“Shock Treatment” The Mel Henke Group on Tempo Records. Nice red vinyl on this one.
Tracks include: Cocky Cuckoo Clock; Pennies From Heaven; Paradis Toccata; In A Mist; Little Rock Getaway; Frenzied Flight; Shock treatment; I Surrender Dear; Dance Of The Cavemen; Kakachurian Toccata; I Can’t Believe you’re In Love With Me; In A Little Spanish Town
Coming up in a variety of Chicago bands in the ’40s, this pianist had an unusual career that included recording downright weird tunes such as “Shock Treatment,” “Cocky Coo-Coo Clock,” and “Frenzied Flight,” as well as creating what might be one of the masterpieces in the genre of lounge music, although experts in this style have been a bit relaxed about establishing an exact opinion. Henke shows up in the rhythm section on some Louis Armstrong records, and meanwhile over in Nashville, he once successfully placed a song with Conway Twitty. Henke was trained to please in writing ad copy, an influence that has been considered both a pro and con factor in his recorded works. Perhaps Henke’s greatest influence as a musician was in the advertising field itself, as he was innovative in mixing music and sound effects as an attention-grabbing factor in the commercials of the ’60s.
By the early ’40s he had settled in Los Angeles, leading his own trio on the side. This outfit landed a deal to make a pair of albums on the Contemporary label, which is where jazz buffs inevitably come across him. Fans of the type of challenging jazz often presented on this label may find the concoctions of Henke a bit bubbly; his followers seem to drift in more from the aforementioned loungey or space age waiting rooms. In 1955 he went to work for Disney’s television department, writing material for a great deal of the studio’s commercials as well as incidental music for the Disneyland television series. Henke ran his own production company as well, and was known for experimenting with sound effects and the concept of mixing dialogue into musical passages. Inevitably, he created a series of albums combining these techniques with full-length musical performances and instrumental skullduggery. La Dolce Henke, worth hunting down for its title alone, is considered his masterpiece. – Eugene Chadbourne, All Music Guide
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