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Post by Stevie on Dec 29, 2015 0:11:19 GMT
Sounds a bit selfish, but I'm missing the Throwback Thursdays Alan...
e&oe.
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Post by AlanB on Dec 29, 2015 4:55:51 GMT
Sounds a bit selfish, but I'm missing the Throwback Thursdays Alan... e&oe. Didn't want to bore folk by over doing it. There's lots I could come up with, I'll see what I can find for this upcoming Thursday. Thanks for the interest, Stevie.
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Post by harpymorgan on Dec 29, 2015 14:23:14 GMT
Saw her quite a few times around the Farnham area. Always accompanied by Pete Emery.
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Post by AlanB on Dec 31, 2015 6:11:24 GMT
The following from Let IT Rock, February 1973 p. 48-49 (less photo & route map which I'll attempt to scan and append later)
ROCK ROUTES: THE LONDON R&B SCENE
by John Pidgeon
At a time when most receptive organs—eyes, ears, pockets—were turned to Liverpool and its Merseybeat, another (and as it turned out almost equally important) moment in rock history occurred in London. Because "the business", the media and their public were fascinated solid by the Beatles, the Searchers, Gerry and the Pacemakers, in fact almost everyone with a fringe and a grin who called you "whack" with the correct enunciation, events in the South went unnoticed by all but a handful of fans, a couple of promoters, less journalists, and a group of musicians (most of whom ultimately achieved widespread recognition, though in some cases only after a wait that would test the patience of a lifer).
Apart from isolated pockets of interest in other urban centres—the British rhythm and blues movement was located almost exclusively in the London area.
Three people were responsible for the birth of British rhythm and blues—Chris Barber, Cyril Davies, and Alexis Korner—but it would be invidious to ascribe specific roles as father, mother and mid-wife, despite some assertions of paternity to Korner.
Chris Barber, best known as a jazz bandleader and trombonist, was the major force in bringing the blues to Britain, and as early as 1953 had formed an intended blues group within his jazz band. Things didn't however work out as he had hoped, because the vocals turned the blues into something else: The singer (and guitarist) who performed in front of Barber on bass and Beryl Bryden on washboard was one Tony (subsequently Lonnie in tribute to Lonnie Johnson) Donegan, and the musical metamorphosis brought about by his high-pitched nasal whine was soon known as "skiffle", the first home-grown pop music craze.
In 1957 Barber backed Bill Broonzy, next he brought Sister Rosetta Tharpe into the country, and in 1958 first Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and then Muddy Waters. The purists baulked at Waters' amplification, but Davies and Korner were inspired to wire up their own instruments. Barber invited them to join his gigs for a rhythm and blues set, backing Ottilie Patterson on harmonica and guitar, and these spots proved so popular that the pair resolved to play their own straight R&B gigs with their own electric band.
Davies and Korner had organized and played blues together for several years at their London Blues and. Barrelhouse Club, but opposition to their electrified music was so intense in the tight circuit of jazz clubs that they were forced to open their own club (in a basement beneath the ABC Teashop by Ealing Broadway underground station) in order to have a regular venue for their band, Blues Incorporated. The club scene in the South had been dominated by "trad" (a meaningless abbreviation of traditional jazz which aptly severed its associations with that long-established form) since the late fifties. The term "trad" was indiscriminately applied to a sound that relied on sub-New Orleans vocals and a predictably warbling clarinet above an equally predictable banjo rhythm: the shallowest of musical backwaters. "Beat" music was confined to records, whose studio sessions were rigidly organized Tin Pan Alley jobs that kept a hard-core of session men in regular employment, or tours of one night stands where solo singers would file on stage for fifteen minute slots backed by Sounds Incorporated (if they were lucky) or dance-stepping instrumentalists would spin out a medley of their Greatest Hits. The rest was for youth clubs and back rooms
Blues Incorporated was just as much a detour around this Nowhereville as it was the result of a desire to recreate the music of Muddy Waters. The line-up of the band which played on the opening night of the Ealing club in March 1962 was Cyril Davies (harmonica, vocals), Alexis Korner (guitar), Keith Scott (piano)j Andy Hoogenboom (bass), and Charlie Watts (drums), with, briefly, Art Wood as singer. After Wood was dropped there were other changes. By mid-summer Blues Inc. consisted of Davies, Korner, tenorist Dick Heckstall-Smith, pianist Johnny Parker, Jack Bruce on bass, and Ginger Baker on drums, though others including Mick Jagger, Brian Jones and Paul Jones would sit in. By this time Chris Barber had given Blues Inc. a residency at the Marquee Club (which he ran in association with Harold Pendleton) and the Rolling Stones made their first public appearance under that name there in July.
