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CONTENTS
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2. Let It Be Me 3. Mama Tried 4. The French Song 5. 24 Hours from Tulsa 6. Ballad Medley (2 songs): Sweet Dreams & Born to Lose 7. Apache 8. Somewhere My Love 9. You Were On My Mind 10. Kentuckian Song 11. '50s R&R Medley (3 songs): Whole Lotta Shakin' I'm Walkin O Boy 12. Help Me Make It Through the Night 13. Down in the Boondocks |
15. Put Hand in the Hand 16. Catfish Bones* 17. Chattanooga Prison Train* 18. Workin' for the Man* 19. Blues 'round My Door* 20. Alligator Mama* 21. Cajun Child* 22. Fool on a Stool* 23. Sad Country Love Song* 24. Mississippi Tripper* 25. Glory Land* 26. Old Jed Clark* 27. Satisfied* 28. Memory Take Me Back* 29. Highway 354* 30. Hillman Express* (* Original Songs by Bill
Hillman)
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The Hillmans: Ja-On --- Bill ---Robin ---
Sue-On --- China-Li
Hillman Career Timeline to CD
No. 12
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Vol.
12: THE CANADA SESSIONS
From
The Early Years
33 Songs Performed,
Arranged and Produced by the Hillmans
Original
Songs © Copyright Bill & Sue-On Hillman and published
by Maple Grove Music PRO
Copyright
and Performing Rights on all other songs
are property of their respective songwriters
and publishing companies.
Unauthorized
Download and distribution is prohibited.
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Born To Lose |
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On My Mind |
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I'm Walkin' ~ O Boy |
Through The Night |
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Me Back© |
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During the '70s decade we were Canada's most prolific "Indie" recording act. |
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| We first recorded Bobby Goldsboro's Muddy Mississippi Line shortly after he had a hit with it in 1969. It was featured on our second album which we released under the name The Western Union. Jake Kroeger, the rhythm guitar player in our group, sang the lead on the song. On a later release, album No. 4, I re-recorded the lead vocals using the same backing tracks which had included Sue-On singing harmony. Our version with Larry Clark's organ and vibes turned out quite different from the Goldsboro original. |
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Working on a barge down in New Orleans Spending all my money on Cajun queens Working from the morning till the end of day And that's when I go out to play Working on the Muddy Mississippi Line
Working on the muddy Mississippi line
I've got a lot of friends down in New Orleans
My daddy was a Mississippi river man
Working on the muddy Mississippi line
I love the Mississippi like it was my own
Working on the muddy Mississippi line |
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| Let It Be Me originally was a French hit in 1955 as "Je t'appartiens." The English version was a major hit by the Everly brothers in 1960. I have been a fan of the Everly Brothers since we opened for them in a concert back in 1965 (See The Early Rockin' Years). Their thrilling harmonies have influenced just about every rock and country group that relies on harmony, including the Beatles. Since many of our best duet numbers are Everly inspired, it seemed natural that we try our hand at one of their biggest hits: Let It Be Me - a song we have done countless times since in concerts, at weddings and on television. |
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I bless the day I found you ~ I want to stay around you And so I beg you, let it be me Don't take this heaven from one ~ If you must cling
to someone
Each time we meet love ~ I find complete love
So never leave me lonely ~ Tell me you love me only
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| Another of our duets is a driving version of this Merle Haggard country hit: Mama Tried. While trying to adapt it to a danceable duet version and fooling around with the Hag's original intro, I found myself jokingly playing the riff from the Monkee's Last Train to Clarksville. It stuck, and that's what we ended up using on the record. |
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The first thing I remember knowing ~ Was a lonesome whistle blowing, And a young un's dream of growing up to ride, On a freight train leaving town ~ Not knowing where I'm bound, No-one could change my mind but Mama tried. One and only rebel child ~ From a family, meek and
mild,
And I turned twenty-one in prion doing life without
parole.
