Janet Klein And Her Parlor Boys - 3 Albums (2004-2010)

With her sleek bob haircut (usually with a flower placed just so), vintage fashion sense, strikingly beautiful looks and artfully customized ukulele, Janet Klein might seem at first to be a simple novelty act, a 21st-century hipster "ironically" recreating the subtly naughty looks of a fin-de-siecle French postcard. Then she opens her mouth to sing. There's no Betty Boop hiccups or Mae West-style brassiness in her charmingly original voice. And when she starts to play her ukulele, it's clear that this oft-ridiculed cousin of the guitar is neither prop nor gimmick, but a delightful and under-utilized musical instrument. Bearing an ever-expanding repertoire of, as she puts it, "obscure, lovely and naughty songs from the 1910's , 20's and 30's," Janet Klein is a musical archeologist hiding in the body of an F. Scott Fitzgerald heroine.

Raised in San Bernardino, California, during the 1970s, Klein's early musical education came from her father Stephen Klein, a teacher and avant-garde animator whose taste ran primarily to Frank Zappa and Classical. Even more importantly, Klein's grandparents regaled her with tales of New York in the 1930s (where her grandfather Marty Klein had worked as a stage magician), instilling a lifelong fascination with pre-World War II American popular culture into the young girl.

By the time Klein moved to Los Angeles to start college in the early '80s, this had translated into an interest in both early jazz recordings and the graphic designs styles of the era. Through the former, Klein discovered early female jazz singers and musicians like, Lil Hardin Armstrong (Louis' wife and early manager) and Blanche Calloway (sister of Cab). The latter hobby led Klein to start collecting sheet music from the 1800s to the Jazz Age, at first purely for the pictures and artwork, then increasingly out of love for the songs themselves.

Around this time, Klein met Robert Loveless, a local post-punk musician (Savage Republic, 17 Pygmies,etc.) who shared her love for early 20th century art and design and encouraged her artistic pursuits. Although Klein was becoming progressively more intrigued with her favorite style of music, she felt at the time that nobody would want to hear her sing, especially not the vintage pre-rock pop and early jazz tunes she loved. Instead, she channeled her creative energies into poetry and painting ( she self-published a chapbook of poems and drawings, When They Kiss I Leave, in 1989) as well as performance art. This changed when Klein discovered the Letter Exchange, a sort of pre-Internet chat room where folks left letters (remember letters?) on any number of topics to be published in small journals, to be read and responded to by others.

Through the Letter Exchange, Klein discovered that she wasn't alone in her dedication to such a supposedly unfashionable style. Encouraged, Klein picked up the ukulele, and as she mastered the instrument, she began to incorporate some of her favorite old songs into her poetry readings. Klein's breathy voice was perfectly suited to material from the teens and '20s, and by 1996, she dropped the poetry aspect of her performances entirely, concentrating on performing her favorite old songs in an authentic and straightforward style, staying true to the original material while entirely avoiding any whiff of kitsch or nostalgia.

Klein's straightforward vocal style places the lyrics foremost, so that the songwriters' clever construction and witty rhymes can be best appreciated. Indeed, her debut album, 1998's Come Into My Parlor, is almost a solo record, with Klein's vocals and ukulele occasionally unobtrusively supported by John Reynold's Django Reinhardt-style guitar and producer Loveless' accordion, mandolin, harmonica and triangle.

After that album was recorded, Klein started putting together a band to perform with. The Parlor Boys is a loose-knit conglomeration that can include up to a dozen musicians but usually tops out around six or seven. Reynolds (the grandson of '30s comic/sound and silent movie actress Zasu Pitts) remains, accompanied by two charter members of Robert Crumb's '70s trad-jazz group the Cheap Suit Serenaders, Robert Armstrong (Hawaiian steel guitar, accordion and musical saw) and Tom Marion (guitar, mandolin and banjo), plus musical historian Brad Kay (piano and cornet) and musicologist, author, radio personality and former British Invasion teen idol Ian Whitcomb (ukulele and accordion).

Klein's second album, Paradise Wobble (like the first bedecked in vintage photos and perfect replications of early 20th century graphic design), was credited to Janet Klein and her Parlor Boys. the wide-ranging disc earns the communal credit, featuring several Hawaiian-flavored instrumentals showcasing Armstrong as well as a delightful Whitcomb lead vocal on the profoundly odd "Tain't No Sin To Take Off Your Skin and Dance Around In Your Bones," a 1930 obscurity with a title that later turned up in a William S. Burroughs poem.

