Gypsy Hale

Found this single shortly after I posted the previous blog entry on Carol Rose, so it's back to Grand Junction this month.

As noted in the previous story, a bio on Carol Rose mentioned that she owned the Misty record label.  This record was put out the same year as her debut LP.  No clue who the band members are on this,  if Gypsy Hale is the name of the band, the female vocalist, or if Carol Rose is, in fact, Gypsy Hale.  I'm sure someone can fill me in.  The only other names on here are producers Frank Chamberlain and Don Jones. Sorry for the quality of this sample. Sounds muddy to me, but I guess that's how Frank and Don mixed it.

Sample of Sleepy Lovin Summer Sunday Sunrise

Misty 784 (1978)

Flipside is a country instrumental, "Black Mountain Boogie."

Easter with Shorty Thompson

Listen

Found this holiday appropriate 78rpm - the second Shorty Thompson disc on the Ace label in my collection (also have Ace 001 "Colorado Rose" / "Baby I've Got the Goods on You"). Maybe 002 will turn up, someday.

There's already a ton of bio info about Shorty on the Internet, so I won't copy and paste here (I mention a bit about him in a past blog post on Dave Spielman and his Rhythm Rangers). That said, I can't find ANY information on this release.  Every discography I have found on Shorty fails to mention this record.  Can't imagine stumbling upon a rarity here, but who knows.

Happy holiday...

Virginia Unrein

  NOTE:  DivShare has been acting up (again) and a good chunk of my audio has disappeared.  Sorry if you have tried to listen to the samples and instead hear the the sound of silence. Going through the monstrous task of moving over all of the DivShare audio on here to my own hosting and embedding my own player.

I'm a sucker for the whole song-poem genre. For those unfamiliar, the concept was this: Write a song (or poem), then pay a company to take your composition, set it to music, back it with studio singers and a band and viola, you have a record! Check out the outstanding American Song-Poem Music Archives site.

Take for example Virginia Unrein of Montrose, and her ode to her nautical love, Sailor Joe.

Listen to a sample of "Strange Music"

No idea on when this was recorded, or who the studio singer is.  Virginia's song appears to be part of an EP with three other folks who handed over a few hundred bucks to the prolific Halmark label.

Virginia left this world in 2013. Her obituary mentions that she "successfully wrote and published several of her own songs on CD."

Del Carsan

Listen to a sample

A bit early for an income tax song, but I have an Easter-related record planned for April.

Nice hillbilly, ridin' the rails ditty about the revenuer man from singer, Del Carsan. Unfortunately, not a lot to go on. Address listed is in a Springs residential area, between East Pikes Peak and East Bijou. The current resident has no clue on the past owner.

A search of the BMI register for "Kimbro Music Associates" brings up nothing, and a White Pages directory search for the singer's name - zilch.

Flip side is an equally enjoyable country ditty, "My Plea."

Carol Rose

Going back to 1978 for this vanity release from Grand Junction's own Carol Rose.

Hi...I'm Carol Rose (Misty Records MSA-78-127) was recorded at Real to Reel Studios in town, and published by Mountain West Music. Studio players include Bobby T (just Bobby T) and Bob Mueller on guitar, Stormy Lee on drums, John Velarde on violin, and Jim O'Connor on bass. Jim also produces the album, and pens the lead off cut, "Tears of a Broken Lady."

Listen to a sample

In 2008 Carol Rose was inducted in the Seattle Western Music Society’s Hall of Fame as a pioneer in western swing. Her bio notes that she was born in 1943, in Oak Creek, Colorado. "After spending several years performing in the state, she moved to Vegas and did the nightclub/casino circuit." Bio also shows that she actually owned the Misty label, and that she has a total of three LPs. 

In 2013 the local Grand Junction paper had a mention of a concert she gave, featuring Big Band music.

Dead Silence - the guys who had the name first...

 

Apparently there are (were) not one, but two Colorado bands going by Dead Silence.

This post is about the first one, formed in 1980 (Ken Just, Brooke Besser, Perry Gragas, and E.D. Meyers). They were only together about five years, but made quite an impression on the harder edge local music scene. Bummer they only released one single.

 Sample of "Can't Stop"

(DSR 001/ 1984)

Looks like they're still in business, with a CDBaby page of never-to-vinyl songs available.

Good stuff. Dig in, but don't hurt your neck.

Imogene (Gene) Bloomfield

 I first ran across the name Gene Bloomfield on the 1983 Ace Ball album, Ace Ball Sings Gene Bloomfield And Some Of His Own. You can read all about Ace's Pueblo years here.

 Not much is known about Imogene Eleanor Bloomfield.  Found out she was born in 1914, and the 1940 census shows she lived in Illinois with her husband, Leo (who passed away in 1972).

According to the U.S. Copyright Office, in 1949 she penned "Forever and a Day" with song-a-minute guy David Hall of Nordyke Publishing, the big song poem racket out of Los Angeles.

Somewhere along the way the Bloomfields made it to Pueblo, where she continued to write songs, eventually partnering with Ball.  At the age of 71 she recorded what is believed to be her only solo record, the endearing "My Letter of Prayer." Found this demo via my buddy Joel Scherzer.

 Listen to a sample of "My Letter of Prayer"

She left this world in 1992 and is buried, next to Leo, at the Imperial Cemetery, off the Beulah Highway.