Dollar Country Newsletter, June 2024
Brother Snellgrove, Judy Brandenburg, Virge Brown, D.C. Mullins, Randy Hobbs
News From Dollar Country
It's spring in Cleveland. People say that Cleveland winters are hard, and they're right. Our winters are cold and they last a long time, but when you get a Spring, Summer, and Fall as temperate as you do up here on Lake Erie I'll take a brutal winter in trade any day of the week. One of my favorite things about this time of year here is that Clevelanders all go outside right when the weather hits. I've been strolling our son around the neighborhood and I see people coming home from work and sitting on their porches. I can hear music blasting from the yards around us, you smell burgers on the grill, and you hear cans cracking open. It's joyous. The sporadic fireworks and speeding, ear splitting motorcycles are a bit of a damper, but you can't have it all.
Having a baby is like having your life exploded. Now, six months in, I feel like I'm starting to pick up the pieces and put them back together. Some pieces won't get put back into my life, and that's OK. It's a great reset. I've made myself a schedule of things for the month to hopefully be able to finish all my things at the right times. The thing that has been most neglected is the website/database. Sometimes I think about pausing everything for a month or two just to do a complete clean up and catch up on back logs, but I've never done it. It's one of those things that I deal with having DIY job. I don't have a boss to talk to, I just have a couple hundred people who support me, so I always want to be sharing and making for all of you fine folks.
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►Queer Country?
Sometimes I'm asked if I have any LGBT+ artists in my collection and my response is “Yes, but I don't know which ones.” Let's face it, country music has a reputation for it's strong association with christian conservatism over the years, which isn't unwarranted. The Grand Ole Opry courted religious rural folks as part of their marketing, and this connection stuck for a long time. But to my point, I feel sure that my collection has many queer artists in it, but I can only go with the information that is available. Since the world these artists made music in 50+ years ago was much more conservative, It's very rare to hear about an openly gay country artist from back then. The ones that may have been were certainly not open about it on their records, and even if they were open to their friends and family there often isn't much information about them at all to find, much less who they preferred to partner with. There is one notable exception to this, and that's Lavender Country, a group from Seattle Washington who released an openly gay country album in 1972. You can find it on the internet.
Thankfully, today, there are many LGBTQ+ artists making country and roots music. Check out rainbowrodeomag.com to explore more!
►Collection Notes
Incoming: Country Gospel LPs and 45s from Tom Fallon
I've gotten more than a few amazing things from Tom over the years. Last time I visited him he had mentioned he had some country gospel LPs he was thinking about letting go of eventually and when I visited recently I just bought the whole shelf full.
Incoming: French Language 78s from Quebec from Moldy Fig
I found a very rare blues 78 last year that was in very bad shape. If it had been in good shape it would have been worth hundreds, but even in it's worn state I estimated it being worth about $100. These are the sorts of things I bring to Brian because he deals in 78s, and I don't. He actually played it on his windup machine while I was there and it didn't sound nearly as bad as it did on a modern needle. So he took the 78 and got it to someone and traded me country stuff for it, and that's how it happens.
►Records From The Archives
D.C. Mullins - My Soldier Mind / Me And Old Blue
Year: 1969
Label: D C
Genre: Country
Format: 7”, 78rpm
My Soldier Mind:
Me And Old Blue:
Sitting down and listening to this recording made me start to feel unhinged. The music meanders on, never quite changing, but never staying the same, and DC Mullins may have used Burrough's cut-up technique* to put these lyrics together. My Soldier Mind is a rambling thought experiment about what's going through the head of a soldier dying on the battle field. As an experimental song it's amazing, but that's not the intent. “As I lay on the front lines, I tell what's on my soldier mind.” What's on this soldier's mind is his wife and his son, and something about being a soldier. The song clocks in at over 5 minutes long, it doesn't just over stay it's welcome it drinks all your beer and asks to crash on the couch too. But like all those friends that have crashed on my couch over the years, I still love it. I love that DC Mullins made this rambling monstrosity for us. He never knew he was making experimental acoustic gold.
On the flip we have Me And Old Blue, a song about a trusty dog. In my view the only bad songs about a dog are the ones where the dog dies at the end, and that doesn't happen here. The music on both sides is very similar, vocals with piano and two guitars. One acoustic guitar strums in the background while the other constantly noodles the whole time, not quite in time with the rest, but close. The piano is strong in the mix and provides the backbone that drums might give a song. There might be bass in there somewhere, but it's hard to tell. I get the feeling that Mullins just got a few musicians in a room, yelled “HIT IT BOYS!” and then they recorded whatever happened. My favorite line is “Now if the president wants Old Blue, say Mr President, I go too.”