Simultaneously another West End club—like the Marquee, a jazz club—the Flamingo in Wardour Street, was developing its own brand of rhythm and blues in the form of the Blue Flames, previously Billy Fury's backing group. At first billed just as the Blue Flames, the talent of the singer/pianist (and soon organist) got his name, Georgie Fame, stuck out in front of the band's. Because the club catered largely for black GIs and West Indians at the all-night sessions where he played, Fame's music evolved differently under the influence of his audience from that of the bands which played the Marquee (with its young white membership). The GIs would lay Smokey Robinson and James Brown records on him while the Jamaicans turned him on to Ska. It was a Negro who first played him Mose Allison.
When, towards the end of 1962, Cyril Davies left Blues Inc. to form his own band and was replaced by Graham Bond, the four styles of British R&B were made; the rocking Chuck'n'Bo style of the Stones, taken up by the Yardbirds and the Pretty Things; Davies's dedicated revival of Muddy Waters' 1958 sound, which had parallels in John Mayall's blues crusade; the Flamingo sound, discovered by Fame and carried on by Zoot Money's Big Roll Band, Chris Farlowe and the Thunderbirds, Ronnie Jones and the Night Timers, and other house bands; the post-Davies Blues Inc. was driven by brass riffs and much jazzier than before—Davies hated saxophones which had in his opinion killed jazz—and when Bond in his turn left with Baker and Bruce he pursued a similar style, first with John McLaughlin in the band and then with Dick Heckstall-Smith.
As the following for rhythm and blues grew (through word of mouth communication) jazz clubs overcame their abhorrence for the music and new clubs opened in and around London.
The rest of the story is the kind of rock history which made the columns of the pop press. The Stones got out of the club circuit into the Top Ten and the big time at the start of 1964 and others followed. Cyril Davies died the week their Lennon/ McCartney song, I Wanna Be Your Man, reached tenth place, Chris Barber was put down as a bandwagon hitch-hiker, and Alexis Korner looked as if he was never going to break big. (It's ironic that he finally made it with CCS—a band that would have got blown off stage by any Blues Inc. Iine-up).
Still, it was fun while it lasted and no doubt would not have done so for so long if the businessmen hadn't been obsessed with Liverpudlians. More importantly, British rhythm and blues was the starting point for most rock music that's happened since.
1. THE ROUNDHOUSE A pub on the corner of Wardour Street and Brewer Street, W1, which was London's "Skiffle Centre" until 1956 when Cyril Davies and Alexis Korner started the London Blues And Barrelhouse Club. The Thursday night sessions often took the form of impromptu jams amongst the blues enthusiasts present and were visited by touring American bluesmen like Muddy Waters, Otis Spann, and Big Bill Broonzy.
2. THE EALING RHYTHM AND BLUES CLUB The first British rhythm and blues club, which opened on March 17th, 1962. The club was run by Davies and Korner in order to provide a regular gig for their band, Blues- Incorporated, which was shunned by narrow-minded jazz club promoters. Various combinations of future Rolling Stones, Pretty Things and Manfreds would sit in with the house band or jam during the interval.
3. THE MARQUEE CLUB Formerly the "London Jazz Centre" the club's premises were beneath the Academy Cinema at 166 Oxford Street, W1, when "Rhythm And Blues Night" was first held in May 1962. The Rolling Stones made their first public appearance there two months later. In March 1964 the club moved to its present location at 90 Wardour Street, where, having relinquished the "jazz" tag, almost every session was devoted to R&B.
5. THE FLAMINGO CLUB A modern jazz club situated at 33—37 Wardour Street, whose "all-nighter" sessions were run by the Gunnell Brothers, Rik and John. The switch to rhythm and blues was largely stimulated by the musical tastes of the black GIs and West Indians who accounted for most of the audience. Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames were the first of the house bands and recorded their classic Rhythm And Blues At The Flamingo album there in September 1963. The bandroom beside the stage was a celebrated meeting place for insomniac musicians and people of other late night professions.
6. THE CRAWDADDY CLUB Opened by Georgio Gomelsky at the Station Hotel, Richmond, the Sunday evening sessions with the Rolling Stones rapidly became so popular that the club had to move from the four hundred capacity hotel ballroom to the larger Richmond Athletics Association Clubhouse. Gomelsky ran a second Crawdaddy Club at the Star Hotel, Broad Green, London Road, Croydon , where the Animals played their first gig in the south of England.
9. EEL PIE ISLAND Now demolished, the hotel on the island in the River Thames at Twickenham (joined to the shore by a narrow footbridge) was a favourite venue. Everyone played there at one time or another, but no one had a stronger following than Cyril Davies. With his R&B All-Stars he made his last public appearance there in January 1964.
10. THE SCENE CLUB Situated in Ham Yard (off Great Windmill Street, W1) was renowned not only for its live bands but also for Guy Stevens' "R&B Record Night" on Mondays.
11. THE STUDIO '51 CLUB The Downliners Sect first made a name for themselves at this club at 10-11 Great Newport Street, WC2, where the Stones had a Sunday afternoon residency.
12. KLOOK'S KLEEK CLUB Despite its exotic name the club's premises were at the Railway Hotel, West Hampstead. One of the many jazz clubs which went over to rhythm and blues, it was the setting for a live album by John Mayall.
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Post by Stevie on Dec 31, 2015 8:12:22 GMT
Thanks Alan. +1!
I must have missed you in the "New Year's Honours List" as an OBE for "services rendered to blues"!
Well, if you can knight someone for riding horses or for steering some damned election campaign...
e&oe...
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Post by AlanB on Dec 31, 2015 10:49:58 GMT
Thanks Alan. +1! I must have missed you in the "New Year's Honours List" as an OBE for "services rendered to blues"! Well, if you can knight someone for riding horses or for steering some damned election campaign... e&oe... Thanks for those few kind words. I'm just a Johnny Come Lately when it comes to this blues stuff....Know what the initials OBE stand for? In my case other buggers efforts.
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Post by AlanB on Dec 31, 2015 11:16:21 GMT
Located the map which illustrated the feature. Somewhat yellowed with age. Click to zoom. Attachments:
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Post by AlanB on Jan 7, 2016 6:41:55 GMT
In light of the resent death of Mack McCormick I thought I'd make today's Throwback an interview Mack conducted with Lightnin' Hopkins in 1959. It was published in Jazz Journal, January 1961 (pps 16-19) before Lightning's LP's on the Heritage and 77 labels. Somewhat lengthy hopefully one or two will stick with it.
A conversation with LIGHTNIN' HOPKINS by MACK McCORMICK
Mack McCormick: Sam, how many songs have you made or known?
Sam Hopkins: Oh-oh. Now, you sure did ask me something. Now you got me tied up. I really don't know how many. I don't know. And then I get to singing—I can sing some more onto them. No way telling how many I know. I just know some songs. I'm a song man.
M: Well, I know you've never failed to surprise me. You've recorded 46 songs for me so far—and before that you've recorded 150 or so other songs.
S: And there's plenty more. I make em, you know, near about as fast as I sing em. Near out everytime I go out I see something, I make it what I know, just go ahead and make me another song.... Now I got two different songs now that come up. Songs I want to record for you. Now just like—you see, look out that window there. You know what that is?
M: On the tree?
S: Cobwebs, Webs taking over that pecan tree and if they don't move em, they gonna kill the stock, it ain't gonna be no good. See? Well, I got it in a song bout the webs oh the wall. But now I see it on the tree. So that old song I could make it into a new song. I got a song about just about anything I see that I know is happening.
M: The other day you were telling me about a new song.
S: 'World in a tangle, getting where you can't tell the women from the men.'
M: And there was one about a saw mill fire.
S: 'Mr. Charlie, don't you know your rolling mill is burning down.'
M: Is that based on something that happened.
S: Why sure. That was in Crockett. Crockett, Texas.
M: Most of your songs, then, are about you, about things you've done and seen?
S: Just like that song, 'Just sitting down here thinking about an old friend I used to have.' Well, I be sitting around, I get to thinking about Blind Lemon, Texas Alexander, first one and another that I never will see again. So that come to me, just sitting down here thinking about an old friend I used to have.
