Sunday, December 13, 2015

The Blog Post Title (Confusing)


So it appears that Gertrude Faith decided that she had material that had to be heard, and she contracted through the Globe Records song-poem factory for a few of her lyrics to be turned into song, sung by label superstar Sammy Marshall. This seems to have been in 1962 or 1963. In her case, she decided to form her own label, naming it after the biggest town in her area, Cheyenne, WY, just about 40 miles from her local burg of Pine Bluffs, WY.

Okay, so far so good - many other song-poets did the same. But let us look at the songs featured on one side of this record (which may very well have been the only record ever issued on Cheyenne Records). It seems to be about the men who guard the nuclear missiles pointed at the Godless Commies, and the guards' fervent hopes that those missiles never have to be used. And it is in a slightly different style than most of the records Globe produced, with the martial beat and 91 second length.

Still, not totally unusual. But why, oh why, did Gertrude decide on the aggressively un-commercial, confusing and ridiculously clunky title, "The Bird (Missile). Will we ever know why? Would anyone, then or now, looking at that title, have any chance of knowing what it was about? These are the things I ponder when I have nothing more important to do.

Download: Sammy Marshall and the Rays - The Bird (Missile)
Play:

A far more typical lyric, title and Globe Records performance can be fond on the flip side, "Game of Love", which predates the big hit single of the same name by a couple of years. If I'm understanding this lyric, this ballad is sung to a young lovely for whom Sammy was once guy # 1. But now she's up to guy # 9, and still she's not happy. Yes, both records involve people grouped into a set of 9. Paging John Lennon!

Download: Sammy Marshall and the Rays - Game of Love
Play:


By the way, thanks to the person who posted a comment about a file link being broken on the post about "One of Satan's Angels". I have fixed the problem!

2 comments:

Timmy said...

Dear Bob, I believe, deep inside my heart, that the term "Bird" is being used here, to represent the flight of American Spirit, which once so proudly beat back the former aggressive natural inhabitants of this continent, so that we could proclaim a dominant stature and be fulfilling a strong urge to become what no God before us could ever imagine. So, therefore, let us soar to heights unbounded by possible reality, and proclaim that all is grand & we shall protect it, without regard as to who gets killed, even if it means undoing all of what evolution has brought forth from eons ago! That is all, I am not a robot, no matter what is proven in court.

KL from NYC said...

Wow. The B-side is an actual song! What a surprise!