DC Mullins released this on his own D.C. Recording Co. based in Creekville Kentucky. According to an ad placed by Mullins in the May 24th 1969 issue of Billboard this release is “Designed for all markets.” and Mullins “prolific pen has combined love, life and religion in a way to please your listeners.” I'd love to hear what a person in 1969 who bought this single would have thought.
*A writing "technique in which a written text is cut up and rearranged to create a new text." (Wikipedia)
Virge Brown and His Shadows - Hello Kate / Your New Love Has Got You
Year: 1979
Label: Country Star
Genre: Country
Format: 7” 45rpm
Hello Kate:
Your New Love Has Got You:
"I woulda ask ya to be my wife Kate, but you would hafta go out and get a job washing dishes. Because I just got enough money left in my pocket, Kate, to pay my taxes."
Virge Brown wants to get married, he has things he wants to do, but he doesn't have any money. He's breaking his back digging ditches and all he's left with is just enough money to pay his taxes. Can you believe that? He can't even afford to buy a wedding ring. I'd recommend to Mr. Brown that he see a tax accountant because it sounds like maybe he needs to write a few things off so he can pay less taxes, but that won't help him now because this all happened in the 70s. Hello Kate is a really interesting tune. It's a laid back tune with laid back instrumentation with a spoken word vocal over top. The exasperated narrator tells the old country music story of working hard but ending up with no money, but in a way that makes you smile. I don't know if Virge was smiling when he made it or if this was a work of sincerity, but either way I like it.
Your New Love Has Got You is an example of one of my favorite country sub-genres: Drum Machine Country. Drum machines don't show up all that often in country because of the abundance of studio musicians on one hand or the unnecessity of full instrumentation on the other. You can record just about any country tune with a guitar and vocals if you need to and it will sound just fine. The song is a lovely ballad to a love lost. It has an extended guitar break in the middle where the solo guitar is the lowest thing in the mix. As opposed to the recitation on Kate, this side has Brown crooning. I get the feeling that both of these tracks were self recorded and multitracked, it has that feel to it.
Country Star was the child of Process Record Co. from Franklin Pennsylvania. Process was active from the late 40s into the 70s where they started releasing things under Country Star, and then later Country Star International. All the imprints under Process had a devil may care style of releasing nearly anything from well produced to home made songs. Virge Brown was a country DJ in Greenville PA who recorded around a dozen records in his time, although they may be more that I don't know of.
Randy Hobbs / Brother Snellgrove - Lo-Ran Records Split
Year 1966
Label: Lo-Ran Records
Genre: Country Gospel
Format: Split LP
Randy Hobbs - I Dug My Daddy’s Grave:
Brother Snellgrove - Backslider’s Plea:
[Full LP Available to Subscribers HERE]
This is an odd release. It's a split with one side by Randy Hobbs and one side by Brother Snellgrove. Split LPs just aren't that common in country, generally it's either a compilation or a single artist. The music is squarely country songs about gospel. Usually when I say “Country Gospel” I'm describing a sort of music that is in between, it's not straight country and it's not straight gospel. If you changed the lyrics in a country gospel song it would still sound like country gospel, but this release is country music about God. If you changed these lyrics to be secular it would just sound like a country album. The strangest thing to me is that I have completely struck out on research about the label and artists.
Now that I've told you what I don't know, let me tell you what I do know. These songs really hit the spot for me. The instrumentation is scant. Most tracks are just vocals over an electric or acoustic guitar with mandolin thrown in occasionally. The playing sounds similar enough that I wonder if the backing band is the same for both sides and they just changed singers, which would fit my idea that this release was a showcase the label put out as promotion. That's just a theory though. The recording quality is lo-fi, although it's from the 60s I'd guess they were still using 50s technology. If there were more instruments it might get muddy, but there's not so it's clear as day. Randy Hobbs sounds like a country singer, he's got that Lefty Frizzell in his singing. Brother Snellgrass, on the other hand, sounds like an amateur, and in the field of country gospel that's not rare.
The song choices are excellent. On I Dug My Daddy's Grave, Hobbs sings about digging his father's grave and the regrets he had for the lies he told his him, which ends with him literally throwing dirt in his face. Backslider's Plea on the Snellgrove side is my favorite pick there. The story of hearing a man asking Jesus to wait a day to come back so he can repent in time for the rapture. Wild stuff.
