Jr. The Soulettes
Rockadelic
Out Digging 13,993 Posts
I was lucky enough to start searching for the private press record back in the 80's when not too many people cared about such nonsense....it allowed me to track down, talk to and sometimes even meet all kinds of characters...So at Chris's request.....the Jr. & The Soulettes StoryMusta been the late 80's or early 90's....my partner Mark and Itook a trip up to Oklahoma City to look for records. Most ofthe day we hit various Flea Markets with pretty good success.Multiple sealed copies of Guiness and Tomorrow label LP's, about 20sealed copies of the Markley LP, and alot more, most of them at$1.00 each.Our last stop of the day was a place called The Memory Market,which is still there today. It's a large metal building that housedabout 10-15 various antique dealers who specialized in "junk". Theback 1/3rd of the building was run by two elderly women who dealt innothing but records. Tens of thousands of records, LP's and 45's. Westarted digging in and it was apparent that we were the first onesto go through this stuff who were looking for what we were lookingfor. The first hour yielded titles like Badge & Co. a very beat upcopy of The Marble Phrogg, Darius, Trizo-50 and many more.The market was going to close at 6:00 and it was about 5:45 whenI came across an amazing looking record titled "The Psycho-DelicSounds Of Jr. & The Soulettes". The cover was a "10" with Jr.playing a Gibson Firebird behind his head while doing a split on thestage. I called Mark over, we pulled out the little Big Bird recordplayer we carried with us and put the LP on to give it a spin. Itwas beyond warped, totally destroyed with only about 20% of thesurface area being playable.....enough though for us to know we hadfound a MONSTER, yet bizarre LP. Mark pointed out that it had anOklahoma City address on the back.We paid for all the LP's and headed straight for the pay phonein front of the place. We looked in the phone book and sure enough,we found a Harold Moore Jr. & Sr. at the same address. I called thenumber and was greeted by something that could only be described assub-human animal sounds.....Uhhhhhoooerrruggyhg....I could not makeout a single english word this guy might be uttering. Then a secondparty picked up another line and told "Jr." to hang up. It wasHarold Moore Sr. and he was one very friendly guy.It was late winter and by 6:00 it was starting to get dark, yetHariold Sr. invited Mark and I over to his house with the promisethat "I have a whole suitcase filled with those old rekkids, youfellas come on over". We got directions and began to drive to thehouse......it wasn't long before we realized we were going to theworst part of OKC.In the South it's pretty well known that if you live near therailroad tracks or by the river, you're probably in the bad part oftown. The Moore house was built on stilts, with the river on oneside and the railroad tracks on the other. We parked, went to thefront door and rang the bell.....no answer. Then we knocked on thedoor pretty hard.....again, no answer. mark walked around to theside of the house and followed some very loud "Disco" music to aroom in the back of the house. He looked inside and saw Harold Sr.sitting in front of a column of amps and receivers that wereproducing this very bass heavy music. he banged on the window, gotMr. Moore's attention and he waved for us to go back to the frontdoor.Harold Sr. opened the front door and acted as if we were longlost friends...he quickly invited us in while yelling up the stairsat "Jr." while apologizing to us for his "effed up son". He broughtus back into the "music" room and it was pretty bizarre. In themiddle of the room stood a camera on a tri-pod. In each corner ofthe room that the camera was facing were little triangular stagesbuilt into the floor with a full length piece of plexiglas fromfloor to ceiling in front of each "stage". The stage was about largeenough for one person to stand on.Mark was an electronics engineer and in an attempt to start aconversation he asked Mr. Moore if he had the "schematics" for thiscontraption he had built out of about 20 amps and receivers. Hisresponse was "Schematics!! I just found this stuff in the garbageand makes it". Our goal was to get some LP's and get back to Dallasbut Harold had alot to talk about and wanted us to stay.After being there about 15 minutes Harold says..."You boys wannasee my puppet"!! How do you answer that question to a grown man??Of course we said "Sure!!"