M: A.lot of your songs are about your family. Like Bunion Stew tells about your parents.
S: Yeah . . . You know, everytime the ground cracked, pa gets a 'tater, and he looks around and there stands ma with a 'mater. She gonna meet him in the soup, you understand, and they gonna be all messed up together. That made a good stew that day.
M: That's one of the songs that's in the album put out by Tradition Records. We've been kind of waiting for that album haven't we?
S: Sure have.
M: Sam, I've got a surprise for you. Look here. What I got in the mail.
S: That is a surprise—ha! That is! That is that album ain't it? Oh, yenh, that's it . . . the songs I made for you the first time.
M: It's strange because I know this is the first time you've seen one of your own LP albums.
S: The first time!
M: But you've had others come out before that
S: That's what they say. You showed me in a magazine where it talks about those others. but you know, nobody would send me one—don't you know they should send me one? Course they should do a lot of things.
M: Well, Sam, you've recorded for about ten or so different companies—and I think you've had pretty much the same experience all along, haven't you?
S: That's right. They come and get the songs and that's all. Later, I don't hear nothing more. Don't even get a copy.
M: How many of your records do you own1
S: My wife, Nettie's got em. She's got three of them. It's those old records I made for Aladdin and Siffln In. She has three of them.
M: That's all?
S: Just those three, well I should say it's six songs—you know, one on each side.
M: Have you made much money out of recording?
S: Oh, I've made quite a bit of money—poor man's part.
M: Have you gotten much in royalty money?
S: One time. That was a long time ago I get some royalty money. Most of the time I'd get what I was paid when I made the record and that's all.
M: This Tradition album, then, is the only record that's available now that you'll be paid royalties for.
S: Sure. So of course I'm hoping it will do pretty good.
M: Do you feel it's the best you've ever done?
S: Well, I do, I feel that way. It has more different songs. Some that are old songs, some that are new that I just made up—blues. and some that I do mostly talking on, and about different things. That one about the convict boy. That's in there, ain't it?
M: The one I like so well? Prison Blues Come Down On Me.
S: Yeah, the one about the old boy getting back home to his family.
M: There's a movie I'm going to take you to see if they ever bring it back. The Grapes of Wrath. It starts off, the opening scenes tell exactly that same story. In your own way, you and John Steinbeck—the man who wrote The Grapes of Wrath—have told the same story. But of course you were telling about something that happened to you.
S: That's right. It happened just like I told it.
M: Something else I wanted to show. This is Jazz Journal, a magazine printed over in England—and this issue of it has a story about a friend of yours who went over to England.
S: Sure does. That's Muddy Water.
M: That's what it says, 'Muddy Waters in London'. There's a lot of interest in the real, country blues over there. How do you feel about going over to England?
S: Well you know, that's just all right with me. Singing the blues—you know, that's my occupation. So I just feel good about it.
M: Think you'd get along all right if we went?
S: Oh, well, you know I'll have to get along. I'm not going to be interfering except with the blues—I'll upset 'em with that.
M: I think you will upset them. They've had some good men over there—but no one like you.
S: I wish Texas was alive, so's he could go with us. Texas Alexander ought to have gone over there.
M: You told me about Texas Alexander getting in trouble over a song. What was that?
S: The way I heard it, he sung a bad song.
M: What was that?
S: Something about the boar-hog. 'She got box back nitties and all them noble thighs, something that works under cover like a boar-hog's eye.'
M: You think that's why they put him in prison?
S: Well, I don't know. That's what they tell me. After he got out, he never got to make any more records. Except that one time he almost made some but that woman took me to California, she was afraid of him. Say, 'I can't drive to California with that big old man'. So when we went, it was early in the morning. She told him he could go but then we left early—sneaked out of town. That was '46. I went to California for Aladdin records.
M: What's that song mean?
S: ' . . . works under cover with a boar hog's eye'. Now, I don't know what it means.
M. You did one for me like that. The Dirty Dozens.
S: Oh, I don't know what that means either.
M: Some of the best songs, people never get to hear.
