Obscure Originators (30): Bob Wilson

From my website's front page series about lesser known artists who performed the original versions of Australian or NZ records.

See also: the full collection of 30 Obscure Originators features.

In 1960 Bob Wilson released the original version of (And Her Name Is) Scarlet. A later version by The De Kroo Brothers was a #9 Australian hit in 1963

Bob Wilson's recording came out on LA label Era. It was written by Steven Howard, a pseudonym of Era's co-founder and owner Herb Newman (1925-1976). He had co-written The Wayward Wind, a hit for Gogi Grant on an Era single (1956, #1 USA).

Before The De Kroo Brothers got to it, Keith Colley had recorded Scarlet, again on Era (1962), and there had been a German version in 1961.

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This was interesting, and not hard to find out, but who was Bob Wilson? The trouble is that the world is full of Bob Wilsons, so his identity was infuriatingly difficult to search for. I discovered that even BMI, the US copyrighting outfit, had registered compositions by at least three different Bob Wilsons together under one name.

Eventually, someone emails. This time, it was a longstanding friend of Wilson who had much information about his life and career. Thanks to him and some further digging, I was even able create a passable Bob Wilson article at Wikipedia.

This Bob Wilson was a guitar virtuoso and singer-songwriter from Pleasant Hill, California. As a teenager just out of high school he recorded some singles on Era, then had a long career as a schoolteacher with occasional reappearances on record.

For example, he featured on an album by folk artist Janet Smith in 1968, and he released albums with Rick Shubb (the Shubb Capo inventor) in 1976 and 1999. In the mid-2010s his Bob Wilson Ensemble appeared at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. 

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For more about the song and Bob Wilson see The De Kroo Brothers - (And Her Name Is) Scarlet.

Obscure Originators (29): Drafi Deutscher And His Magics

From my website's front page series about lesser known artists who performed the original versions of Australian or NZ records.

See also: the full collection of 29 Obscure Originators features.

In 1960s Germany, singer-songwriter Drafi Deutscher was a chart-topping pop star, but to most  Australian pop fans at the time his name would have been, well, obscure.

Johnny Chester's moderate hit Teeny (1963 #28 Australia), with English lyrics by Johnny himself, is a cover version of Teeny by Drafi Deutscher And His Magics.

More than that, Johnny is singing over the backing track recorded for Drafi’s single, and he repeats the procedure on the B-side with Do The Stomp, a cover of Drafi’s B-side Shu-bi-du-bi-do The Slop, again with Drafi's recycled backing track.

The following year, W&G did this again when Merv Benton sang new lyrics by Noel Watson over the backing tracks from both sides of Drafi's single Shake Hands / Come On, Let’s Go.

English translations or rewrites of songs are not unusual. The lady in Mark Holden's I Wanna Make You My Lady (1976) was an angel in the original Swedish hit Jag Ska Fånga En Ängel. You're My World came from Il Mio Mondo, and My Way came from Comme d'habitude.

The idea of recording vocals over the backing track of an original version is not unheard of either. Six months before Johnny Chester's Teeny, Ben E. King's 1963 hit I (Who Have Nothing) had used the backing track from Uno Dei Tanti (1961), the original version by Joe Sentieri.

Other double-sided covers exist, too. In 1957 The Diamonds covered both sides of The Rays’ single Silhouettes / Daddy Cool, and in 1964 Australian band The Cicadas covered both sides of The Marauders' British single That’s What I Want / Hey Wha’ D’Ya Say with some regional chart success.

But W&G's twofold use of the manoeuvre I like to call the double-sided cover version with English adaptation and recycled backing track must be unique.