Dear old Daddy, rest his soul ~ Left my Mom a heavy
load,
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| Manitoba-born Lucille Starr had a million seller, international hit with The French Song. French is fourth language for Sue-On. but she and our audiences enjoyed her version. Thanks to multi-track recording she was able to sing all the harmony parts and Larry was able to play vibes, piano and organ on the backing track |
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Quand le soleil dit bonjour aux montagnes, Et que la nuit rencontre le jour. Je sui seule avec mes reves sur la montagne, Une voix me rapelle toujours. Ecoute a ma porte les chansons du vent, M'rapelle les souvenirs de toi Quand le soleil dit bonjour aux montagnes Je suis seule, je ne veux penser qu'a toi Now when the sun says good-day to the mountains
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| Gene Pitney and Dusty Springfield both had hits with 24 Hours From Tulsa, but since we wanted to perform it as a duet we were perhaps more influenced by the Ian and Sylvia version. A serious problem arose when we recorded the song, however. As we had done on many of our sessions we recorded the bed tracks first and then returned to the studio a week later to voice-over the vocal tracks. While listening to the bed tracks at home we were shocked to hear that we had left out a few beats in the spot where the song goes "She said... beat... beat... OK... beat... beat." Panic time! Finally, rather than redo the bed tracks for the whole song we decided to shorten it to "She said OK... beat... beat." No one ever seemed to notice . . . until now : ). Larry played a gung ho Hammond on the song and I played all the guitars -- including the "organ" solo for which I played two guitars through a Fender Leslie unit that I had borrowed for the session. |
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Dearest darling I had to write to say that I won't be home anymore 'Cause something happened to me while I was driving home And I'm not the same anymore Oh, I was only twenty four hours from Tulsa Ah, only one day away from your arms I saw a welcoming light and stopped to rest for the night And that is when I saw her as I pulled in outside of
the small motel she was there
Oh, I was only twenty four hours from Tulsa
Oh, I was only twenty four hours from Tulsa
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6b. Born To Lose (Ted Daffan) |
| We had enjoyed the versions of Sweet Dreams sung by Don Gibson, Faron Young and Patsy Cline as well as the renditions of Born to Lose by Eddie Arnold and Ray Charles and they were always popular with our audiences. When we were deciding on a ballad for one of our early sessions it was so hard to choose between them that we combined them both into a medley. It seemed to work. My guitar solo was using my Fender Telecaster with my home-made B-bender played through my Echochord delayunit and a DeArmond volume/tone pedal. |
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Sweet dreams of you Every night I go through Why can't I forget you and start my life anew Instead of having sweet dreams about you You don't love me, it's plain I should know I'll never wear your ring I should hate you the whole night through Instead of having sweet dreams about you Sweet dreams of you Things I know can't come true Why can't I forget the past, start loving someone new Instead of having sweet dreams about you BORN TO LOSE Born to lose, I've lived my life in vain Every dream has only brought me pain All my life I've always been so blue Born to lose and now I'm losing you. Born to lose, it seems so hard
to bear
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| Sue-On and I recorded APACHE in 1971 in the first
Century 21 studios on King Edward.
* I had recorded two guitar instrumental tracks on our first album: The Steel Guitar Rag and a medley of Freddie King's Hideaway and the Wailers/Kingsmen hit Louie Louie. I put the solos on the back burner, partly because guitar instrumentals are so exacting, and partly because my dream had been to someday record an entire guitar instrumental album. * I chose Apache for this, our first guitar solo on a multi-track session, as it was one that I hadn't been able to do well on stage because of our trio instrumentation. But now, in the studio I could overdub all guitar parts: a couple acoustic rhythms (Gibson and a Fender Malibu in Nashville Hi-Bass tuning) and and two lead parts. By this time I had customized my Telecaster by adding a Bigsby, homemade B-Bender and re-wired pickups. I played through a DeArmond volume/tone pedal, into an Echochord tape delay echo unit and through a Fender Twin Reverb amp. * I had been a major Shadows fan back in the days before good vocal PA systems. I learned a multitude of their instrumentals when I had to play hours worth of guitar tunes every night. We even worked out their choreography steps while playing. But for some reason their UK hit version of Apache didn't receive play on this side of the Atlantic. Rather, the Jorgen Ingman cover version got all the play. * So the arrangement I came up with on this Jerry Lordan instrumental was about three equal parts of Ingman and Shadows versions, along with my own riffs using the B-bender and volume pedal. Barry Forman was on bass and Sue-On and Ted Paley shared the drums/percussion. Uncle Smokey, Larry Clark, added a subtle Hammond fill. The "arrow" sounds were accomplished by dragging my pick along a guitar string with echo added. |
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| Somewhere My Love (Lara's Theme) from the movie Dr. Zhivago was very popular with our audiences who loved to dance to it. Through the years about half of our recorded material was original. Originals got more air play and critical recognition but well-known songs were important for record sales off the stage. The original had full orchestra backing but we tackled it with three-piece combo backing. Sue-On sang her own harmony parts and I played the solo with B-bender and volume pedal. |
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Somewhere, my love ~ There will be songs to sing Although the snow ~ Covers the hope of spring. Somewhere a hill ~ Blossoms in green and gold
Someday we'll meet again, my love.
You'll come to me ~ Out of the long ago,
Till then, my sweet ~ Think of me now and then.