S: Well, you got to watch it. Like my song about Mr. Tom Moore and them four Moore brothers. First time I made that song on a record, them Moore brothers came and gave me trouble. I haven't hardly been back to Washington County since. Now, I made that song again for you but only because I don't figure them Moore brother's will hear it this time. 'Ain't but one thing this black man done was wrong, that's when I moved my wife and family down on Mr. Tom Moore's farm'. Course this time I made it even better, put in three four verses wasn't in it the first time I made it. Now, that isn't exactly my song, lots of people sing it, but I sing it different. Fellow here in town, boy named T. Lipscomb, he sings that song. He's crippled up you know—it was the Moore brothers that crippled him so he really sings that song.
M: You do a lot of gambling?
S: Yeah, I gamble from town to town.
M: We had a big crap game the other night, didn't we?
S: Sure did.
M: What'd you win in that game?
S: I didn't make but $165. That's all—but they all running around saying I made $300 and something. But 1 know what I win. I gets it down, you can believe that.
M: How do you feel about gambling?
S: Well, that's just a habit just like drinking or anything else . . . I just like to gamble. Cause I fed like I win, my luck be just as good as anybody else's—I know if I get lucky I win cause I will bet that money. I don't want good luck to catch me knitting. What I mean by that—if I get up there and bet a quarter when I could bet a hundred and make nine, well, I'd feel bad knowing too that I could a made it for a hundred just as good as for that quarter. So I just 'Here it is, boys, if I can't "point" it's yours'. 'Ain't no harm in it, get up and brush my hands and walk along.' That's the way I gamble.
M: Sam, I'm going to play some records and you tell me what you think of them . . .
(In response to Blind Lemon Jefferson's Peach Orchard Mama.)
S: Yeah, that's Blind Lemon Jefferson. I don't think I ever heard him sing that one before. You know, some of his records I didn't like too much. Those where they put a piano with him I didn't like at all.
M: On the cover of this LP there's a photo of a guitar on the side of a freight car. Is that the kind Lemon used?
S: Not when I knew him. No, that's the make—I mean he had a round-hole box—but it's new style the way they got it there. His guitar was straight. Didn't have them yokes in it. Then too, so long a time, he probably may have got him one like that. See, when I knew him it was before he went O making records. He left and went to Dallas County and that's the last I ever saw of him—but later on I heard him on the records that was coming out.
(In response to Lonnie Johnson's Backwater Blues. King.)
Lonnie Johnson. That's him. I knowed Lonnie around Ft Worth and Dallas and around.
(In response to Dan Pickett's Baby, How Long. Gotham.)
No, I can't place him. It's a bottle he's using up and down the strings—that's what make it sound like it does. I do that sometimes—get a whiskey bottle bout empty and go to sliding it on the strings, make them notes hang on.
(In response to Johnny William's [John Lee Hooker] House Rent Boogie, Gotham.)
That might be John Lee Hooker. Yeah, that's who. Now, that there, that's the barrelhouse piano type of thing you was asking about. They used to do it on piano, some people do it the same way on guitar—barrelhouse style. Boogie for dancing.
(In response to Lightnin Hopkins' Lightnin Boogie. Gold Star.)
Now, there, that's what I mean . . . yeah, that sounds like Lightnin Hopkins. That's like the barrelhouse piano.
M: Who's that tap dancing?
S: That's L. C. Williams . . . 'See ain't that good . . . I'm fixing to have a ball . . . I'm looking at the little girl way over yonder. . . '
M: On some records, you did the tap dancing didn't you?
S: Some was L. C., then some I did it myself. Put bottle caps on my shoes, make a trap—then I just sit there doing the tap dancing same time as I'm playing. That was me on the records I made the time I went to New York and then on some I made here—I think it was for Mercury.
(In response to Tommy McClennan's Bottle Up and Go. Bluebird.)
That man—I don't know his name, but I've heard him but I don't think he's from around here. That's an old song I still like to sing.
(In response to Josh White's Careless Love. Stinson.)
Now, that's funny. I mean—who is that? Is that some white man singing there? The guitar, now he can sure cut that guitar —but still and all it sounds funny. What I mean, it's not real blues.
M: That's Josh White. I'm afraid he's been in New York too long.
S: This picture, that him? Well, he sure don't sound like no blues man—but he looks black, black as me. Guess he has been in New York too long.
(In response to Smokey Hogg's Dark Clouds. Meteor.)
Yeah, that's Smokey—he's from up in the Piney Woods. He's around here a lot. You know they say he's Texas Alexander's son—but I mean it wasn't put down that way so I don't really know about it. He oughta be back around here pretty soon.
