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The Texan born Larry Dale only recently passed away, in May 2010, aged 87. His passing is doubly sad for us, as he never got to see these two gems pressed up and released on 45rpm vinyl, as they should have been some 55 years ago. Discovered a while back languishing in the vaults of Groove, a long defunct sub of RCA set up to handle the parent labels R&B output, these two sides were recorded at New York sessions in the mid-50s. Both tracks feature the sterling guitar and arrangement skills of the legendary Mickey Baker, and the handiwork of the equally infamous Jack Dupree on the '88s. ‘Down To The Bottom’ is a real monster - a rolling Blues Rhumba with crashing piano rolls and rather suggestive lyrics from Dale, who is headed down to the Gulf of Mexico to find himself a woman - with one pre-requisite, “She‘s got to like to jelly roll”. Whatever he’s talking about, and I’ll let you all draw your own conclusions, one thing is clear, and that is that this is a floor-rocking, roof-raiser of a record. On the flip, ‘Midnight Hours’ is a low and greasy, down home Blues, cut in the same session and the likely intended B-side. In the event, the single was inexplicably pulled from release by Groove. As such, we have maintained the original Groove logo and label design for this long overdue 45rm vinyl pairing of these two great rocking Blues sides. |
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