LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS NEW ORLEANS GANG – 1934-1935 | The Chronogical Classics – 1048 (1999) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Born and raised in New Orleans, Louis Prima came up in his hometown gigging steadily in the clubs and doing his best to emulate Afro-American musicians. His number one role model was Louis Armstrong. After playing Cleveland with Red Nichols in 1932, Prima began recording in 1934 and thoroughly established himself on 52nd Street in New York City the following year. Prima was good looking and sang in a pleasantly hoarse voice. His humor was often heavy-handed, and his bands pushed hard to generate excitement among live audiences and the record-buying public. Prima's 1934 bands had strong players in George Brunies, Claude Thornhill, and Eddie Miller. "Jamaica Shout" is a rare example of instrumental Louis Prima: hot jazz with nobody yelling. "Breakin' the Ice" was the first in a series of Prima interpretations of songs made popular by Fats Waller. Bill "Bojangles" Robinson performed a lively version of "I'm Living in a Great Big Way" with Waller during the last reel of the 1935 RKO motion picture Hooray for Love. Waller never managed to make an actual phonograph recording of this song. Prima had fun with it and with every tune he grabbed onto, sometimes maybe too much fun. During "Let's Have a Jubilee," which was recorded twice during November of 1934, Prima spits out weird nicknames for each bandmember, including "Baboon Face" and "Liver Lips." This sort of talk was not uncommon among Afro-Americans, but it is particularly unsettling coming out of the (big) mouth of a (Southern) white musician. The real gold on this CD lies in the last six tracks, ground out by a band that had Pee Wee Russell as its artistic nucleus. Prima was the handsome leader, Prima sang and blew his trumpet, but Pee Wee was the light, the emulsion, and the pigment in this picture. "The Lady in Red" just might be the very best record that Louis Prima ever made, largely because of the magical presence of a gifted clarinetist with poetic sensibilities and a tone like nobody else. arwulf arwulf  
Tracklist + Credits :

LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS NEW ORLEANS GANG – 1935-1936 | The Chronogical Classics – 1077 (1999) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Here's Louis from his first flush of success at the Famous Door in New York City. Backed by his New Orleans gang, Prima's distinctive style was already emerging on material like "How'm I Doin'," "Plain Old Me," "Sweet Sue," "Lazy River," "Dinah," and the original version of "Sing Sing Sing." Although the backing is strictly New Orleans (and thus a long way stylistically from his later Capitol sides with Sam Butera & the Witnesses), most of the tunes boast the highly inventive clarinet work of Pee Wee Russell, and Prima's horn is well to the fore on these sides. One for hardcore Prima fans. Cub Koda
Tracklist + Credits : 

LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS NEW ORLEANS GANG – 1937-1939 | The Chronogical Classics – 1146 (2000) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

During the late 1930s Louis Prima evolved ever so slightly beyond the New Orleans revival and hot novelty formulas that he'd milked so relentlessly from 1934-1936. Almost everything he recorded during the years 1937-1939 followed the same pattern of small group swing lathered over with Prima's showy vocals. These records didn't sell very well, and neither Vocalion nor Decca felt obligated to keep him on their rosters. The only two instrumentals heard here are a vigorous "Tin Roof Blues" and a neck-snapping "Jitterbugs on Parade" which is played so fast that the band sounds almost tortured rather than enthused. Poor Louis was desperate, his vocals were overbearing, the public wasn't interested, so it seems he figured the only thing left to do was to play so fast that it hurt. On each of the vocal tracks his frantic humor seems rather forced. It's good to have access to these recordings in order to satisfy one's curiosity and get a glimpse of an overview of the man's recording career, but they are certainly not the best of Louis Prima. Greater enjoyment will be derived from the work of the men he so closely imitated during the 1930s: Louis Armstrong and Wingy Manone. arwulf arwulf  
Tracklist + Credits :

LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS ORCHESTRA – 1940-1944 | The Chronogical Classics – 1201 (2001) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

During 1940-1941, Louis Prima led a medium-size (ten-piece) combo, which by 1944 had expanded to a full big band. Although a popular figure during this era, Prima was not quite a star and his big band never really caught on. The 23 numbers on this good-natured CD include a couple instrumentals ("To You, Sweetheart, Aloha" and the swinging "Look Out"), novelties, vocal numbers for Lily Ann Carroll, and the debut versions of "Robin Hood," "Angelina," and "Oh Marie" (which hints at Prima's 1950s rendition). The leader is the main star throughout the historic release. Scott Yanow
Tracklist + Credits :

LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS ORCHESTRA – 1944-1945 | The Chronogical Classics – 1273 (2002) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Like a Sargasso Sea of commercial challenges lying fallow between his hot traditional jazz of the mid-'30s, and his well-known success as a pop star in the 1950s and '60s, Louis Prima's big band recordings from the mid-'40s reveal this man's relentless scuffle to find a sustainable niche in the overall scheme of things. Most of the selections date from the middle of 1944, the presentation positively sweating with beefy or sweet arrangements behind Prima's handsome vocals. "The Very Thought of You" was clearly patterned after Billie Holiday's version, and even conveys some of the same gorgeous sentimentality. Lily Ann Carol had an attractive voice, and some listeners might deliberately succumb to the prescribed lushness of prettiness and stylized form. The Majestic and Hit labels were designated showcases for cheap popular entertainment, and the material speaks volumes about American culture, like it or not. Hearing a team of grown men chanting "Hitsum Kitsum" is one thing, but "I Want to Get to Tokio" burrows quickly to a nadir of jingoistic racism, with Prima loudly comparing "dirty Japs" to "monkeys in a bamboo tree." While this sort of abusiveness was fairly common in U.S. media during WWII, ethnicity in general seems to have been regarded as a reliable sounding board for Prima's far-from-subtle sense of humor. "What's the Matter Marie?" at least focuses upon the singer's own Italian background, as does the minestrone-spattered "Angelina" and a remarkable performance bearing the title "Please No Squeeza da Banana," which might be the most useful recording Prima ever made. During "Rum and Coca-Cola" the band attempts to invade Trinidad with Lily Ann Carol perched atop the bogus Caribbean arrangement like a tin hood ornament. But the primary ethnic touchstone for Prima was always Afro-American, as he flagrantly imitated Louis Armstrong, Hot Lips Page and Louis Jordan over the span of several decades. Prima's handling of "Caldonia" is pretty stupid. The best tune here is "The Blizzard," a hot instrumental boogie woogie stoked with hot solos by sax and trumpet, building to a nearly caustic level of intensity before collapsing with a flourish into a heap. arwulf arwulf  
Tracklist + Credits :

LOUIS PRIMA AND HIS ORCHESTRA – 1945 | The Chronogical Classics – 1374 (2004) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Tracklist + Credits : 

LOUIS PRIMA WITH KEELY SMITH - Breaking It Up! (1953-1998) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

In late 1951, Louis Prima was hot on the heels of a comeback success the year before with "Oh Babe!," and a record so big that it spawned numerous cover versions by everyone from Wynonie Harris and Lionel Hampton to Kay Starr and even a Spanish language version by Lalo Guerrero ("Chitas Patas Boogie" on Imperial and used in the movie Zoot Suit with Edward James Olmos). After three follow-ups went nowhere (one of which was the immortal "Zooma Zooma"), Prima came to Columbia Records and was handed over to A&R chief Mitch Miller. And here was part of the problem. Prima's audience liked a cruder Louis and were used to records cut on shoestring budgets with production values that were as raw as the music they framed, while Miller's production was state-of-the-art squeaky-clean. Miller had Prima covering R&B hits of the day ("One Mint Julep") jump blues ("Oooh-Dahdilly-Dah" and one of the few tracks to feature Keely Smith on here), Latin-flavored tunes ("Chili Sauce"), novelty tunes like "Barnacle Bill the Sailor," "Boney Bones," and "It's Good as New (I Painted It Blue)," as well as his patented Italian shuffles like "Eleanor," "Basta," "Luigi," "The Bigger the Figure" and a bombastic version of "Oh Marie" (perhaps the only dud in this entire package), framed in the corniest "Sing Along with Mitch" arrangement imaginable and a million light-years away from his famous Capitol recording of the same tune. This entire set combines all 14 sides of the seven singles issued, plus the addition of "Chop Suey, Chow Mein" along with the original 1958 cover art to Columbia's original issue of this material. Not his best, but an interesting one to add to the collection after you have most of everything else. by Cub Koda  
Tracklist :
1 Eleanor 2:02 
Written-By – N. Paon
2 Shake Hands With Santa Claus 2:25
Written-By – B. Hilliard, M. DeLugg
3 Oooh-Dahdily-Dah 2:19
Written-By – K. Smith, L. Prima
4 Basta 2:26
Written-By – A. Wilder, M. Barer
5 The Bigger The Figure 2:38
Written-By – A. Wilder, M. Barer
6 Boney Bones 2:42
Written By – DeMare, T. Eddy
Written-By – L. Prima
7 One Mint Julep 2:43
Written-By – R. Toombs
8 Chili Sauce 1:52
Written-By – B. Kinberg
9 Oh, Marie 2:18
Adapted By – L. Prima
Written-By – E. DeCapua
10 Luigi 2:42
Written By – A. Antonio, A. Araco, L. DiLeo
11 Paul Revere 2:30
Written By – A. Stillman, B. Darnell, G. Shannon
12 It's Good As New (I Painted It Blue) 2:12
Written-By – B. Bernier, M. Charlap
13 Barnacle Bill The Sailor 2:24
Written-By – C. Robinson, F. Luther
14 Shepherd Boy 2:31
Written By – R. Carlyle
Written-By – R. Bagdasarian
15 Chop Suey, Chow Mein 2:39
Written By – A. White