Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Hussein Hj. Tuah & D’Acrobat’s J. B.




Hussein J. Tuah was from Brunei.
According to Merv Espina, Brunei was “one happening joint” back in the Sixties, and was very cosmopolitan. Merv has been researching the sole product of Brunei’s film industry, Gema Dari Menara (Voice from the Minaret), which was produced in 1968. Apparently the film features a few bands and exotic dancers. But much like that film, the music scene is Brunei has almost no information…

From what I have been able to find, it appears that all of the musicians from Brunei went to Singapore to record, and there was only one label that issued records by Bruneian artists. I did manage to find a little bit about Hussein J. Tuah & D’Acrobats’ J. B.’s is Management / Label: Times Record Company:

Around 1960′s in Singapore, Times Record was a record company which released Malaysian EP’s and LP’s, on labels such as Olympic, Eagle, Sea Lion, etc. There record labels had competition with international recording companies such as EMI and Philips. In the 1960’s there were many artists and singers and records under Times management, so audience can listen them.

D’Acrobats’ J. B. were from Johor Baharu, Malaysia. They released a handful of other singles as the backing band for other Malaysian singers such as Yusoff Ahmad and H. Anuar for the Universal Label.

Catalog number T.R.C. 1032 on Olympic Records of Singapore. No release date given.

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I recently received some more information from Merv Espina. His name is actually Hj. Tuah, and not J. Tuah. The big H in on the cover was a stylistic graphic design choice. You can see it on his first single, which was released on the SOR Records label of Singapore. Hussein worked as a teacher, and one of the subjects that he taught was English. He continued singing, and became a popular patriotic singer

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