Jackie and Roy – “Storyville Presents Jackie and Roy”

Originally (I think?) released as “Jackie Cain and Roy Kral,” this record is a re-release on Storyville records—so, I’m not sure about the year. Let’s just say 1955. Wait, there’s another record, exactly the same title, same year, same label, with a great (very different) cover, totally different songs and sidemen. What is going on? So… I guess this is one of their first LPs—well—if you can figure out their very early discography, based on your collection, memory, or online info—you’re a far better madman than I!

Anyway, I got this one! It’s old, sounds crystal-clear in the way only really old stuff sounds—before pop groups started gumming up the works with their bullshit. Everybody knows Jackie and Roy… except me—well, this is the first I heard of them. I bought it knowing nothing about them, and in spite of the gnarly album cover—a kind of mustard-gas tinted b&w photo of… I have no idea what—it looks like part of a destroyed piano—and then in the foreground, someone’s hideous bare feet—the kind of photo that epidemic-ized Instagram, because—you’re holding your stupid phone camera—what’s the first thing you see in front of you? Your hideous feet, that’s what. I saw a picture of them from back around time—not ogres, by any means—so you have to wonder about the choice of the album cover! Still, I bought it—and it’s a fine LP. Jackie Cain and Roy Kral sing (and don’t hold back, are not shy). Roy plays piano, and there’s a hot band: Shelly Manne, Barney Kessel, and Red Mitchell.

One number one (number one hit in the alt-universe where things are ranked by how interesting they are) hit after another, believe it or else! And the fine song selection is listed on back, including a few I know (via Sinatra, as usual) and some I don’t know. Some intriguing song titles like: “Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most,” “Bill’s Bit” (drill? Or is Bill a horse?), “Tiny Told Me.” And my favorite, an amazing number called: “You Smell So Good.” (I thought it might be Millsap & Spooner [Kiss Me, Stupid (1964)] but no, it’s Tommy Wolf.) Liner notes are by Alec Wilder—dude simply goes overboard with enthusiasm—I wonder if he’s still with us, and if I could afford him to do my liner notes? Oh, missed him by 45 years. Anyway, Jackie & Roy—they kept cranking out the albums up to the end of the century, through rock’n’roll, punk, disco, hip-hop, cassette tapes, 8-Tracks, the death of vinyl, CDs, the rebirth of vinyl. I don’t know… maybe they succumbed to all of it. I do have a later record of theirs (haven’t written about it yet) called “Changes”—uh, oh, and by the song titles, they appear to have been afflicted—like so many recording artists of the Sixties—with Lennon-McCartney-itis. Hopefully, maybe, they create something unique with those proverbial chestnuts!

4.11.25