Big Road Blues

Show Notes:

Today’s program spotlights the tireless contributions of record producer, songwriter, label owner and all around hustler Bob Geddins. Modern Records co-owner Joe Bihari recalled Geddins this way: “Geddins had his own sound. He was a very nice person, he was black, and easy to deal with. A hustler? Well, you’ve got to do something, eh? I think the artists respected Geddins very much. It was like a family up there, yes.” Geddins was the dominant figure in Bay Area blues scene from the mid-1940′s to the mid-1960′s and made hundreds of records over the years on small labels he ran like Down Town, Big Town, Irma, Plaid, Art Tone, Cavatone, and Gedison’s and leased material to other companies bigger companies like Modern and Aladdin. He was also the first to set up a pressing plant in the Bay area. He released records by Lowell Fulson, Jimmy McCracklin, Johnny Fuller, Roy Hawkins, Jimmy Wilson among many others and was involved in the careers of many of these artists. Geddins died in 1991 at age 78.

It’s a bit difficult to get a handle on the West Coast sound, which is not as identifiable as say Chicago Blues but encompasses several different interlocking strands. As Mike Rowe wrote: “Unlike New York and Chicago there had been no blues or any kind of recording industry pre-war …The music as well as the industry was starting from scratch. …It was very often of Do-It yourself triumphing over the most adverse conditions.” The Black population swelled in the 1940’s, due to large manpower needs to work in the U.S. defense industry during World War II. These new arrivals needed entertainment, of course, and the local jazz and blues club scene heated up quickly. Geddins’ brand of blues was decidedly downhome as he told Lee Hildebrand in a 1980 interview: “I make everything I record as sad as possible. …I want black folks to feel the troubles of old times. All the people that have had similar problems are the ones that’s gonna buy those records. A lot of people make like they don’t like the blues but sneak off and play them.”

Oakland became a blues mecca during the 1940s. The city’s shipbuilding industry boomed in support of World War II, and the consequent profusion of manufacturing jobs and military bases brought a huge influx of African Americans to the Bay Area. Many settled near the shipyards in West Oakland, and a vibrant entertainment district sprang up on Seventh Street, where the blocks were crowded with pool halls, card rooms, and as many as 40 blues clubs, including the Lincoln Theater, Esther’s Orbit Room, and Slim Jenkins’ Place.

Discharged from the Navy in 1945, Fulson found his way to to Oakland, California, where he played small nightclubs. In 1946, he formed a group with pianist Eldridge McCarthy and recorded on Bob Geddins’s Big Town with Geddins leasing his recordings to Jack Lauderdale’s Los Angeles-based Down Beat and Swing Time labels. As Geddins recalled in the book Honkers and Shouters, “Lowell Fulson was the first great bluesman I put on wax …. [I] Bought him an electric guitar and amplifier–cost a hundred and eighty dollars. And he did a lot of rehearsing in the Seventh Street Music Shop.”

Along with Lowell Fulson, who left the Bay Area shortly after he became successful, McCracklin was the biggest name to ever emerge from the Oakland blues scene. He made his first record, “Miss Mattie Left Me,” for the Globe label in Los Angeles in 1945. Two years later in Oakland, he began a relationship with record producer Bob Geddins that would last on and off over the next two decades.

Jimmy Wilson scored a huge hit in California with his 1953 number “Tin Pan Alley” written by Bob Geddins. He was never able to match the record’s success but issued fine sides between 1948 and 1961 on labels such as Aladdin, Cava-Tone, Big Town, 7-11, Rhythm, Chart, Irma, Goldband and finally Duke. He died in 1965 at the age of 42.

Accompanying himself on both guitar and rack harmonica Bonner sung highly personal tales typified in songs like “Life Gave Me A Dirty Deal” and “Struggle Here In Houston.” He won a talent contest in 1947 in Houston that led to a radio spot. He cut his first sides for Bob Geddins’ Irma label in 1957 and next for *Goldband in 1960. Full length albums came about do to the interest of Mike Leadbitter, co-editor of Blues Unlimited, who recorded Bonner in 1967, issuing his full length debut on Flyright. He cut his best work between 1968-69 for Arhoolie Records. A few European tours ensued but by the 70’s he was working outside of music. He died of cirrhosis of the liver in 1978.

Johnny Fuller was a West Coast bluesman who left behind a batch of 1950′s recordings. He was equally at home with low down blues, gospel, R&B, and rock & roll. Making the Bay Area his home throughout his career, Fuller turned in classic sides for Heritage, Aladdin, Specialty, Flair, Checker, and Hollywood; all but one of them West Coast-based concerns. His two biggest hits, “All Night Long” and the original version of “The Haunted House,” improbably found him in the late ’50s on rock & roll package shows, touring with the likes of Paul Anka and Frankie Avalon! By and large retiring from the music scene in the ’60s (with the exception of one excellent album in 1974), Fuller worked as a garage mechanic until his passing in 1985.