"I'm on a mission for charm," Klein states unapologetically. Everything she does, both professionally and personally, is done with an eye for beauty, wit, and indeed charm. Her current activities include recording new work for CD number six. Joined by her band,as well as special guests, Janet draws from rare material originally recorded by the likes of Wilton Crawley (little known clarinetist and vaudeville contortionist of the 1920's)and Robert Cloud (a highly quirky composer from Florida who had several of his works recorded by the Ross Deluxe Synchopators in a tobacco warehouse in 1927 by the Victor Recording Company). Other unusual tunes for the new record will include a little known Cole Porter song entitled "I'm Getting Myself Ready for You" and "Nakasete Chodai" or as titled in English, "Please Cry Me" a 1930s Japanese blues song. As usual, the group is cooking up some wild and wooly renditions of their own.

She continues to perform with her band mostly in Los Angeles but also makes appearances frequently in the San Francisco area (notably February 4, 2007, opening for R. Crumb's Cheap Suit Serenaders at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley), as well as touring Japan regularly since 2002. Janet & the Boys have given concerts in numerous American movie palaces and other historic venues such as the grand Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite and can be found jazzing it up at their regular monthly shows at the Steve Allen Theater, Los Angeles. (www.steveallentheater.com) Janet also continues to utilize her collection of vintage photographic matter in graphic design projects including two miniature books "Love is A Boomerang" and "Take A Picture of the Moon" and has plans for a dvd of musical film shorts and live concert footage.



Ukulele chanteuse Janet Klein's 2004 most hotsy totsy CD release entitled "JANET KLEIN'S SCANDALS" vivaciously evokes the mischievous music of 1910-30s nightclubs, clip joints and dance halls with a simmering selection of early jazz tunes. Most of these 22 songs are originally from burlesque, Vitaphone short films, dance hall and movie musicals of the 1920s and 30s, many of which originally not intended for radio or records. In the vein of naughty comedy singers like Sophie Tucker, Eddie Cantor, Fannie Brice and Chico Marx, Janet renders these clever tunes with a loving flare like no other sweet spunky gal can. The captivating Janet Klein and Her Parlor Boys have a knack for bringing to life great forgotten music, in a fresh and irresistible way.

The title and evocative cover of the CD is a play on images and words from the original 1930's George White Scandals variety show and follies. They ably represent the CD's saucy thematic contents as the band delivers their own musical follies show complete with naughty comic tunes, Burlesque patter, hot dance hall numbers and some sweet and soulful songs to round things out. The first six titles can give you an idea of what's going on here: "Hollywood Party, Good Little Bad Little You, You Keep Me Living in Sin, How Could Red Riding Hood? My Bluebirds Are Singing The Blues, Don't Take That Blackbottom Away."

The CD features inspired performances by Parlor Boy notables: Ian Whitcomb (of 1960's pop fame), Tom Marion and Robert Armstrong (of Robert Crumb's Cheap Suit Serenaders), 91 year old Bob Mitchell (of Bob Mitchell's Boys Choir, featured in over 110 movies) and Dan Levinson horn player for Leon Redbone. It's produced by Robert Loveless of the innovative groups: Scenic, 17 Pygmies and Savage Republic.

This is Janet's 4th CD release and as in her former releases, great care has been taken to produce a quality package with exquisite design well representative of its red-hot jazz musical contents.

Janet Klein - Vocal, Ukulele
Robert Armstrong - Hawaiian Steel Guitar, Accordion
Ian Whitcomb - Vocal, Ukulele, Piano, Accordion
Dan Levinson - C-Melody Sax, Clarinet
Tom Marion - Guitar, Mandolin, Banjo
Billy Steele - Guitar
Dave Jones - Stand up Bass
George Edwards - Percussion
Brad Kay - Piano
Benny Brydern - Violin
Corey Gemme - Cornet
Randy Woltz - Vibes, Percussion, Xylophone
Bob Mitchell - Mighty Wurlitzer Organ
Russ Blake - Lap Steel Guitar

