RARE BILL HALEY VOGUE PICTURE DISC THE DOWN HOMERS
$
48
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Description
Rare Vogue Picture Disc. R736. The Down Homers and Kenny Roberts. I am not certain if Bill Haley is actually on this Vogue disc but he had a history with "The Down Homers." A short bio of The Down Homers and Bill Haley: "Bill Haley Way Before The Comets. Our story starts at the old North Swanzey, New Hampshire Rec Center one day in the early 1940s, when a 16-year-old yodeler from Massachusetts, Kenny Roberts, was performing with a western band called the Red River Rangers. Also on the bill that day was an established group called the Down Homers. And the Down Homers so liked what they heard that they hired Kenny Roberts as their lead singer. For a time, the group lived in Keene, performing several times a week on WKNE. In those days, many radio stations offered regular programs of live music, and around here that usually meant western music. In any event, bigger radio stations eventually offered the Down Homers steady work, in Indiana and Iowa. So the group headed west, with the exception of one member, Yodelin' Slim Clark. He stayed on for a decade at WKNE. Yodelin' Slim is still something of a household name among Keene natives of a certain age.
By the time the Down Homers left town, the United States had entered World War II, and young Roberts signed up with the Navy. So the Down Homers advertised for a new lead singer. Pennsylvania native Bill Haley answered the ad. "I taught him how to yodel," Roberts told us the other day.2 Then he headed off to war.
When Roberts returned to the Down Homers a little more than a year later, Haley was naturally out of a job. So he formed his own group, the Range Drifters, with Bob Mason on guitar and Lloyd Cornell on bass. Haley had heard a lot of good things about Keene from the Down Homers, so he eventually brought the band to Keene and WKNE.
Accounts differ as to exactly when that was, but it was probably in 1947 or 1948. Keene native Leo Howland was just a kid at the time, but he remembers Haley as a friendly sort who used to let his young fans hang out with the band members at the Washingtonian boardinghouse, at 173 Washington Street, where they lived. Over the years, Howland says he has told a lot of people that he knew Bill Haley, and that Bill Haley used to live in Keene. But he says most of them said, "Sure you did, Leo."
According to Roberts, the Range Drifters left Keene in the late 1940s, attracted by a bigger paycheck at a radio station in Syracuse, New York. There they split up. Haley went home to Philadelphia, where he formed a group called the Saddlemen. But musical tastes were changing rapidly, and the Saddlemen soon added a saxophone player and a drummer and became Bill Haley and His Comets. After a few regional hits--"Rock the Joint" and "Crazy, Man, Crazy"--they exploded into the big time with "Rock Around the Clock." It was recorded in 1954 and became a monster hit when it was featured as the theme song of the 1955 film "Blackboard Jungle." According to the Guinness Book of World Records, "Rock Around the Clock" remains the most successful rock 'n' roll record to this day, having sold some 25 million copies worldwide. And little did the teenagers of Keene know, as they were dancing in the aisles at the Latchis Theater in 1955, that Bill Haley used to live just up the street." Source: Editorial, The Keene (NH) Sentinel, September 23, 1995. I imagine this piece was written by then-editor Guy MacMillin. This Vogue Picture Disc is in excellent plus condition with no fading, cracks or damage. Bidding starts at .99 cents with NO RESERVE. High bidder to pay 3.00 shipping.
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