....He opened his drawer and pulled out apuppet made out of a sock. You know, one of those winter socks thatthey make "Sock Monkey's" out of. "This here is my snake" and I'llbe damned the thing had a hat that could not be described asanything but a "Pimp" hat and a big fat set of lips.He then went on to explain that everything in the room was setup for the puppet....the music, the camera, the stages. He alsoexplained that all his grandkids loved the puppet but he couldn'ttell them about the puppet's "night life". He then pulled out avideo, put it into a VCR and began to show us just what the puppetwas all about. Before I attempt to explain what we saw I have to saythat this moment was surely the most surreal in my life and I'd havegiven anything to have had a camera as I knew I would have to repeatwhat I saw and that no one would believe it.The video starts off with that same bass heavy, thumping, Discomusic and the pimp puppet "dancing" to the beat. Then a black woman,a naked black woman comes into the frame and begins to dance withthe puppet. This goes on for about 5 minutes with the puppet doingvarious obscene things to what appears to be this super-imposednaked woman. The video stops, a new song starts to play and now thepuppet starts dancing with a different, nude, black woman. Friggin'Amazing!!!After about 10 minutes we've seen enough and tell Mr. Moore that wehave to be going. Harold then explains at Mark's request just how hemakes these movies. On a Friday or Saturday night Harold usuallygoes out and picks up a hooker. Not for sex, but to dance with thepuppet. The naked hooker stands behind the plexiglas in one cornerof the room while Mr. Moore operates the puppet behind the secondpiece of plexiglas in the opposite corner. The way the camera is setup on the tripod, it is able to not only record the puppet, but usesthe plexiglas to make a reflection of the woman in the oppositecorner so he gets the effect that they are actually dancingtogether!!! GENIUS!!!!Getting down to business we asked for the LP's promising to payhim some big bucks. He goes into a closet and drags out a very oldand beat up suitcase. He opens the suitcase which is FILLED withsleeveless 45's. Not an LP to be seen. "Oh you boys are looking forthose BIG rekkids" he said....."I don't have any of those, they wereall ruined". Needless to say we were disappointed but we bought afew of the 4 different 45's from him, two of them being non-LP cuts.Harold apologized for not having any of the LP's and told thisstory.....He had 4 children, Jr. and his three sisters who had beenabandoned by their alcoholic Mom. Harold Sr. worked for a very richJewish woman who took a liking to the kids and bought them musicalinstruments and paid for lessons(This explains the Gibson Firebird).She made the kids a deal that if they learned how to play at least 3songs she would get them a slot on some local TV Telet
hon. The kidstook to music very quickly and within a year were appearing on localTV. The response was so good that the woman paid for them to recordan LP but suggested they write "original" songs.This is where Harold Sr. comes in, writing all the songs thatappear on the LP, with most of them being attacks on the drunken andsupposedly abusive ex-Mrs. Moore......"Mama drinks Tequila, Shestays drunk all the time"......once the LP was recorded and pressedthe next step was to get them in the local record stores. At leastone store told Mr. Moore that they could not stock them unless theywere shrink wrapped. Harold went to a butcher shop where his brotherworked and used their shrinkwrap machine to seal theLP's....unfortunately this was a high heat machine and he meltedevery single LP in the process. This wasn't discovered until someonebought one and brought it home....all the LP's were pulled from thestores and rather than re-press it, the woman decided to release some45's.The 45's themselves are a work of art....with photos of each ofthe kids heads on the label....very home made and cheesy looking. AsMark and I were leaving the Moore's home he asked for two favors.One was to write to the Guinness World Book Of Records and requestthat his kids be put in as "The youngest group to make an LP andplay their own instruments" which we did to no avail. The second wasto never tell his grandkids what we saw the puppet doing...which hasnot been a problem to uphold.No matter how well I told that story there is no way you canbegin to understand just how weird it was. If I ever win the lotterythis will be just one chapter in a film I'd like to make about someof the folks I've met in this wacky world of music....hope youenjoyed.RichP.S. The day after we got home I made a cassette of the LP and axerox of the cover and sent it to legendary Psych dealer Paul Major. Paul truly thoughtthat I had made this whole thing up and that there was NO WAY an LPlike that existed......he eventually believed me.
