Whereabouts Unknown was Jim’s first full-length studio album. Recorded in Houston in 1980, the LP (long-playing disc)
featured ten songs and more than twenty working musicians.
Most of the songs were recorded in the 16-track 2” analog multi-track format, or on 8-track 1” analog tape.
Bill Wade and Bobby Ginsburg produced the album for Skinny Man
Records. Jim sang all lead vocals and played rhythm guitar throughout the album.
Contributing musicians were: Dana Cooper, Michael Mashkes, Billy Block, Rick Gordon, Tim Munson, Bubba Robin,
Luis Juarez, Roger Tausz, Jim Raycraft, Rich Layton,
Gil Rossellini, John Macrini, Jim Alderman, Jimmy Don Smith, Richard Askin, John Haass, Terry Lecce, John Landry,
Charles Long, Larry Rothwell, Peter Gorisch, Jack Saunders,
Malcolm Smith, and Bobby Ginsburg.
Supporting vocalists included: Larry Rothwell, Jean Kilborn, Dana Cooper, Jeri Ross, Kay Ross Stevenson,
Bill Stevenson, Pat Hernandez, John Landry, Terry Lecce, and Alicia Pelaez.
LINER NOTES as TRIVIA QUESTIONS: 1) MRS actually stood for Musicians Recording Studio, but it had a more common nick-name among local musicians.
What was the nick-name?
2) Mexican Movie was based on a true-life adventure from Jim’s college days. Who was the mysterious senorita in
the recording?
3) Jim wrote all the songs on the Whereabouts Unknown LP, except one. Name this song and its author?
4) Peter Gorisch played a valuable vintage cello borrowed from his father (who used the instrument in the Houston
Symphony Orchestra); on what song is this cello featured?
5) Sharp-dressed blues-harp soloist, Rich Layton—featured on the hot R&B tune On the Rebound —was also known as?
6) Dana Cooper, Michael Mashkes, Jim Alderman and Jack Saunders all contributed to WU. What popular Houston band were
they in?
7) Who is Jim’s only vocal duet partner on the WU album?
8) Nashville Morning (written in Nashville) was inspired by whose wedding? It was recorded on whose birthday?
9) WU was mastered and pressed to vinyl LP at one of the nation’s most famous pressing facilities, Wakefield
Manufacturing, Inc. Where was this plant located?
10) Which of the many drummers featured on Whereabouts Unknown went on to become a Nashville television
celebrity?
11) One of Jim’s fellow KLOL-FM personalities sang background vocals on the title song. Who?
12) Jim was a radio personality at Houston’s 101-FM in 1979 & 80. What was his air-name?
13) Name the two guitars Jim used during the recording of Whereabouts Unknown?
14) Guitarist Jimmy Don Smith (featured on Hitchhike up to Heaven) had a popular rhythm & blues band in Houston
in the 1970s. What was it called?
15) Jim played regularly at a bar in Montrose, right across the street from KLOL-FM. What was this popular bar called?
16) One night in 1979, Jim opened two shows for perennial swing favorites Asleep at the Wheel . What was the
name of the club (which later became a gay skating rink)?
17) Jim recorded two songs that didn’t make it to the Whereabouts Unknown LP, and the master containing these
songs was eventually lost. What were they?
18) Name the Colorado-based artist whose original watercolor was used as the cover art for the
Whereabouts Unknown LP and CD?
19) What is the only song on Whereabouts Unknown featuring a single-take solo performance by Jim?
20) The title song Whereabouts Unknown is about a fictitious drug deal gone bad. In what town did this occur?
ANSWERS:
1) Magic Rat Studio
2) Alicia Pelaez (producer Bill Wade’s girlfriend)
3) Standby Woman by Larry Rothwell
4) Sunday Song
5) Dr. Rocket
6) Shake Russell Band
7) Jean Kilborn
8) Wedding of friends David & Anne Marie Romero / birthday of Jim’s mom Bonnie J. Hoard
9) Tempe, Arizona (outside Phoenix)
10) Billy Block
11) Pat Hernandez (all-night DJ)
12) Gentleman Jim Stricklan
13) Martin D-35 (acoustic) and Gibson ES-330 (electric)
14) Jimmy Don & the Cold Cuts
15) Corky’s
16) Texas Opry House
17) Rosewood Piano and Ooby Dooby Man
18) Randy Yeates
19) Nashville Morning
20) El Paso
1) Producer Bill Wade; 2) Producer Bobby Ginsburg; 3) Engineer Sarah Bullington; 4) Jim at Magic Rat
1) (from left) Jim, Dana Cooper, Michael Mashkes; 2) (from left) Jim, Jim Alderman, Dana Cooper, Michael Mashkes, Malcolm Smith
1) Terry Lecce; 2) John Landry; 3) Charles Long; 4) Malcolm Smith
1) Michael Mashkes; 2) Lecce & Landry; 3) 2 inch 16 track tapedeck used for original recording
1) Jim between sets with Mary Ann and Eric Amelang at Texas Opry House; 2) Jim with David Romero in Nashville
ANSWERS:
