DavesMusicDatabase.com is devoted to ranking, rating, and reviewing music of all genres and eras. The DMDB blog serves up album and song reviews, best-of lists, music history snapshots, and music-related essays.
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 | Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame:1978-2004 |
The Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame operated from 1978-2004. It was a non-profit organization based in North San Diego County in California. Here’s the full list of inductees and their years of induction. See other Hall of Fames.
Resources/Related Links:
First posted 12/31/2004; last updated 5/6/2023. |
 | Earth Angel (Will You Be Mine)The Penguins |
Writer(s): Curtis Williams, Jesse Belvin, and Gaynel Hodge (see lyrics here) Released: October 19, 1954 First Charted: December 18, 1954 Peak: 8 US, 3 CB, 7 HR, 13 RB, 1 DF (Click for codes to charts.) Sales (in millions): 4.0 US, -- UK, 10.0 world (includes US + UK) Airplay/Streaming (in millions): 2.0 radio, 43.89 video, 51.7 streaming |
Awards:Click on award for more details. 
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About the Song:In the 1950s, it was common practice to refashion an R&B hit as a “sanitized, big-label cover.” RS500 The intent was to craft a version of the song which would be more palatable to mainstream white audiences and subsequently have a better shot at success on the pop charts. While the remake generally lacked the grit and soul of its source material, it would often outperform the original. “Earth Angel” was no exception – at least in terms of chart success. The Crew-Cuts, a “schmaltzy white group” RS500 from Canada, took the song to #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 while the first version, by the Penguins, peaked at #8. Regardless of what the charts said, however, the Penguins’ take on the song became the more celebrated. The original outsold the remake and outperformed it on jukeboxes. DM In fact, when measured by appeal over time, Billboard called this “the top R&B record of all time.” NRR The Penguins were a vocal group of high-school friends who formed in Los Angeles in 1954. They recorded the song in a garage; producer Walter Williams recalls redoing takes because he had to quiet the barking dog next door. TB Their “artless, unaffected vocals…defined the street-corner elegance of doo-wop” RS500 and “Earth Angel” is “one of the finest examples” TB the genre has to offer. A 1997 listener poll done by New York’s WCBS ranked “Earth Angel” the scone best doo-wop song of all time, only behind the Five Satins’ “In the Still of the Night.” SS “Like many doo-wop ballads, [it] was structured on the chord changes of Rodgers & Hart’s ‘Blue Moon.’” TY2 “Earth Angel” is the song that cemented that chord progression. AH It has “virtually all the qualities cherished by doo-wop lovers: melodic beauty, a shimmering and earnest lead vocal, stripped-to-the-bone simplicity, and a pristine romantic innocence.” SS The idealized teen romance AH as well as the melody is similar to “Dream Girl,” a song the Penguins’ Jesse Belvin took to #2 on the R&B chart in 1952. SS The arrangement is from “I Know” by the Hollywood Flames, a band which featured Penguins’ members Curtis Williams and Gaynel Hodge. AH “Earth Angel” was originally intended as the B-side RS500 for “Hey Senorita,” AH released through DooTone, a black-owned and operated label. NRR It bore the distinction of being the first song from an independent R&B label to hit the Billboard pop charts. DM Even more significantly, it was one of the first crossover records NRR and “a pivotal record in rock & roll’s early development.” RS500 Resources:
Last updated 3/23/2023. |
How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb |
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Released: November 23, 2004 Charted: December 11, 2004 Peak: 11 US, 13 UK, 11 CN, 11 AU Sales (in millions): 3.3 US, 1.2 UK, 11.6 world (includes US and UK) Genre: rock |
Tracks: Song Title [time] (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts.
Total Running Time: 49:03 The Players:
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Rating:  4.032 out of 5.00 (average of 32 ratings)
Awards: (Click on award to learn more).