Geddins had discovered Roy Hawkins playing in a club in Oakland in 1948. Hawkins and his backing group the Four Jacks were very popular and were doing sell-out business at several Bay area clubs at that time. Geddins rushed Hawkins and his band into the studio to cut some sides to capitalise on their current popularity and released “They Raided The Joint” on Geddins’ Cava-Tone label. After recording some more sides with Hawkins, Geddins sold “It’s Too Late To Change” and “Strange Land” to Modern and Jules Bihari then brought Hawkins and his band to LA to record. Starting in October 1949 through 1954/55 Hawkins’ records were released on Modern. In 1958 Hawkins cut a four-song session for Geddins’ Rhythm label.

James Reed was an exceptional blues singer who cut only ten sides at sessions in 1954, which were issued on Flair, Rhythm, Money and Big Town.

Little Caesar was fine but forgotten vocalist who waxed a couple of dozen sides in the 1950’s including a four-song session for Geddins’ Big Town label.

Willie B. Huff Cut was a terrific downhome blues singer who cut  two sides in 1953 for Big Town and two in 1954 for Rhythm. She turned up at the 1977 San Francisco blues festival before drifting back into obscurity.

As winter sets in here in the Northeast we turn our attention to sunny California circa the late 1940′s and 1950′s and spotlight two fascinating collections of West Coast Blues: The Downhome Blues Session Vol. 5: Back In the Alley 1949-1954 on Ace and Bob Geddins’ Big Town Records Story on Acrobat. These anthologies spotlight the tireless contributions of record producer, songwriter, label owner and all around hustler Bob Geddins. Modern Records co-owner Joe Bihari recalled Geddins this way: “Geddins had his own sound. He was a very nice person, he was black, and easy to deal with. A hustler? Well, you’ve got to do something, eh? I think the artists respected Geddins very much. It was like a family up there, yes.” Geddins was the dominant figure in Bay Area blues scene from the mid-1940′s to the mid-1960′s and was involved in a series of labels including Big Town, Down Town, Cava-Tone, Rhythm, Irma, Art-Tone and others. Many of his records were leased to bigger labels such as Modern. He was also the first to set up a pressing plant in the Bay area. He released records by Lowell Fulson, Jimmy McCracklin, Johnny Fuller, Roy Hawkins, Jimmy Wilson among many others and was involved in the careers of many of these artists.

It’s a bit difficult to get a handle on the West Coast sound which is not as identifiable as say Chicago Blues but encompasses several different interlocking strands. As Mike Rowe wrote: “Unlike New York and Chicago there had been no blues or any kind of recording industry pre-war …The music as well as the industry was starting from scratch. …It was very often of Do-It yourself triumphing over the most adverse conditions.” The Black population swelled in the 1940′s, due to large manpower needs to work in the U.S. defense industry during World War II. These new arrivals needed entertainment, of course, and the local jazz and blues club scene heated up quickly. More piano based and jazz influenced than anything else, West Coast Blues is really California blues even if most of the main practitioners actually hailed from Texas. One strain of blues that rose to prominence was a moody, after hours brand of piano blues popularized by the inimitable Charles Brown who himself was influenced by Nat King Cole. Brown’s influence was profound, setting the stage for fellow pianists like Amos Milburn, Floyd Dixon, Little Willie Littlefield, Ivory Joe Hunter, Cecil Gant and Roy Hawkins. T-Bone Walker’s influence was to guitar as Brown was to piano. Much of T-Bone’s material had an after hours, jazzy jump blues feel, an influence that would characterize T-Bone disciples like Pee Wee Cratyon, Lafayette Thomas, Gatemouth Brown, Goree Carter, Pete “Guitar” Lewis, Ulysses James and others. There was also a more swinging, jazzy jump blues as performed by artists like Roy Milton, Joe and Jimmy Liggins, Johnny Otis and others.

Geddins’ brand of blues was decidedly downhome as he told Lee Hildebrand in a 1980 interview: “I make everything I record as sad as possible. …I want black folks to feel the troubles of old times. All the people that have had similar problems are the ones that’s gonna buy those records. A lot of people make like they don’t like the blues but sneak off and play them.” There was certainly a market for downhome blues as sales of Lightnin’ Hopkins, Smokey Hogg and John Lee Hooker proved. Modern hooked up with Geddins in 1949 and the fruits of that relationship can be found on The Downhome Blues Session Vol. 5: Back In the Alley 1949-1954. This is the fifth volume of Ace’s superb Modern Downhome Blues Sessions, the first four dealing with recordings in the south. The first major reissue of this material was in 1969 and 1970, issued as the Anthology Of The Blues 12-volume LP series on Kent. Ace is very much geared to the collector and they have upped the ante from the original LP’s with excellent remastering, uncovering unissued sides, bringing to light new information about artists and providing meticulous notes.

