pad for this crazy little thing then Norman Petty's Clovis, New Mexico studio(s) were like mission control funneling all these cats off to diskeries like Hamilton, Dot, Decca, Jaro, Brunswick, and Coral.

One of those cats was Larry Trider. Pretty much all histories list Larry's place of birth as the TINY and out-of-the-way farming town of Lazbuddie and then jump right on along to his Amarillo days as a member of Rick Tucker's band, though Bill Griggs gives mention to a spot in Clovis hosting his own program in '56 and '57 on KICA in A 'Who's Who' of West Texas Rock 'n' Roll Music (2002). Rick Tucker, like most other West Texas artists, had a serious hangup on the Holly hop sound and this is born out on his releases on Erwin Short's Veeda label. Bill Griggs mentions that when Tucker moved on to the West Coast in the early 60s Larry Trider fronted a series of his own bands, making his first recordings with Petty in 1961.

"Don't Stop" and "The Ha-Ha Song" were picked up by Roulette and released in the Spring of 1961. If there is one negative thing that can be said about so many of the artists from the South Plains and the Panhandle it is that they took the Holly influence and stuck with it. Even after Buddy was gone from this earth they couldn't shake either the vocal mannerisms or guitar style, both of which were so very influential. And listening to the Roulette 45 one can't dismiss that influence. "Don't Stop", written by Petty and Amarillo's Bob Venable, is a thin rewrite of "When Sin Stops" by the Nighthawks... and Bob Venable... from 1958. "The Ha-Ha Song", co-written by Venable co-hort Eddie Reeves, again mines the Holly sound, but a trace of clownishness helps the song stand out a bit. Based on the recollections of Robin Brown Larry's next few years in Amarillo were busy. He eventually got a deal with Petty's ol' standby Coral Records, getting two releases.

Trider's first release on Coral, in 1963, paired "I'm Comin' Home" with "Note Upon My Door". Though penned by Charlie Rich, it is Carl Mann who tore through an OUTSTANDING version of "I'm Comin' Home" for Phillips International in 1960. Though it ain't got the go of Mann's waxing, Trider does a fine job reworking the tune in a Cricket-y style. "Note Upon My Door" came from the pen of a Ken Davis. This would not be the "Shook Shake" Ken Davis guy, but the Ken Davis guy that recored "Drop Out" at Petty's studio for a 1964 release on Dot. "Note"'s got a twistin' go-go style to it, and while I can hear Buddy I know that had he been alive in 1963 he would have been years beyond this sound and style.

Larry's next Coral release would be 1964's "Carbon Copy" which was written in part by Plainview's Keith McCormack. While Larry never had a big run at the charts during his time, the string-y "Carbon Copy" was picked up by the Northern Soul crowd a few years back and has gone on to be big soul/popcorn hit. Larry's last 45 for Coral was "Make It Do" b/w "Who's Gonna Stand By Me" and it was not a hit upon its release in 1965 and nor has it been a hit since.

1965 seems to have been a busy year for Trider as he jumped from Coral to Dot and was also in California for a short stretch as a Cricket, after which he returned to Texas taking up a residence in Lubbok and jumping to the Amy label for a country-ish release. Then in the 70s it was off to Las Vegas for a stretch and an album on Rainwood and then back on into Lubbock and the Red Raider club. Last seen, Trider was back in Vegas where he may - or may not have- passed away 10 years back or so.

Evelyn & Virgie Galleges w/ the Rhythm Heirs, El Paso

I had previously stomped the A-side of Yucca 105, by Art Wheeler, HERE. Here's the sweet chick-ano flip. Hee hee har...


EVELYN AND VIRGIE GALLEGES w/ the RHYTHM HEIRS - Cradle Rock (Yucca 105 B)

Ruben Molina places Evelyn and Virgie Galleges (os?) in El Paso in his book Chicano Soul, even referring to "Cradle Rock" as one of the very first doo wop-styled recordings to come out of the border town. And yet this February 1959 release sounds earlier. The vocal group sound hit El Paso a bit late, but just as it was in cities like Los Angeles and San Antonio the Chicanos hung on to the 'oldies' sound loooooong after it had fallen out of favor on radio.

The most interesting thing about "Cradle Rock" is that it was remade by brothers Benny and Joe Rodriguez who, as members of L.A.'s Heartbreakers, re-recorded the song for Bob Keane's Donna Records in 1964. Mayhaps LA legend Dick "Huggy Boy" Hugg got ahold of the Yucca 45 and turned it into a hit at some point, making it a part of the East LA oldies lexicon.

"Cradle Rock" is- of course- and rewrite of the "Rock-A-Bye Baby" nursery rhyme. Not too bad either.

Whether it means anything or not, producer Ken Dunnagan's last name appears on the Gatorvettes' "If It's Tonight" on Bocaldun, another El Paso doo wop record (Stomped HERE.) which carries publishing for Fred Stryker's Fairway Publishing. Fairway was the publisher for almost all of the releases on Yucca up through early 1961 before switching over to Styrker's Briarcliff Publishing.