Track List:
1. Hollywood Party 2:40
2. Good Little Bad Little You 2:48
3. Living In Sin 3:32
4. How Could Little Red Riding Hood? 2:11
5. My Blue Bird's Singing The Blues 3:30
6. Don't Take That Black Bottom Away 3:34
7. Ce Disque Vous Dira 2:33
8. Baby O' Mine 3:18
9. I Love My Baby 3:02
10. Jersey Walk 2:55
11. If You Do What You Do 3:17
12. Ballin' The Jack 2:19
13. Big Time Woman 4:02
14. The Sheik Of Ave B 2:52
15. Some Little Bug Is Going To Find You 3:20
16. True Blue Lou 3:04
17. Everyone Says I Love You 1:44
18. Unrequited 3:16
19. Night Wind 3:09
20. Jacksonville Blues 2:57
21. Sunday 3:03
22. Sing Me A Baby Song 3:27





Announcing!!! “Oh!” the latest, newest CD collection of Rare, Vintage, Rollicking Musical Funtime Frolics from the 1910’s, 20’s and 30’s, as sung and performed by Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys. Janet and the Boys are the best at what they do! They’re unearthing, revivifying, rejuvenating, Vaudevillinating, whoopifying and bringing to joyous life tunes so rare and surprising that they are off the map! Here are the sonorous, hauntingly frank and clever sounds of a lost America, an underappreciated time between the two world wars. This is music that kept people up all night in speakeasies, barrelhouses, dance halls and Vaudeville theatres by the millions. When this band dishes out these neglected melodies and lyrical gems you know you’ve been spoken to. This CD is a “where have you been all my life” musical lost and found treasure box.

Oh How Sweet! The band’s ruff and ready live approach to song recording comes across from the first to the last cut. In the first and title track song “Oh!” the band shows an affinity to the expressive unique quirky charm that Robert Cloud gave his arrangement of the same song in 1927. The songs: “When The World Is At Rest” and “Ida I Do” are just simply stunning. “Who-oo? You-oo! That’s Who”, “Oh!” and Blanche (sister of Cab) Calloway’s “Concentrating On You” benefit from the thrillingly buoyant horn trio of Corey Gemme, Dan Weinstein and Brad Kay. The naughty and suggestive “I’m Busy and You Can’t Come In” is notable for it’s breakdown of harmonized humming by the band.

Fix your lamps on hotcha sweetie & ukulele chanteuse Janet Klein and just some of the notable members of the Parlor Boys: Ian Whitcomb, author and British invader of pop music fame circa 1960’s, Tom Marion and Robert Armstrong, members of Robert Crumb’s Cheap Suit Serenaders and Brad Kay, former member of The Original Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo.

Oh My! This is the 5th CD from the enchanting Ms Klein and her highly acclaimed, girdle-bustin’ bunch of West Coast Jazz Archeologists whose previous CDs include:
1998 Come In To my Parlor 2002 Put A Flavor To Love
2000 Paradise Wobble 2004 Living In Sin

OH! Is a gorgeously- packaged little candy box of vintage Jazz-Age Delights-Obscure, Comical, Lovely and Spirited musical bon-bons from the Only Decades That Were Ever worth a Hill O’ Beans.

Track List:
01. Oh! (2:48)
02. Concentratin' On You (3:06)
03. When the World is at Rest (3:28)
04. That's Love! (3:00)
05. Baltimore (3:11)
06. Ida, I Love You (2:51)
07. Who-oo? You-oo! That's Who! (2:20)
08. Mon Ami Perdu (2:08)
09. Don't Worry 'Bout Me (3:28)
10. Undecided Now (3:03)
11. Sweet Man (3:05)
12. Hello Bluebird (2:41)
13. Little Coquette (4:12)
14. I'm Busy and You Can't Come In (3:40)
15. Lonesome and Sorry (2:30)
16. Butterflies in the Rain (1:58)
17. If You Hadn't Gone Away (2:59)
18. Rebecca Came From Mecca (3:26)
19. When? (3:23)





“Whoopee Hey Hey!”, Tunes to Cheer In Tumultuous Times, is Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys’ 7th CD release and times couldn’t be more ripe for this vibrant and evocative bunch of rare and wonderful tunes from the 1920s and 1930s. Performed with freshness and zeal these long lost tunes are alive again with timeless perspectives on life’s ups and downs and will surely have listeners musing over parallels with our current state of affairs.

