SHELLAC DISC Archives - Guerssen Records

Eden’s Island

GuerssenAdmin — Thu, 06 Feb 2025 23:00:00 +0000

Born George Alexander Aberle in 1908 and later adopted and raised under the name George McGrew, Eden Ahbez is regarded as a precursor to the hippie generation. Ahbez claiming that only the words God and Infinity were worthy of capitalization; approached Nat King Cole in 1947 and offered him his composition “Nature Boy”. The song was a big hit for Cole and was also covered by many artists. It became the best known song by the man who lived in communion with nature under the Hollywood sign in L.A.: he wore sandals, long hair and was a vegetarian.

Ahbez would supply more material to Cole, but he also recorded the amazing album you hold in your hands in 1960. The missing link between beatnik poetry and exotica sounds, Eden’s Island didn’t sell good back in its day, but has since become a very sought after piece among collectors and a source of inspiration among musicians – here’s your chance to understand why.

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Port Said Music Of The Middle East

GuerssenAdmin — Wed, 19 Mar 2025 23:00:00 +0000

Lebanese tenor, lute player and conductor Mohammed El-Bakkar became a star in Egypt, where he appeared in several Arabic-language films. In 1952 he moved to the United States, where he played a singing oriental rug salesman in the Broadway play Fanny. Port Said was his first LP, a magnificent piece of world music whose oriental flavors will make the perfect soundtrack to your belly dancing evenings. Six more volumes followed in his Music Of The Middle East series, which brought the Middle Eastern musical tradition to the United States, one of the first long-playing records to do so, sparking a frenzy for what has become the world music genre.

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Seven Day Fool

GuerssenAdmin — Thu, 02 Jun 2022 22:00:00 +0000

Born Jamesetta Hawkins in January of 1938, Etta James started her carrer in 1954. She could sing in a variety of genres, and by the early 1960s when she launched her first albums her repertoire was built of blues, jazz, R&B, doo-wop, soul and rock’n’roll tunes, with her powerful,deep voice feeling at home in either of these styles. Etta James’ career expanded over six decades, and she kept active until her death in January of 2012.

This double LP compilation selects tracks from her early albums and 45s, and offers a glimpse to the immense talent of this legendary artist. From fabulous vocal jazz tunes like Stormy Weather or Palm Nuts to classics of the blues like Howlin’ Wolf’s Spoonful or Muddy Waters’ I Just Want To Make Love To You (James’ version became very popular when used in a very famour Coca-Cola TV commercial); from delightful ballads like At Last to dancefloor fillers like Seven Day Fool (an extremely popular tune in the Northern Soul scene), here is an excellent selection of songs that set Etta James as a very big name in Afro-American music already at this early stage of her career.

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Eartha Kitt Live At The Tivoli

GuerssenAdmin — Wed, 19 Mar 2025 23:00:00 +0000

American singer and actress Eartha Kitt was probably the strongest personality in the music world of the 1950s and 1960s. She began her career in the early 1940s, appearing in several Broadway plays throughout the decade. By the early 1950s, she had already entered the Top 30 of American songs, including “Uska Dara” and the magnificent “I Want To Be Evil.” In the 1960s, she became the most evil Catwoman, opposite Adam West’s Batman, in the famous television series of the DC Comics character. The album you hold in your hands is a rarity in her discography. She performs some of her greatest hits to an astonished Danish audience at the Tivoli Varietéen Theatre in Copenhagen.

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Con El Diablo En El Cuerpo

GuerssenAdmin — Wed, 02 Apr 2025 22:00:00 +0000

Here is the amazing 1960 debut LP by Lupe Victoria Yolí Raymond, better known as La Lupe. Recorded in Cuba after her live shows in La Habana’s Vedado Night Club had attracted the attention of the whole city.

The album contains some of the numbers that made her fame: “No me quieras así”; “Quiéreme siempre”, which won her a Gold Record; “Es una bomba” or the fabulous title tune “Con el Diablo en el cuerpo”. It also contains her first recording of “Fever”, a song she would reprise on her US recordings and a most sought after 45 in the latin / boogaloo scene.