M: One day, you remember, he was visiting you and I came over just a half-hour after he'd left.
S: He went back up around Tyler, I guess.
(In response to Lil Son Jackson's Doctor, Doctor. Imperial.)
Now, this boy, you know I taught him. He's up in Dallas now, got him a little band. But when I was recording for Quinn— you know, Gold Star records—I took him out there and he made some records for Quinn. Lil Son, Smokey, and me, and T-bone Walker—you see we're all about the same age. Sometimes I went around with them others but not too much. T-bone came from around Conroe.
(In response to Leadbelly's Black Snake Moan.)
Now, that's Blind Lemon's song. But I don't know who it is. 'Oh-oh, you ain't got no mama now . . . ' I used play along behind Blind Lemon on that one. That's a 12-string guitar. I used to play that some but don't no more.
M: A friend of yours from Centerville told me that a Mexican fellow named Sevelle was the first man playing 12 string guitar around Leon County.
S: That could be. I remember it was some Mexican played it but I don't know what his name was. This fellow on the record, where'd he come from?
M: Caddo Lake. He was born around there but he traveled all around East Texas. Silver City, Waco, Dallas, and he was here in Houston in 1925 and 1926.
S: I might of known him . . .
M: He spent quite a bit of time at Central 2.
S: Oh, well, I could have missed him then. I never was in the Brazos bottom. The prison I was in, it was second to the bottom. It was the County farm. Not exactly the penitentiary. He was down at Sugarland, huh? Yeah, well, I could have missed him easy.
(In response to Lightnin Hopkins' Abilene. Aladdin.)
S: Well, that's him again.
M: What is this song?
S: I tell—you gonna have to wait. I had so many that start the same way, you couldn't tell till you go to singing. . . . Oh, yeah, now . . . ' . . . stop by Abilene'. That's the West Texas Blues. '. . . house painted green'.
M: What kind of house was that in Abilene?
S: Green house! It was a green house with some pretty girls there.
M: Well, what'd those girls do?
S: You know how that is—they was attractive. Yeah, you stop by there you see some pretty girls.
(In response to Lightnin Hopkins' Going To Galveston. Lightnin plays piano on this song.)
That's the one for my li'tle wife Antonnette, Nettie. We used to go down to Galveston a lots and we 'stop by that old cafe' just like I'm singing it.
(In response to John Lomax' Take A Whiff On Me.)
Now that is a white man. That's the one who was at the Alley Theater concert with me. Now he's got it. That night he sang 'Long gone like a turkey thru the corn' only it was different than the way I sing it. He's got it about Long John and I sing it 'If I'd a listened to what my momma said, I'd be home in that snow white iron bed'.
(In response to Rev. M. B. Burnett's Do You Know Him. Blind Texas evangelist. Avant.)
Some people say I got a voice like a preacher—you know, heavy. I been told I ought to line em out like this man does. Course I'm like a preacher, I got to keep hearing that 'Amen!' from my congregation just the same as a preacher.
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Post by AlanB on Jan 21, 2016 6:09:13 GMT
Carrying out a search here for Junior Kimbrough I note that he's had quite some coverage hereabouts.
For a "throwback" I thought I'd resurrect the following which originally started out on the now, moribund, discussion group Blues-L in 1995. Sadly the author, Tom Freedland, is no longer with us (see internet for obits). ==============================================
Junior Kimbrough by Tom Freeland 15/01/1997
There is a new/old Junior Kimbrough recording just out; I'm going to use it as an occasion to update some posts that I did on Blues-l blues group in May of 1995. The subject, then, was Junior Kimbrough's output prior to Deep Blues. His Highwater single is more-or-less well known; his other work is pretty obscure and hard to run down. I've since obtained a few more pieces of information, and even heard some of the recordings. It seems that he has had the following recording sessions:
two in the sixties, one involving Charlie Feathers and one at Phillwood that did not. The latter, in 1966 according to Sylvester Oliver, may have involved Scotty Moore. These are very interesting connection because they are *serious* connections to Memphis’ rockabilly era. According to Quentin Claunch, Feathers recorded five songs with Junior in the predecessor to American Studios; they were never released. Claunch stated that the sound on these tapes was substandard, and he still has them. The songs were "Ain't It Lonesome" "I Feel Good, "I'm Sorry" "I Done Got Old," and "Meet Me In The City." Claunch let Goldwax have a copy of those tapes in the early 1990s.
one in the seventies involving Charlie Feathers, plus an interview broadcast on the BBC.
one in the eighties involving Highwater.
and then Deep Blues and Fat Possum.