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| Reflecting our growing fondness for duets, we did
an electric version of Ian and Sylvia's On My Mind on which Larry
played percussive organ riffs. The US pop group, WE FIVE, with a quite
different arrangement had a big hit with the song, but we preferred the
original version written by Sylvia.
We were always on the lookout for songs suitable for our duets and we performed many of the Ian and Sylvia songs over the years. Some we adapted as lively show or dance numbers by adding a heavy beat with electric instruments. But many of their songs were more suitable for acoustic arrangements and we featured them at folk festivals, cowboy poetry gigs and in smaller more intimate settings. WE FIVE Five ran into censorship problems with the phrase "I got drunk and I got sick . . ." which they left out of their arrangement. We stuck with the original lyrics and never met any problems for radio play or live performances. Such a phrase certainly wouldn't raise any eyebrows in today's music scene. |
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Got up this morning, you were on my mind, and you were on my mind. I got some ache's and I got some pains and I got some wounds to bind. Went to the corner just to ease my pain, it was just
to ease my pain.
I got a feelin, down in my shoes. it's way down in
my shoes.
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| This ballad was the beautiful title song from an old Burt Lancaster western movie, The Kentuckian. It had always been a favourite of mine, but we couldn't find a copy of any recording of it -- this was long before the days of the Internet and Youtube. I remembered, though, that the Ray Little CKY touring western show had featured the words in a souvenir song book I had bought at one of their shows in Strathclair's Bend Theatre back in the mid-'50s. I finally found the booklet in one of my piles of old memorabilia, and relying on memory, taught the song to Sue-On. It was a natural for her and is one of my all-time favourite Sue-On songs. Larry's vibes and my sustain guitar gave our rendition a rather unique sound. |
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I see my darlin' in each spray of summer sunlight I see my darlin' in the leaves that fall I see her walkin' in the rainy April sadness And hear her name in every bluebird call I've told the possum in the gum tree, the raccoon on
the ground
I've told the possum in the gum tree, the raccoon on
the ground
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Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On (Williams-Hall-David) I'm Walkin' (D. Bartholomew - Antoine "Fats" Domino) Oh Boy! (Tilghman-West-Petty) |
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Come on over baby, whole lotta shakin' goin' on Yes I said come on over baby, baby you can't go wrong We ain't fakin' a whole lotta shakin' goin' on Well, I said come on over baby, we got chicken in the
barn
Well shake baby shake (4x)
Well come over baby we got chicken in the
Easy now ~ Shake it, shake it babe
What you gonna do when the well runs dry? ~You gonna
run away and hide
I'm lonely ~ Yes I can be, I'm waitin' ~ For your company,
I'm hopin'
What you gonna do when the well runs dry? ~ You're
gonna sit right down and cry
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Take the ribbon from your hair ~ Shake it loose and let it fall Layin' soft upon my skin ~ Like the shadows on the wall Come and lay down by my side ~ Till the early mornin'
light
I don't care who's right or wrong ~ I don't try to
understand
Yesterday is dead and gone ~ And tomorrow's out of
sight
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Down in the boondocks ~ Down in the boondocks People put me down 'cause ~ That's the side of town I was born in I love her she loves me but I don't fit in her society Lord have mercy on the boy from down in the boondocks Ev'ry night I watch the lights from the house up on
the hill
One fine day I'll find the way to move from this old
shack
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The old home town looks the same ~ As I step down from the train And there to meet me is my Mama and Papa Down the road I look and there runs Mary ~ Hair of gold and lips like cherries It's good to touch the green, green grass of home
The old house is still standing tho' the paint is cracked
and dry
Then I awake and look around me ~ At four grey walls
that surround me
Yes, they'll all come to see me ~ In the shade of that
old oak tree
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Put your hand in the hand of the man ~ Who stilled the water Put your hand in the hand of the man ~ Who calmed the sea Take a look at yourself ~ And you can look at others differently Put your hand in the hand of the man ~ From Galilee My momma taught me how to pray ~ Before I reached the
age of seven
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GO TO PART II
Hillman Original Songs
16-30
www.hillmanweb.com/albums/album12a.html
Order Information:
New Volume 12 -- CD III or Tape
or Vol. 11 or Vol 10..........................$15.00 US each
Price for two CDs or tapes =
$25 US...............Price for any three CDs or tapes= $33 US
All prices include shipping
and handling costs
Contact: hillmans@westman.wave.ca
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BILL and SUE-ON HILLMAN:
A 50-YEAR MUSICAL ODYSSEY
BOOK
COVER
BOOK
CONTENTS
PDF
Version
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E-MAIL CONTACT:
hillmans@wcgwave.ca
Copyright 2019: Bill and Sue-On Hillman
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