The Brandenburg Family - Judy Sweet Judy
Year: 1976
Label: Self-Released
Genre: Gospel
Format: 12” LP
Jerry McFarland - Judy Sweet Judy:
Judy Brandenburg - What A Beautiful Day:
[Full LP Available to Subscribers HERE]
Judy, Sweet, Judy is a memorial album for Judy Brandenburg, who died in a car accident on May 16 1976 at the age of 14. Unlike most memorial albums, these aren't songs about Judy but songs sung by Judy and her family and friends. It's a snapshot of a life cut short and unlike any other album I've come across. The songs are recorded by an amateur, presumably at home or at church, and it's the sort of low fidelity sound where you can hear the air in the room. These were made with one all purpose microphone placed somewhere in the room. It's an incredibly touching record. You can hear the Amens from the listeners.
It's hard to think about someone when their life is cut so short. To think of what people would think of me if I had died at 14 is impossible to understand, most of my life and the things that made me who I am today happened after that age. In that view Judy will always be a young, sweet, and innocent person, which is exactly how she's described on the back of the album. Her family describes her as a “dedicated Christian girl” who “blessed the hearts of many people” with her singing. A friend's father describers her as loving tomatoes and that she “was a good Christian girl from a good Christian home.” Maybe I'm just a pessimist, but I tend to think of the age of 14 as being right around when you start to come into your own. At 14 a lot of kids still mimic their parents and have their parents' opinions, who knows if Judy would have been a good Christian in the future or not. We'll never know, because when you die your story is written.
The music on this disc is heart-warming and authentic. They range from group gospel singing to just a single vocal and piano. One track has a bit of preaching, and the lone song recorded specifically for this album is vocals and guitar. These don't sound like songs recorded to release on a record, they sound like a community existing together and trying to make a document of themselves, and it paints quite a picture. Most of the recording dates are within 14 months before Judy's death, including In The Upper Room, which was recorded the morning of the car accident. Who knows if these would have been released at all had Judy not died. The most common refrain on the album is that god chose to take Judy away, and I find that so heartbreaking. Religion gives many people a way to cope with the difficult aspects of life, and I'm glad this family had a way to deal with such an impossible situation. It's a touching album and a fitting memorial.
┌Book Corner
Author: Pierre V. Daigle
Year: 1972
Publisher: Acadian Publishing Enterprise
PP: 164
The Acadians were a group of French immigrants who came to North America and settled in Acadia, which is now the area of Maine, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland. They were forcibly removed from Acadia by the British and eventually settled in south Louisiana, you may know them by their more common name, Cajuns.
Mr. Daigle is a Cajun himself, and has great pride for Acadian heritage, history, and music. In many ways this book is a love letter to the Acadians, even if you skipped the About The Author, Foreward, and Introduction (all written by Daigle) you would feel his connection to the history just by the way he writes about it. The first third of the book tells the history of the Acadians from their French origins to their resettlement. It's not an easy story to hear, like many other groups of people who were at odds with the British, the Acadians were treated abhorrently. After building homesteads and farms in the Northeast they had all of their possessions and lands taken and they were shipped off on boats against their will, with a large portion of them ending up in Louisiana, but also scattered groups all along the Atlantic coast. Daigle makes a point to write all of this out in very plain English so that even a schoolchild could understand it, but as an adult I didn't find the text to be childish or simple.
The following two thirds of the book are about Cajun music and musicians. One chapter being all dead or retired musicians and the next being “Musicians Playing Today.” Here we get everything from the first Cajun musicians to up and coming teen accordion players. Mr. Daigle has his take on just about everyone's playing and isn't shy about his opinions. He only included artists he could get a picture of, which ends up leaving plenty of people out, but that's just the way he wanted to do it I guess. I found a lot of these artist bios very interesting as some of these don't exist online. After these two chapters there is a limited discography of Cajun records and an appendix showing all known Acadians who fought in the revolutionary war.
This book is a great introduction to Cajun history and culture that is easy to read and informational. You can pick up a copy online for $10 from Down Home Music.
►Upcoming Events
June 19th: Chris Acker & Zach Bryson at The Little Rose Tavern
July 2nd: Country Night at The Little Rose Tavern in Cleveland
July 6th: Brule County Bad Boys & Jeremy Summer at The Happy Dog
►Upcoming Radio Shows
June 12th: DC Episode 246
June 26th: DC Episode 247
July 10th: DC Episode 248
Thanks for reading this, I put a lot of work into it and I hope you enjoyed it.
-Franklin
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Keep up the good work. Thanks
Thank you, Frank. This is terrific stuff, and the records are amazing. DC Mullins and the 'Drum Machine Country' guy were oddly compelling ... but the clip of Judy Brandenburg floored me completely. Wow.