The releases prior Fat Possum were all either on compilations or singles. In the 60s, he put out a Phillwood single from the non-Feathers' session. The Phillwood single was "You Can't Leave Me" b/w "Tram", which is a typo-- it should be "Tramp", the Lowell Fulson song.
In the 70s, he put out an English single from the 70s Feather’s session. According to Oliver, this was in 1975 or 1976. The song was called "Meet in the City" (I do not know what the other side was). In 1972, he was interviewed by Geoffrey Haydon for the BBC TV series "The Friendly Invasion" as a result of an interview with Feathers. The series did not include the interview, and Haydon allowed Charlie Gillett to broadcast it on a BBC radio show, Honky-Tonk. Included in the broadcast was a performance of "Meet In The City;" I've heard from someone with that performance on tape, who says it is wonderful.
In the early 80s, Gillett compiled an album (on a Dutch label) of musicians who had career breaks on Honky Tonk; it included a Kimbrough track along with Ian Dury, Lena Lovitch, Graham Parker, Mark Knofler, Elvis (then D.P.) Costello, and others.
Sylvester Oliver produced the Highwater sessions. Oliver says that
there are 10 unreleased sides from those sessions (plus two that were
released); he says they were in 1982 (Evans said to me they were from
1988).
In the late 80s/early 90s, Quentin Claunch sent Goldwax Records (then in Nashville) the 60s Charlie Feather's session tapes, which Claunch considered substandard from technical standpoint. Goldwax was supposedly considering licensing them, but didn't.
This seems to have lead to a release by a label called ADVENTURE IN MUSIC on a compilation called COTTON PATCH BLUES, AIM-028 (copyrighted in
1991). It included 3 Junior Kimbrough tracks: "I Feel Good", "Ain't It Lonesome" and "I'm Sorry." The liner notes states that Goldwax is going to put out a CD of Junior's material; also on the compilation are some Frank Frost tracks ("Midnight Prowler" and "I Got Jane On My Mind." The former is not the same as the Earwig version). I had access to it for literally about 15 minutes last summer; I was very impressed with Junior's singing on the tapes, but found his band less interesting than on his more recent material. The CD implies that a full-blown release by Junior is forthcoming, but I have seen no credible evidence that such a release exists (I think at one point Vincent was convinced it did, but I also think he doesn’t think that anymore).
Finally, a Nashville label is has just released a 78 (!) which consists of one side of Junior Kimbrough on electric guitar and Charlie Feathers acoustic, with Junior singing, titled "Feel Good Again". The other side is a Feathers song, "Now, Little Girl." It is on the Perfect label, a reproduction of an old 78 label. I do not know whether it is "I Feel Good" from the 60s Feathers session for from some other session; it is virtually impossible that it is a more recent recording.
The information in this post comes from telephone interviews with Quentin Claunch, Sylvester Oliver, Dave Evans and Eliott Clark at Goldwax in Nashville. Additionally, information about the BBC radio programs and subsequent releases came from Alan Balfour (who contacted Charlie Gillett) and Chris Smith, and about the AIM release is from blues-list's very own Vincent.
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Post by AlanB on Jan 28, 2016 6:53:33 GMT
Now for something totally different. In March 1976 I was sent by Shout magazine a 7inch, four track EP in a plain sleeve for review. Twenty years later an LP of the same name was released on Pete Welding's Testament label (LP5025) which can be "Googled". Here follows both sides of the EP, the press release accompanying it plus my extremely short, toe curling review which can be read below. JOHNNY TURNER & BLUES WITH A FEELING Jake Leg Records JL-100 (7inch 331/3)
Can't Hold Out Much Longer; Checkin On My Baby/Tomorrow Night/Don't Start Me Talkin' (Available from Zaven Jambazian, 815 E. Villa Ave., Pasadena, Ca 91101, USA. Price $3.00)A rather strange record, this, for though the headliner is guitarist Johnny Turner, it's harp player Zaven Jambazian who cones away with the honours. Hardly surprising since all four numbers are associated with harmonica bluesmen, Turner's band taking their name from a Little Walter song. The recording, made during one of their 'Frisco club dates, has a 'polite' aura about it, lacking the raunchy attack I'd expect from a band performing these songs in club conditions. This may just be a reflection of the type of club since, despite the restrained approach, they are obviously first-rate musicians playing blues with a feeling (ouch) and sincerity. By no means an essential record but, with the lack of new blues talent, a welcome one none the less. More please. Alan Balfour (Shout 110, Sept/Oct/Nov1976 page 21)
Might have to click images to zoom.
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Post by Michael Messer on Jan 28, 2016 8:44:46 GMT
The best thing about Thursday mornings is opening up the forum and reading Alan's latest 'Throwback Thursday' post!
I really ought to start doing these too.
Thanks Alan
Shine On Michael
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Post by kiwi on Jan 28, 2016 10:10:25 GMT
Me too, although for me throwback Friday. Enjoy the postings as while we had a miniature blues thing going down here with a few local bands nothing as big as over there. And we certainly never had tours of any the traditional blues performers until the late 70s.
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Post by AlanB on Jan 28, 2016 13:18:10 GMT
Originally I was going to post the following but thought it somewhat indulgent, especially in light of the many up-to date BBB topics discussed elsewhere here.
Note: The first published 'review feature' by Alan Balfour for Soul: The Magazine for the R&B Collector, issue 3, April 1966, p 12-13, who still owns all the discs cited.
BARBECUE BOB - A KING OF THE 12 STRING
A few months ago an EP appeared on the Swedish Blues Society label by Barbecue Bob, a name which once was widely known and respected in the twenties but who has been ignored generally speaking by the vast majority of pre-war blues re-issues. Almost nothing is known about Robert 'Barbecue Bob' Hicks save that the sixty one sides he recorded for Columbia offer some of the richest Georgia singing and above all some of the finest bottle-neck guitar playing put on wax in the pre-war period, Let's take a look at his few re-issued sides.
When Fontana issued their 'Nothin' But The Blues' LP (only six blues tracks on this disc, the other side featured jazz bands) they released one of Bob's finest tracks. The poignancy of this song 'Motherless Chile Blues' is beautifully brought out by Bob's high' wavering voice while his bottle scraping agonisingly at the strings of his guitar adds a wonderfully tense feel to this great side.
Paul Oliver's fine anthology to the classic 'Blues Fell This Morning' book on Philips BBL 7369 offers another vastly important, musically and socially, side in 'Chocolate To The Bone' which was one of Bob's biggest hits and which was of course an 'answer' record to Lillian Glinn's 'Brownskin Blues'. He makes a reference to Lillian's recording. This has long been a favourite of mine. the tune stemming back from the earliest origins. If you happen to come across this LP which is unfortunately rather scarce owing to its removal from the catalogues for over five years.
The Piedmont LP 13159 'Kings Of The Twelve String' (a wonderful LP featuring among others, 'Blind Willie McTell and Charlie Lincoln) has two more choice items 'Barbecue Blues' his first record made on 25th March, 1927 in Atlanta and 'How Long Pretty Mama' which he recorded eight months later, four days before he was to cut the first two of his classic sides with Charlie Hicks.
The one re-issue devoted entirely to Barbecue Bob on SBS presents us with some material other than strictly blues. Such songs as 'The Spider And The Fly' and 'Hurry And Bring It Home' are marvellous examples of an artist who recorded every type of number from medicine show songs to gospel numbers, from sexual blues to traditional folk songs. The other tracks on this EP, 'Blind Pig Blues' (using a tune that crops up many times in his sixty one sides) and 'Sure Got Hard Times Now' (made during the beginnings of the depression) that was to mark the end of his brief recording career, are equally fine.
Lastly mention should be made about the great accompaniments for Nellie Florence's 'Jacksonville Blues' and 'Midnight Weeping Blues' on Origin's 'The Country Girls' LP.
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Post by AlanB on Feb 4, 2016 7:17:09 GMT
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Post by AlanB on Feb 25, 2016 6:47:22 GMT
Came across this. Don't know if Johnny Guitar Watson floats any boats but I came across the DJM "press pack" that accompanied his European Tour of 1976. Within the pack there was also his latest DJM 45 but, search as I might, seems to be misfiled/AWOL. (click on image to zoom)
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