Worth mentioning are the superb arrangements by Felipe Dulzeides and Eddy Gaytán.

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Tito Puente Swings, The Exciting Lupe Sings

GuerssenAdmin — Sun, 24 Jan 2021 23:00:00 +0000

By 1965, the great maestro Tito Puente had asked La Lupe to join forces with him in two excellent albums, this is the second of those two albums. It has been said that La Lupe was more effective when backed by a smaller band rather than a big orchestra, and yet the results of her association with Tito Puente are unbeatable.

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Is Back!

GuerssenAdmin — Tue, 31 Jan 2023 23:00:00 +0000

Lupe Victoria Yolí Raymond (23 December 1936 – 29 February 1992), better known as La Lupe, was a Cuban singer of boleros, guarachas and Latin soul, known for her energetic, sometimes controversial performances. 1961’s “La Lupe ls Back” was her second LP on which she went one step ahead of her brillian debut “Con el diablo en el cuerpo”, incorporating several pop and rock’n’roll hits of the time to her repertoire, such as the Carole King/Jerry Goffin penned “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow” which had been a big hit for The Shirelles or “Lipstick On Your Collar” which had hit the RnR charts in the voice of Connie Francis, among others, all done in the unique Lupe style and adapted to Spanish.

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Marisol Internacional

GuerssenAdmin — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 22:00:00 +0000

Acting and singing prodigy child Marisol is one of the greatest stars in Spain ever.
She was incredibly big in her country, and her popularity soon reached other lands, some as far away as Japan where she issued some records and even recorded one of her hits in Japanese. Germany was another country that saw a market for a German-sung 45, as was Italy with a couple of rare Italian-sung tunes released. Marisol also sang in English, and even Chinese-as you willhear on the songs compiled on this LP, which features some of her non-Spanish sung sides alonside with very rare performances from TV appearances on vinyl for the first time ever! The selection is completed by tunes based on rhythms from the world and a couple of other favourites from her more classic repertoire.

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Som Definitivo

GuerssenAdmin — Wed, 13 Sep 2023 22:00:00 +0000

On Som Definitvo, their second long-play, they are accompained by another big name of Brazilian popular music: the amazing Tamba Trio, which featured Luiz E¿a on piano, vocals and arrangements, Bebeto Castilho on double bass, flute, sax and vocals and Helcio Milito on drums, percussion and vocals.
Together, Quarteto Em Cy and Tamba Trio deliver a sensational LP where bossa nova, jazz and Brazilian ancestry sounds mix to perfection as the base for the septet’s phenomenal vocal harmonies on songs written by some of the biggest talents in Brazil at that time, such as Edu Lobo, Dorival Caymmi, Gilberto Gil or Vin¿cius de Moraes himself, a.o.

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I’ve Got My Mind Set On You

GuerssenAdmin — Mon, 09 Aug 2021 22:00:00 +0000

James Jay Raymond was born in Washington D.C. in 1941 and started his recording career as Little Jimmy Ray. His early recorded efforts failed to hit the charts, but by 1961 he teamed up with his friend Rudy Clark. Clark’s songs, on Ray’s voice, called the attention of Caprice Records executive Gerry Granahan, who signed Ray for the label.
He would soon enter the charts thanks to Clark’s “If You Gotta Make a Fool Of Somebody”, which was recorded with Hutch Davie’s orchestral arrangements. It would not be his only hit, as follow ups “Itty Bitty Pieces” and “I’ve Got My Mind Set On You” also reached the top of the charts.
Nowadays “I’ve Got My Mind Set On You” has probably become James Ray’s most famous number thanks to the cover launched by George Harrison as a single from his 1987 “comeback” LP Cloud Nine, which he took to the top of the charts again with the help of two different videoclips to promote it.
Sadly, Ray would not live to see this revamped success, he died too soon in 1963.

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