Songs from the 20s and 30s reflect culturally "tumultuous times"- the heady frivolity and sassy wild good times followed by modernistic stylings colored by “The Crash” and the Great Depression that followed. The enchanting and effervescent Ms Klein’s singing on "Whoopee Hey Hey!" is sweeter than ever. The album is chock full (19 tracks) of rich and bold music and lyrics vivid with heady parlance of the period.

Included are eleven tunes from the 1920s… It is the first time Janet and Boys have tried to get a characteristic 1920s dance band feel. You can hear the crisp foxtrot and vertical clip on ‘Honey Child’ 1929, ‘Shanghai Shuffle’ 1924, ‘I Found A New Baby’ 1926 and ‘Bye Bye Blues’ 1929. ‘Honey Child’, the CD’s opening track at once transports the listener to a 1920s dance hall with its bright tenor guitar and up-beat, bouncy accordion stabs. The record then leads with more Southern fantasy tunes such as the yearning ‘Delta Bound’ and playful romping of ‘Mississippi Mud’.

The six 1930s songs and arrangements let on a more "knowing", lush and world-weary sound with sophisticated undulating rhythms, ie “Delta Bound”, “Isn't Love the Strangest Thing”, “I'll Never Be the Same”. A novelty song on the CD (written by band-member, the incomparable Ian Whitcomb) is lovingly inspired by the English Music Hall favorites- Flanagan and Allen who were known for their down and out but jolly tramp tunes such as "Underneath the Arches", 'Two Very Ordinary People', On the Outside Looking In'. In this vein Ian’s tune, "Ambling Along”, complete with old style introductory patter, is a bitter sweet strolling melody and a heartfelt hobo song for our own agitated times.

Featured are two new full time Parlor Boy band members: best on the planet 1930’s style guitar and plectrum banjo whistling master-John Reynolds and hobo bon vivant Marquis Howell who plays stand-up bass with an authentically inspired vintage panache. Other notable performers are: Daniel Glass who literally “wrote the book” on vintage percussion styles. Set to the task, he succeeded in deciphering and recreating in his own style the fantastic percussion effects of Paul Whiteman’s original recording of ‘Mississippi Mud’ and discovered a rare devise called a bockety bock. Also, Randy Woltz who continues with his marvelously adroit Vibraphone and xylophone playing is featured on jaunty piano duets with Janet. One of these tunes ‘Poppa’s back With Momma Now’ (from a lost Vitaphone short) is a virtual laundry list of pre 1929 whoopee lavish lifestyle ‘when every fella from a banker to his caddy’ had lots of dough and wandering ways only to find they are now all staying home with momma because they’ve discovered ‘there’s a kick in the old gal still’.

Having come so perilously close to the brink of economic calamity… what better time than now to contemplate the zeitgeist of pre and post Depression America…As Janet likes to say, ‘This music got folks through the Depression, the last time’. So Bye By Blues…

Since Janet’s last release (‘Ready For You’ in 2008) the band has toured Japan and Australia and played at the famous Fuji Rock Festival and Adelaide Cabaret Festival. The group plays regularly in and around Los Angeles. “Whoopee Hey Hey!” is produced by Robert Loveless (Scenic, 17 Pygmies and Savage Republic) with gorgeously crafted vintage style artwork adornments designed by Janet, David Barlia and Robert.

Track List:
01. Honey Child (3:18)
02. In My Honey's Lovin' Arms (2:42)
03. Delta Bound (4:28)
04. I Found A New Baby (3:51)
05. Isn't Love The Strangest Thing? (4:16)
06. Shanghai Shuffle (2:40)
07. Poppa's Back With Momma Now (1:51)
08. Baby (3:41)
09. I'll Never Be The Same (3:27)
10. Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Love (3:04)
11. Maybe She'll Write Me, Maybe She'll Phone Me (2:24)
12. Under The Moon (Yoo-oo-oo-oo) (3:11)
13. A Little Bit Independent (4:39)
14. Mississippi Mud (2:45)
15. Ambling Along (3:53)
16. Keko (3:22)
17. A Room With A View (2:23)
18. Bye Bye Blues (3:20)


All thanks go to the rfccbh, What.cd (Popcat)

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