That’ll Flat Git It Vol 51- Various Artists

johnaalex
Aug 7
4 min read

That’ll Flat Git It Vol 51 – Rock and Roll From The Vaults of Challenge & Jackpot Records (Bear Family) (2025)

https://www.bear-family.com/various-that-ll-flat-git-it-vol.51

The latest in the seemingly endless That’ll Flat Git It from the folks at Bear Family of Germany. This time we are going to California for Challenge & Jackpot labels. The Challenge vaults have been raided for CD release before. Notably the Ace CD More Hollywood Rock & Roll focused on the Challenge masters. It’s true there is a bit of repetition between this & the new Bear Family disc, but there’s plenty of tracks exclusive to this volume. Plus the CD is jam-packed with three-dozen recordings. There’s quite a lot of well-known on the rockin scene tracks here so let’s take a look at what we have.

The Champs had a monster hit with Tequilla. That’s not on here, after all who doesn’t own that track already. However, we get other Champs recordings. Everybody’s Rockin’ opens the comp & is, surprisingly for me, a great Vocal rocker. Well I say Vocal rocker, the lyrics must have taken 14 seconds to write & that’s being generous. It’s more vocals to go over an instrumental track but still gets things off to a fine start. We also get Alley-Cat from 1960, a great vocal track from the Champs. The Champs also accompany Dave Burges on Maybell. Huelyn Duvall gets 5 tracks. Three Months To Kill (1958) & Pucker Paint (1960) are classic 45s. we also get both sides of a 1957 45rpm, Teen Queen & Coming or Going are both fine pop-rockers. Friday Night On A Dollar Bill from 1958 is in the same vain, all good stuff. The under-rated Country singer Wyn Steward provides his classic 1958 Jackpot release Come On, as well as a really good number I didn’t know in the form of Uncle Tom Got Caught. Country star Bobby Bare gives us Vampira, a fun Halloween rocker. In the same vain, though far less PC, are Amazon by Phil Carter & Uprising, an instrumental from the Cherokees. Both sides of a 1958 Four Tunes release, Spark Plug & Go Little Go-Cat, are rightly considered classics on the rockin’ scene, as is Life Begins At 4-O-Clock by Bobby Milarno. The Cufflinks provides some vocal group sounds in So Tough & Eyeballing, which describes standing on the corner watching girls go by, something that would get you at best moved on by the police nowadays. Al Downing provides us a Little Richard-style rocker in the classic Down on the Farm. The series is now starting to feature more varied styles rather than just Rockabilly, but when the tracks are that good, who cares. Saying all that, Big Al Downing did become a successful Country artist. Dean Beard provides us with two tracks, Shiverin & Shakin is a decent rocker. With This Ring by Jerry Wallice is average, Good & Bad by the same artist is better. Both Kipp Tylor tracks, Wail Man Wail & She Got Eyes are average. I didn’t care for George Western doing Well Don’t You Know or Hey Little Car Hop, but no doubt some people will enjoy it. My Little Girl, one of two Kimble Koben tracks is really good. When The One You Love Don’t Love You by Lee Harris has a Buddy Holly sound |& to these ears is decent. We get a frantic instrumental by the Rip Tides in the form of Machine Gun. Instrumental sounds also come from Ralph Mooney, with the primitive sounding Moonshine, & for those missing their Champs Taquilla fix, we get Taquilla Song by The Contenders, which is basically the exact same song but is still fun. The album closes with a really strong track; The Noble Brothers Didn’t It Rock.

This has been a really enjoyable dig through the Challenge & Jackpot record vaults. Plenty of well-known tracks & artists, & some obscurities I didn’t know make it an interesting listen. Not all the tracks appealed to me, but I’m glad I’ve heard them, & the ratio of good to bad is very high. A really good entry in the series, keep ‘em coming Bear Family.

Track Listings

01 Everybody's Rockin' The Champs

02 Spark Plug The Four Teens

03 Vampira Bobby Bare

04 Come On Wynn Stewart

05 Amazon Phil Carter

06 Egad, Charlie Brown Dean Beard

07 With This Ring Jerry Wallace

08 Well Don't You KNow George Weston

09 Pucker Paint Huelyn Duvall

10 Kee Ro Ryin' Johnnie & Jonie

11 Alley Cat The Champs