Leftover Explorers and Triples

Anchovies?  You've got the wrong man. 
I spell my name with VITRIOL!

Peter Lubin set a high bar for our American Explorers fantasy camp.  He wanted to make sure the tracks were representative of the artists’ talents and the ethos of the original American Explorers series, which featured legendary practitioners of many genres of popular American music:  blues, country, jazz, soul, gospel, zydeco, rock, and rockabilly.  

We combed Discogs, AllMusic and RateYourMusic for releases and appearances by the artists on Peter's list, and we “auditioned” about 70 albums.  Peter discarded a lot of his own nominees, and he suggested alternates for some of the tracks that we proposed. Some of the artists (like Marty Stuart, Rodney Crowell and Ray Wylie Hubbard) were dropped simply because they have thriving careers and didn’t need our “help” as imaginary A&R representatives.  We also had a surplus of blues and jazz guitarists, all of whom were deserving. We gradually whittled four hours of music down to two.  

The compilations are stronger as a result of this aggressive “pruning” – but there were songs I fell in love with that didn’t make it past the final round.  Even these discards are top quality tracks. Today (for my own listening pleasure, and for anyone who might be curious) I'm sharing some personal favorites that were cut from the project or replaced by other songs.

One of Peter's favorite musicians who we didn't get to include is Don Randi.  Peter highly recommends the early 60's albums by the Don Randi Trio.  Don is still an active performer, but hasn't recorded in years.  He would be perfect for an album in a revived American Explorers series.  Here's Don in action:

In addition to these Leftover Explorers, there's another trifecta of Triple Song Titles.  Many were sent in by Richard, as well as andreyud, Berni, CC, and Stinky.  I had no idea how many songs there were at the start of this thing.  It has gotten way out of hand, but (as with the Fantasy American Explorers project), it has also led to some truly wonderful artists and songs that I might not have heard otherwise.  Here's one cool example: Cool, Cool, Cool by The Clare Sisters (click on the song title for a cool-cool-cool animated video!)

If you're not exhausted by the triples, please enjoy Six Six Sixties (rock songs of the decade), Shame Shame Shame (funk, soul and disco), and Poing Poing Poing (schlager and chansons).