The nameless archivists at Germany's
Buffalo Bop
label continue their unending study of American
rockabilly
and
western bop
with
Wild Men
, a collection of 30 rare sides that, as the title suggests, features a number of unsung heroes chronicling the lifestyle and habits of the common or garden Bop Cat. From the high school ladies man of
Kenny Smith
's
"Wild Man"
and the plus-size hipster of
Duane Schurb
"Roly Poly"
to the pumping piano man of
Groovey Joe Poovey
"Ten Long Fingers"
and the hepcat hillbillies of
Rudy Hansen
"Saturday Jump,"
this disc features a healthy portion of jumpin' sounds from the '50s that surfaced on various regional and independent labels, though the closer,
the Rhythm Rockets
' stomping
"The Slide,"
makes its first commercial appearance on this collection. It's a testimony to how fertile the
and hillbilly boogie fields were at the time that
are still finding find so many quality recordings after over ten years in the game, and while some of these sides are a good bit more frantic than others, everybody on board rocks on out and there's no shortage of teenage attitude no matter which track you cue up. The label has also dug up some great photos of some of the artists, including
in an impressive fake Nudie suit and
Weldon & Wanda
showing off their guitars which have been customized with stick-on letters one commonly finds on mailboxes.
is great stuff for fans of first-generation
rock & roll
, from the rollicking sounds to the quality audio remastering. ~ Mark Deming