Doug Poindexter

Doug Poindexter and the Starlite Wranglers were only the fifth or sixth white act ever signed to Sun Records. Heavily influenced by his idol Hank Williams, Poindexter was pure country-in fact, pure hillbilly. The Starlite Wranglers circa 1953/54 consisted of Bill Black on stand-up bass, Tommy Sealey on fiddle, Millard Yow playing steel guitar, Clyde Rush on acoustic guitar, and Scotty Moore on electric guitar, with Poindexter providing the nasal, traditional country-style singing and strumming a guitar as well. Scotty Moore claims credit for bringing Poindexter to Sam Phillips' attention at Sun, and for organizing the session that resulted in May of 1954--he certainly shared songwriting credit on both sides of the resulting single, the very hillbilly-sounding "Now She Cares No More" and the raunchy, almost proto-rockabilly "My Kind of Carrying On." The latter pointed the way toward the sound that Moore would capture about a month later, when he and Elvis Presley got together at Sun for the first time. Elvis certainly was familiar with Poindexter and the Starlite Wranglers, and had attended a number of their performances. It's also possible that Doug Poindexter played without credit on several of Elvis Presley's Sun recordings, including "Good Rockin' Tonight", and may have helped in putting together some of the arrangements.

Read More