Pinky Tomlin's Greatest Hits

Pinky Tomlin

The singer-songwriter Pinky Tomlin (1907-87) popped up in my most recent post, devoted to renditions of "Ragtime Cowboy Joe", so I thought I might explore three of his bigger successes. Each comes in two versions - his original recordings for Brunswick and 1940 remakes for Decca.  

Tomlin's career peaked when he was a young man - almost all of his records were made in the 1930s, and he appeared in quite a few films during that decade. He left show business altogether in the 1950s, except for a 1963 LP with Nelson Riddle that featured remakes of the three songs discussed below. (I have the album if anyone is eager to hear it.)

Pinky's first and perhaps biggest hit was "The Object of My Affection," a catchy number that became very popular in 1934-35. Wikipedia tells us, "Tomlin came to national attention in the 1930s due to a song he had written while attending the University of Oklahoma, one he composed for a student at the school, Joanne Alcorn, whom he would later marry. His original composition was subsequently adapted by Coy Poe and orchestrated and recorded in 1934 by bandleader Jimmie Grier."

Tomlin's singing is assured for someone who had little experience as a vocalist, and he already had a style of his own. His approach is notably conversational and informal. He occasionally sings out of time or alters the melodic line, seemingly deliberately. In some ways, he can be compared to the slightly older Willard Robison and Hoagy Carmichael, although he does not imitate them.

Grier's band, based in Los Angeles, is usually identified as the Coconut Grove Orchestra, although not here. His arrangement of this tune is standard for the time - staccato brass, soupy saxes, etc.

Jimmie Grier

Grier brought Pinky back in December 1934 for a session devoted to the singer's "What's the Reason (I'm Not Pleasing You)." The number was again attributed to Poe and Grier along with Tomlin. The arrangement turns the song into a duet with Betty Roth, who made at least one other recording with Grier. Her strident tones don't go all that well with Tomlin's relaxed approach.

By 1937 Tomlin was established enough that the Brunswick label promoted him to solo artist for another major hit, "The Love Bug Will Bite You (If You Don't Watch Out)." The song has a unusual structure in that it calls for the vocalist to ad lib a bit of a different song in each chorus: "The love bug will bite you if you don't watch out / He ever bites you, you'll sing and shout: [insert song of choice]." On this record, Pinky interpolates snatches of "Carry Me Back to Old Virginny," "Honeysuckle Rose" (a nod to Fats Waller, perhaps for recording some of Tomlin's songs), "Sweet Adeline" and "Swanee River," among others. At another place, he scat sings, showing an unexpected Louis Armstrong influence.

Texas Jim and Pinky

Tomlin moved to  Decca in 1938, recording 12 songs for the blue label between April of that year and December 1940. The first eight were in the company of Harry Sosnik's band, but for the final session, Decca matched him with Texas Jim Lewis and His Band. The band, generally billed as the "Lone Star Cowboys," was a Western swing outfit, and Tomlin's backing largely consists of accordion, fiddle and guitar.

The Cowboys were not virtuoso musicians and added little to the records, but Tomlin's singing is assured. Among the four songs they cut were remakes of the three discussed above, which I've included in the download. This time, Pinky's interpolations for "Love Bug" included "Beat Me, Daddy, Eight to the Bar," a hit at the time. He also adds a coda not on the 1937 version.

Lewis went on to appear in dozens of Western films during a period when seemingly anyone with a ten-gallon hat and a guitar was cast as a singing cowboy. In the 1950s, he surfaced as the host of a kiddie show in Seattle, where he was very popular.

These songs were remastered from Internet Archive needle drops. The sound is very good for the time.

That Hifalutin, Rootin'-Tootin', Son-of-a-Gun from Arizona

Vaudeville singer and recording artist Bob Roberts did well in front of the microphones in the early years of the last century, even rivalling such stars as Billy Murray for popularity with such fare as "The Woodchuck Song." But his fortunes were ebbing in 1912 when he managed to enjoy one last hit, a record that would become one of the most popular of that year - "Ragtime Cowboy Joe." 

It's a song that was still well known when I was a pup 40 years later, and was one of my firm favorites. In today's post we'll look back at its recordings over the period from Bob Roberts' Camden session until the Jo Stafford disc of 1949 - one that I would have heard as a young Bronco Buster.

"Ragtime Cowboy Joe" was the handiwork of three successful young songwriters. The clever words are by Grant Clarke, who also wrote the words to "Am I Blue?", "Second Hand Rose" and "He'll Have to Get Under (Get Out and Get Under)." Maurice Abrahams wrote the music for the latter song. Lewis Muir's biggest hit was "Waiting for the Robert E. Lee." 

The story is told that Abrahams was inspired to write "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" by the cowboy outfit sported by his young nephew, Joe. That sounds like a publicist's concoction, though.

The Bob Roberts record is a fun listen, with the singer coming through with great presence, although he is mainly notable for being able to enunciate at a rapid clip while singing loudly into the recording horn. As per usual in 1912, the orchestra makes wheezing sounds in the background.

The Girls of the Golden West

"Ragtime Cowboy Joe" had a recording revival in 1938, for reasons that aren't clear to me. Our next disc comes from that year and is by a radio act called the Girls of the Golden West. Said girls were two sisters (Dorothy and Millie Good) who named their act after a Puccini opera. Dorothy accompanied the sisterly vocals on guitar in this recording. They seem under-rehearsed, which is surprising because they surely had the song in their repertoire.

Ella Logan

The unlikeliest 1938 disc may have been a Brunswick release by Ella Logan, a Glasgow-born band singer who would not have her greatest success for nearly another decade - in Finian's Rainbow. Her backing on the record is by a Perry Botkin group.

Singer-songwriter Pinky Tomlin did well with his 1939 recording, where he was backed by the Foursome and Harry Sosnik's band. Grant Clarke's lyrics had called Ragtime Cowboy Joe a "son-of-a-gun from Arizona" but Tomlin relocated him to Oklahoma, his home state. Pinky's greatest hits were "The Object of My Affection" and "The Love Bug Will Bite You If You Don't Watch Out."

Louise Massey and the Westerners

The Good sisters weren't the only country act to feature "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" - Louise Massey and the Westerners recorded it in 1939 for Conqueror. They were very much a Western swing outfit at the time, with a prominent trumpet similar to Bob Wills' band. Louise isn't featured on this record; I believe the lead vocal is by her brother Curt, who could have used another take. Curt, who is in the center of the photo above, later had a successful solo career.

Finally, Jo Stafford's 1949 recording. This is certainly the best sung rendition but it has a few mildly mysterious elements. First the label claims the song is from Hello, Frisco, Hello. True, but that Alice Faye film had come out six years earlier, and the song had also been used in a more recent movie, 1945's Incendiary Blonde with Betty Hutton. The label also claims the piano solo is by Pat Gillham, which may be the case, but if so, he has no other recording credits I can find. The Jo Stafford discography and Wikipedia both claim the pianist is actually Joe "Fingers" Carr. But that name is a pseudonym for Lou Busch, who hadn't started recording as "Fingers" just yet. Was "Pat Gillham" another nom du disque that Busch used before the Carr identity?

The Stafford record was not the end of Ragtime Cowboy Joe's recording history. I have spared you and the song the indignity of including the most recent hit version - a 1959 single by Alvin and the Chipmunks. Today, an adaptation of the tune is in use as a fight song by at least one US university - that of Wyoming.

These recordings were redone from Internet Archive needle drops.