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:: Carol Channing & Jimmy C. Newman - Louisiana Cajun Rock Band ::

Who knew Carol Channing rocked? To me she was little more than an
oddball has-been Broadway actress who occasionally turned up on
daytime TV shows like Mike Douglas and The Match Game. A big mush
mouthed blonde with a voice like sand paper who inexplicably seemed to
have a career. She was born in 1921, so by the time I became aware of
her, she was too old to appreciate as a sex symbol, if she ever was
one to begin with. It was hard to say what it was about Carol Channing
that was appealing.

Most of her fame came from Broadway. She was Lorelei Lee in "Gentlemen
Prefer Blondes," but Marilyn Monroe did the film version. She was
Dolly Levi in "Hello Dolly", but Barbara Streisand ruined the movie
role. She ultimately became known as a strange looking, but appealing
blonde with a huge mouth and an oversized personality. Female
impersonators had a field day with her. So how did it come to pass
that she should make a country album?



Don't know, but here it is. I wouldn't have picked this record up if I
saw it for ten cents in a dollar bin. As it happened, I bought a
couple of records from an old lady on Ebay, and she threw this one in
for free. It's an odd one, to say the least. Recorded in the mid '70s
and featuring some decent country musicians of the day like Hank
Locklin and fiddler Rufus Thibodeaux on the low-budget country label,
Plantation Records. You could do worse. This song is a duet with Jimmy
C. Newman. Originally known as just Jimmy Newman, he was a straight
ahead country singer who eventually became known as a Cajun-country
singer, thus adding the "C." to his name. With this song, you get a
little country, a little Cajun, a little rock, and a whole lot of
Carol. What more could you possibly want?


Mike

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