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About the Album: In the 1980s, U2 gradually built their audience from college rock to the culmination of “biggest band in the world” with 1987’s The Joshua Tree. Four years later, the band had another monstrous success with Achtung Baby, a conscious attempt to modernize their sound with dance and electronica elements. The new millennium found the Irish quartet “returning to the big, earnest sound and sensibility of their classic ‘80s wor.” AMG with All That You Can’t Leave Behind. “It was a confident, cinematic album that played to their strengths, winning back the allegiance of wary fans and critics” AMG who’d somewhat soured from 1993’s Zooropa and the “rocktronica fusion” AMG 1997’s Pop. U2’s follow-up, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, continued to “erase their wild flirtation with dance clubs and postmodernism so they can return to the time they were the social conscience of rock music. Gone are the heavy dance beats, gone are the multiple synthesizers, gone are the dense soundscapes that marked their ‘90s albums.” AMG Instead, there is “a clean, sharp production, gilded in guitars and anchored with straight-ahead, unhurried rhythms.” AMG This is “U2 at their simplest, playing direct, straight-ahead rock with little subtlety and shading in the production, performance, or lyrics.” AMG That can evoke criticism that the band are “scaling back their sound so far that they have shed the murky sense of mystery that gave The Unforgettable Fire and The Joshua Tree an otherworldly allure.” AMG The album “feels too constrained and calculated, too concerned with finding purpose in the past instead of bravely heading into the future.” AMG Still, “the stark production can also be an advantage, since the band still sounds large and powerful. U2 still are expert craftsmen, capable of creating records with huge melodic and sonic hooks.” AMG There are “songs as reassuring as the slyly soulful Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own and the soaring City of Blinding Lights, or the pile-driving All Because of You.” AMG
Notes: “Fast Cars” was added as a bonus track in UK, Ireland, and Japan. |
Resources and Related Links:
Other Related DMDB Pages: 
First posted 2/22/2009; last updated 5/1/2022. |
image from ebay.com
This special issue of the British music magazine Mojo ranked the greatest music stars of all time. Here’s the list:
 | Mr. SandmanThe Chordettes |
Writer(s): Pat Ballard (see lyrics here) First Charted: October 11, 1954 Peak: 17 US, 18 HP, 17 CB, 13 HR, 11 UK, 14 AU, 2 DF (Click for codes to charts.) Sales (in millions): 1.0 US Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 79.3 video, 109.04 streaming |
Awards:Click on award for more details.
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About the Song:This “vocal group favorite” DJ was written by Pat Ballard, the music editor of College Humor. TY2 It was first recorded by Vaughn Monroe and released in 1954 as the B-side of “They Were Doin’ the Mambo.” WK It was followed by multiple covers in late 1954 and early 1955 by the Four Aces (#5 US, #9 UK), Buddy Morrow (#20 US), the Lancers (#28 US), Dicky Valentine (#5 UK), Chet Atkins (#13 CW), and Max Bygraves (#16 UK). There were later chart versions by Bert Kaempfert (1968, #12 AC) and Emmylou Harris (1981, #10 CW, #37 US). The Andrews Sisters, Marvin Gaye, Bette Midler, and the Supremes have also recorded the song. However, the Chordettes had the first – and most successful – charting version. Theirs topped the Billboard, Cashbox, and Your Hit Parade charts. The Chordettes were a female vocal group comprised of Carol Buschmann, Lynn Evans, Jinny Osborn, and Nancy Overton. They formed in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. They were known for their “barbershop-type close harmony…with a doo wop and pop twist.” DD They were “the stylistic bridge between the barbershop harmony vocalizing of predecessors such as the Andrews Sisters and the rhythm & blues pop of the Shirelles.” TB “Mr. Sandman” is “an excellent example of their main form, singing close harmony a cappella with minimal accompaniment.” SF This was the first chart hit for the foursome. They went on to reach the top 40 on the Billboard pop charts eight more times, including four top-10 hits. Their next biggest hit was “Lollipop,” which reached #2. Their version features an iconic male voice in the third verse in simply responding, “Yes?” one time after the quartet sings “Mr. Sandman.” The voice was supplied by Archie Bleyer, the founder of Cadence Records, the company which released the Chordettes’ version of the song. WK The version by the Four Aces is featured in the movie Back to the Future when Marty, played by Michael J. Fox, first realizes he’s in 1955. WK Resources:
First posted 9/8/2021; last updated 3/23/2023. |
