The Rock-A-Teens Woo-Hoo (CD, Mono & Stereo)

(Sparkletone) 34 tracks (69:46) Their complete recordings including their only album in both stereo and mono versions. 4 page notes by Johnny Cecka and Billy Miller
 
In the closing months of 1959, six cool Richmond, Virginia swingers called the Rock-A-Teens hot-wired the collective hooves of teenage America with just two words: W00-HOO!
You know, as in WOO-H00, WOO-HOO HOO!! The infectious holler was to launch these Dixie delinquents directly into the national Top 20 and into the annals of pop history - without so much as a nod to the social significance of lyrical content! Boo Walke (one of the greatest rock & roll names ever!) and Vic Mizelle started strummin'guitars together in 1956 and after gettin'a nasty chomp by the big beat bug, they threw together a loosely knit combo called Boo Walke & the Rockets. According to Vic, there was nothin' too special separating the Rockets from a million other 50's racket squads ("`cept maybe that we were worse!") and they spent a good three years working local Richmond teen hops and parties until fate happily kicked 'em in the butt in early 1959.
 
 'One day we went up to this radio station WEZL, recalls Vic,'Where Jess Duboy was the local DJ. We were up there practicing and it was just the kinda thing where we were (Rock-A-Teens) just fiddlin'around with a boogie which at the time we called The Rock-A-Teen Boogie and ROCK-A-TEENS it was like Elvis in the Sam Phillips days where things just happened. So were puttin'it down on tape and Jess Duboy starts goin'WOO HOO, WOO HOO HOO 'while we're playin'and we're like `WHAT?!!' But we really didn't think nothin'of it. We had a few of my songs goin'down on tape, too and that's what we were really concentratin'on. The Rock-A-Teens (the sportier name the Rockets rechristened themselves with) had settled into a lineup of Mizelle, Walke and Billy Cook on guitars (though Vic ditched his for a vocalist role after the success of Woo-Hoo), Paul Dixon on bass, Eddie Robertson on sax, and drum smasher Billy Smith (who eventually sold a set of drums to a then unknown Hasil Adkins!) and it was mutually agreed that outta the Mizelle toons on the tape, there was definitely something wax worthy there.
'Me and Billy Cook, we heard through the grapevine that there was a label in Roanoke, Virginia, that was looking for original material like our stuff So me and Billy grabbed our tape and hitch hiked down Route 16 to Roanoke. Well, we get there and come to find out this label Cavalier Records was goin'outta business. So the guy who owned the label turned us on to George Donald McGraw who had a record store in Salem, Virginia, and said he might be interested in our tape. We hitched to Salem and Billy & I played McGraw the tape. Nothin'really knocked him out but when he gets to this Rock-A-Teen Boogie, his ears perked right up! He sez, `Look, you boys go and get your band and bring`em down here. We're gonna cut this Woo-Hoo thing'...(excerpts from the liner notes)