Dumpster Vinyl Volume 9: Celebrity Degrees from “The Big Sound” series

Oh man.  This is the kind of treasure that I was hoping would be buried in all these boxes of LPs my uncle saved from the junkheap.  This is a disc full of 10-second spots of celebrities telling you what the temperature is, backed by the most early-60s swingin’ kinda big band music you’ve ever heard. Plus a lot of them relay the temperature in rhyme! And Spike Jones gets to use cartoon sound effects!

Unlike the public service messages, this is a good backdrop against which the celebrities can make some light-hearted jokes about how hot it’s gotten. I love this kooky stuff! If you ever wanted to hear Tony Curtis tell you it’s 88 degrees, your dream is now fulfilled and you can die happy. Please leave me in your will.

I hope you all enjoy this as much as I did!

P.S. Disc MF-7 R in “The Big Sound” series; all the celebrities participating are in the tags for this post.

P.P.S. They had a lot of Connies back then, didn’t they?

P.P.P.S. Fabian’s track sounded like he was in a bathroom stall until halfway through, when I assume someone adjusted his mic or some levels or whatever.  And one of Steve Allen’s deliveries is really weak. Makes me wonder how many takes some of these celebrities got.

Dumpster Vinyl Volume 4: Who’s in the Magic Circle Now? from “The Big Sound” series

Spinning, spinning, spinning the magic circle of all-time favorites! Who’s in the magic circle now?

Another disc (this one’s RAM-3-R, so I guess I’m doing them in order now), another mix of singers. Again, some I know, some I’ve never heard of.

The ones I knew, or have at least heard of: Henry Mancini (he refers to himself as “Hank”!), Debbie Reynolds, Johnny Cash, Bobby Rydell, Les Baxter.

No idea about these people: Mary Kaye Trio, Bob Crosby, Sue Raney (jeez, those three just sound like store-brand knock-offs, 50-odd years later), Billy Eckstine, Kay Starr, Bud & Travis, Stan Kenton.

Also, starting with this disc, they start introducing a little variation into the production tracks (the part with the announcer that precedes each of the artists). On some of them, instead of saying the standard “Who’s in the magic circle now?”, he lowers his voice and booms “Who’s there now?” It makes it sound like somebody real important’s about to show up; it works on the Johnny Cash track; less so for Stan Kenton.

Maybe I wasn’t paying attention before, but a few of these artists mention the “magic circle of all-time favorites” title on this disc.

Overall, it’s getting kind of weird listening to these in isolation from the music of these singers & artists. Some of the artists refer to the upcoming song as “one of [their] favorites”, but did they even know which songs would be introduced?

P.S. My favorite part is when one of the Mary Kaye Trio starts talking when he’s not supposed to.