When Bill Haley’s popularity waned in the United States, mainly because of a young, talented and handsome guy called Elvis Aaron Presley, he decided to move to Mexico in 1961 and became a star in Latin America. While in the early 60s Hank Ballard and Chubby Checker started the twist craze in the US, it was Bill Haley who became the “King of Twist” south of the border. In 1962, he released “Bikini Twist”, an album recorded in Mexico for the Dimsa label (a subsidiary of Discos Orfeón) comprised mostly of instrumental twist tunes. His old friend and bandmate Rudy Pompilli stayed with him and lent his talents as saxophone, clarinet and flute player on these recordings. Here are three cuts from the album, featuring Pompilli on each instrument: Clarinet on the title track, flute on “Rudy’s” and tenor saxophone on “Twist Del Expresso”.

Original Colombian pressing. I played this record A LOT when I was a kid, and lost it many years ago. I had lost hope of finding it, but thanks to the great people at Discos Cosmos in Bogotá I was able to find it. Great used record stores are really hard to find in Colombia, and these guys gave me a really nice surprise for sure. Highly recommended. They can be found here:

(00:00) Video intro

(00:14) 01. Bikini Twist
(02:20) 02. Rudy’s
(04:22) 03. Twist Del Expresso

Numark TTXUSB turntable – Nagaoka MP-500 phono cartridge – ART DJPRE II phono stage preamp – Vinyl record vinilo LP