BOB WILLS AND HIS TEXAS PLAYBOYS
THE TIFFANY TRANSCRIPTIONS (10CD BOX & BOOKLET)
COLLECTORS CHOICE (CCM991)
In 1945 Bob Wills and two business pals formed Tiffany Music to create a series of transcriptions. What are transcriptions? Well, they were pre-packaged radio shows featuring Bob's famous band that were sold to radio stations with listeners who just couldn't get enough of the Playboys Western Swing.
Over two years Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys recorded tons of blues, country songs, pop songs, jazz classics, fiddle tunes and improvised instrumentals, in true Western Swing fashion, at the famous Sound Recorders studios in San Francisco and here is the complete set of Tiffany Transcriptions, re-mastered to absolute perfection and you've never heard them sound better. Play this music at high volume and it feels like a train is passing through your house.
The Texas Playboys are nothing short of masterful. Ocie Stockard on banjo, Tiny Moore playing electric mandolin, Millard Kelso on piano, Billy Jack Wills slapping double bass and Alex Brashear on trumpet. Nobody could get sweeter sounds out of a steel guitar than Noel Boggs unless it was Herb Remington and they both feature strongly on these sessions. The electric guitars come courtesy of Eldon Shamblin whose arrangements were responsible for the polish of the Bob Wills sound and Junior Barnard whose beefy, audaciously distorted runs on his blonde Epiphone Emperor were years ahead of their time. Then there's the wonderful interplay between the fiddle players Louis Tierney, Joe Holley and Bob himself with their distinctive hot swing techniques, rural breakdowns and high pitched runs taking their sound into the stratosphere.
No other Western Swing band had a cooler, more relaxed singer than the legendary Tommy Duncan. He was a hardcore blues fan who could howl out tunes like "Sugar Blues" and "Milk Cow Blues" while his versions of current pop tunes left the originators standing. Nothing fazed him. He could croon sentimental ballads as effectively as the jazzy numbers and hot dance tunes that drove his audiences crazy and cope with Bob Wills - who delighted in interrupting his performances with chattering jive and humorous asides. If this resulted in Tommy breaking up in laughter, like he does on "Oklahoma Hills" - well, so much the better.
The thing about these Tiffany Transcriptions is that the whole band had time to stretch out and improvise. Because they weren't bound by the strict time limits of a 78rpm record, everyone could indulge in a rollicking good jam session and produce some spectacular results. Listen, for instance, to the stomping drive of the good humoured "What Is This Thing Called Love?" or the boggling "St Louis Blues Part 2" where everyone gets to show off.
Sleeve writer Rich Keinzle sums it up succinctly when he writes "For all the great records Wills made for Columbia & MGM, the Tiffanys capture something deeper, intangible, and vibrant - music that even the occasional missed note can't diminish. It represents the very soul, spirit and musical passion of Bob Wills and the band as they really were on those South Western bandstands. 60 years later, it still sounds like yesterday. Play it loud and listen. The magic is still there".
The package includes a 16 page booklet with notes by Ranger Doug (of the Riders In The Sky), Ashley Kingman and Big Sandy (of Big Sandy & The Flyrite Boys) and Ray Benson (Asleep At The Wheel). The CDs are in double card sleeves containing notes and reminiscences by band members Tiny Moore, Roy Honeycutt, Luke Wills, Monte Mountjoy, Joe Holley, Herb Remington, Eldon Shamblin, Johnny Cuviello and Dean McKinney. Even Merle Haggard gets in on the act with his brief tribute.
This set hasn't been off my player since it arrived. It's just packed to the brim with glorious, heartening, majestic American music that is bound to make it my reissue of the year! Not cheap but worth every penny!
Ask for CCM991. Price £125.00 (post free in the UK).
Review Date: March 2009