hon. The kidstook to music very quickly and within a year were appearing on localTV. The response was so good that the woman paid for them to recordan LP but suggested they write "original" songs.This is where Harold Sr. comes in, writing all the songs thatappear on the LP, with most of them being attacks on the drunken andsupposedly abusive ex-Mrs. Moore......"Mama drinks Tequila, Shestays drunk all the time"......once the LP was recorded and pressedthe next step was to get them in the local record stores. At leastone store told Mr. Moore that they could not stock them unless theywere shrink wrapped. Harold went to a butcher shop where his brotherworked and used their shrinkwrap machine to seal theLP's....unfortunately this was a high heat machine and he meltedevery single LP in the process. This wasn't discovered until someonebought one and brought it home....all the LP's were pulled from thestores and rather than re-press it, the woman decided to release some45's.The 45's themselves are a work of art....with photos of each ofthe kids heads on the label....very home made and cheesy looking. AsMark and I were leaving the Moore's home he asked for two favors.One was to write to the Guinness World Book Of Records and requestthat his kids be put in as "The youngest group to make an LP andplay their own instruments" which we did to no avail. The second wasto never tell his grandkids what we saw the puppet doing...which hasnot been a problem to uphold.No matter how well I told that story there is no way you canbegin to understand just how weird it was. If I ever win the lotterythis will be just one chapter in a film I'd like to make about someof the folks I've met in this wacky world of music....hope youenjoyed.RichP.S. The day after we got home I made a cassette of the LP and axerox of the cover and sent it to legendary Psych dealer Paul Major. Paul truly thoughtthat I had made this whole thing up and that there was NO WAY an LPlike that existed......he eventually believed me.
Comments
Peace
Rich
Brilliant, you were sworn to secrecy about the magic you saw unfold inside that house.
Let's hope that the Soulette grandkids are not soulstrut readers to keep the second promise true.
What a story!! I can't believe scott didn't relay that one to me when we chatted about the 45.
sayin'!!!
Plaese to report here:
http://soulstrut.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=496556&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=7&fpart=1
ok sorry. missed that thread. so the mark you refer to in the story is Migliore?
Thanks for sharing it.
Hi Rich, it's great to see you here, I know you from the psychedelica group.
I hope your next story will be that one about going to the house of the weird hippie guy from an obscure 70s band and he opening up the door totally naked...
I think I posted this earlier in the year, but I know of these 45s:
"Do Your Funky Thing/ Pop Little Jr. Pop" (Hammon 1022)
"Fue/ Ten O??? Clock, Loving Kids" (Moore???s 6282)
"2009 Cherry Soul Sound/ Natural Little Red Riding Hood" (HMM Jr. LH-8766/8767)
"Gee Baby/ Share Him" (HMM Jr. 1001)
"Dum Dum Huch E??? Koo/ Count Bump" (HMM Jr. 13451/13452) 1975
"Bo-Yea/ Fou-Da-Lee" (HMM Jr. 14387/14388) 1975
"Boogie Gerldine/ Disco Mama" (HMM Jr. 1009) 1977
"Disco Mama/ Baby Boy Cartrece" (HMM Jr. 1010) 1977
At least two of these have picture sleeves.
I could post up pictures of most of these later.
Needless to say, "Dum Dum Huch E' Koo" is probably the most tore up of all the recordings, and that's really saying something.
the titles alone tell a wacky story
After that teaser, I'd like to know more about his "effed up son" and what made him answer the phone that way!
(Or should we just leave well enough alone?)
You should leave well enough alone, you don't want to hear the stories on the kids. Really freaky and even more depressing.
yeah, I played guitar in Mazinga Phaser. We were making an album for Mark when he passed away, then Castille took over and well, it wasnt a pleasant experience...would like to get my hands on Matt and ask him about some $$$ issues...but thats all I wll go into in public here.
Rich
yeah I hate the guy. I have to admit it made me smile when I heard his girlfriend destroyed his studio.
Anthony read this shit!