The Waikikis - Hawaii Beach Party
This a slightly odd one. When I heard the first track, "Hawaii Beach Party," I thought these guys are European. Weird la-la-la female vocals (like the kind you hear in cheesy Z-movies from early 70s Germany and Scandinavia) in front of a Northern European martial parade beat. Yeah there's steel guitar but no one in Hawaii or California plays like this. Then I hear the second track, "Farewell Hawaii," and think maybe these guys are from Nashville. The steel git has that 60s Nashville "Now Sound" vibe. Each track had me going back and forth, finally deciding on The Waikikis being German guys living Nashville.
Its not your trad Hawaiian album. Some of the tracks are downright borderline obnoxious but tracks 2 (Farewell Hawaii), 4 (A Little Bit of Heaven in Hawaii), and 8 (Coral Girl) are quite sweet and tasty. Very nice. Track 10 (Waikiki-Ki-Hu La Hu) gets two thumbs up for the cheeze factor.
"Coral Girl" is a bit of an odd name for a song. When ripping this I'd just finished re-reading Hawaiian Dick: Byrd of Paradise and pictured Coral Girl as an animated golem gal made up of bits and pieces of coral. If I sound like an idiot, well maybe I am, but Hawaiian Dick is a "graphic novel" (comic book) set in a 50s noir Oahu with supernatural themes like The Night Marchers of the Pali Highway and Kahami's sister, Leila Rose, getting killed and turned into a lovelorn zombie. So my Coral Girl would fit right in. You can find it on Amazon if you are so inclined.
Euro-Nashville-Hawaiian music here!
posted by Kono at 9:36 PM
12 Comments:
Grass skirts and leis, hula-dancing babes with fire in their eyes, tropical nights under the palms ....that was how Hawaii appeared to Germans in the Fifties. It had the same exotic appeal then that Mallorca has now. Dozens of bands saluted the islands in music and song. The Waikikis spearheaded this movement, singing in a language that might have been Polynesian...but probably wasn’t. Behind the scenes, producer Horst Fuchs promoted the band’s career and pulled the strings. Composers such as Hans Blum and Michael Thomas (the famous Martin Böttcher) created songs like Hawaii Tattoo, Aloha Parade, Honolulu Parade and Waikiki Welcome. The Waikikis - all of them Belgian (!) studio musicians - sold their colorful island reveries by the millions, and some of their own creations like Hilo Kiss or Hula-Hochzeit even made their way into the charts in several countries.
Thanks for the background story Herr Anonymous. It all makes more sense now.
Nevermind for the background. I'll do what I can. :D
If you like, try another album by The Waikikis (Hawaii Tattoo):
http://rapidshare.de/files/22309657/TW_HT.rar.html
Regards,
Herr Anonymous ;)
Thanks for the link Sr Mssr Anonymous. You made me remember that album (The Waikikis (Hawaii Tatoo)) and I had to go and dig it out.
Right there on the back it said that The Waikikis are from Belgium. Hmmmm. If only I picked that LP first maybe I wouldn't have looked so dumb. :D
One thing that has always bothered me about that album (Hawaii Tatoo) is the gal on the cover. She doesn't look even remotely Polynesian! That always bugged me.
I'll d/l your DL as soon as rapidshare says my turn is up again. Thanks!
Anonymous was ahead of me by posting, although I first uploaded it to RS .. :-).
I also wanted to tell you they're from Belgium.
I also uploaded their LP Hawaii Tattoo from 1962.
Got your's. It's the same vinyl LP. Mine is 30MB 160KBits and a different order of tracks (my post is alphabetically, so you cannot check that now). Also the channel mix is a very littlebit different (very, very littlebit).
I think your upload is little better quality.
If you still want to compare :
http://rapidshare.de/files/22238075/W_B_-HT-1962.rar
Pass : jeansmusicblog.blogspot.com
Here's the link to the scan of my LP (included in the download). Different from yours.
http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/1141/2625/320/Waikiki%27s%20-%20Hawaii%20tattoo.0.jpg
As I did the effort I still wanted to let you know.
Will come back because I think you have great special stuff, if only it's for reading and maybe I'll take some.
Hello, i like to read blog like this because has images.
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This is actually pretty nice because we're looking for a bit of deviation from the traditional Hawaiian vibe we came to love. Hope to hear these for myself.
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