The latest collection is no exception, boasting exhaustive but fascinating notes from Dave Sax and several unissued alternate takes among the 26 tracks. A doomy brand of blues pervades this collection like the fog that obscures the rain slicked streets and neon signs in those classic film noirs of the 1940′s (yes, I’ve been watching way too many old movies!). Geddins discovery James Reed was an exceptional vocalist delivering downtrodden tales with terrific, minimalist accompaniment on “This Is The End”, “Dr Brown”, “My Love Is Real” and “My Momma Told Me” (the latter two featuring the always outstanding guitar of Lafayette Thomas). Great stuff but why leave out “Roughest Place In Town (Tin Pan Alley)?” The seven sides by Johnny Fuller have a very similar feel as Fuller turns in smoldering performances including the wonderful “Back Home” where he speaks to his his fellow transplanted southerners: “As I sit here, in alone/Yes my mind wonders back, to my home in a little country shack/If you’s born in Texas, Mississippi, New Orleans you can understand just what I mean.” Fuller’s rich, deliberate vocals are equally fine on “Hard Times, “Prowling Blues” and the exceptional “It’s Your Life” one of many variations on the “Tin Pan Alley” theme which Fuller also cut as  “Roughest Place In Town” at another session. No one delivered gloomy blues as magnificently as pianist Roy Hawkins as he demonstrates on “Just A Poor Boy” and “You Had A Good Man” backed by T-Bone influenced guitarist Chuck Norris and the atmospheric tenor of Lorenzo “Buddy” Floyd. Hawkins’ two collections on Ace come highly recommended. By the late 1940′s Jimmy McCracklin was leading a tough little blues combo called the Blues Blasters that excelled in lowdown blues and the more rocking variety. The five cuts here include three unreleased alternate takes. Featuring the great guitarists Robert Kelton and Lafayette Thomas, The Blues Blasters cook on the hilariously shuffling “Couldn’t Be A Dream” that involves “a funny man wearing ladies clothes” and copious amounts of Old Taylor, the blistering “Josephine”  and “I’ll Get A Break Someday” with Robert Kelton really taking flight and Kelton and Thomas together on the down-in-the-alley “I Think My Time Is Here.” Much research has gone into the early McCracklin sides the results of which can be found on the Ace website (PDF). Rounding the set are a pair of fine country blues performances from Lowell Fulson and the excellent harmonica blower and singer Walter Robertson’s two issued sides.

Bob Geddins’ Big Town Records Story is a more expansive look at Geddins’ activities with 84 tracks spread over three CD’s and covering blues, vocal groups and a good deal of gospel. Big Town operated from 1945 to 1955, becoming a subsidiary of 4 Star Records in 1953 and also reissued Swing Time Recordings by Lowell Fulson. An in depth look at the label and Geddins is provided by Opal Louis Nations who provides the thick booklet that accompanies the set. Collectors should take not that this set is does not include all the Big Town recordings and a complete discography of the label is difficult due to Geddins’ lax record keeping. Nearly half of the recordings are gospel and while our focus here is blues, i will say that there are some exceptional sides by the Gospel Consolators, the earliest sides by the Pilgrim Travelers, Rising Star Gospel Singers which featured Jimmy Wilson, Southern Travelers and Tommy Jenkins. The aforementioned Jimmy Wilson provides some of the collection’s finest moments including his masterpiece, “Tin Pan Alley.” Written by Geddins (based on a Curtis Jones number) the song is a mesmerizing, dirge like ghetto tale featuring Wilson’s yearning vocals, Que Martyn’s mournful tenor and Lafayette Thomas’ distorted guitar. Wilson never had a hit of equal measure although he cut some masterful ominous blues including the stunning “A Woman Is To Blame” and “Blues At Sundown” from the same session and “I Found Out” and “Trouble In My Home”, all benefiting from the outstanding Lafayette Thomas. These songs alone should be enough to cement Wilson’s reputation as one of the era’s great blues vocalists. He also sounded comfortable on uptempo fare including a reworking of “Oh Red” (Thomas again!) and the swinging “Jumpin’ From Six To Six.” Sadly Wilson succumbed to alcoholism in 1965 at the age of 42. Unfortunately there’s only one Wilson collection on the market, Jumpin’ From Six To Six, which is badly remastered. Little Caesar was another fine but forgotten vocalist who waxed a couple of dozen sides in the 1950′s including a four song session for Big Town which is included here. Little Caesar was a wonderful smooth voiced crooner and witty lyricist who sounds quite a bit like Jimmy Witherspoon. “Big Eyes” is the standout with seriously cynical lyrics: “You got big eyes for me baby/But big eyes won’t pay my rent/If big eyes don’t keep me broke/Big eyes will keep me badly bent/Get a bankroll big as your eyes/And then call me on the telephone.” The remaining three numbers are terrific and it’s a shame there’s not collection of his material available. After listening to these I’ll have to dig out the LP collection I have of him, Lying Woman… Goodbye Baby on the defunct but fondly remembered Route 66 label. Speaking of fine vocalists there’s a pair of superb sides by King Solomon including the moody, harmony laden “Mean Train” and two of the four issued sides by the excellent Willie B. Huff who comes across as a female version of Lightnin’ Hopkins, even covering his “Hello Central” as “Operator 209.” Perhaps the best known artist is Joe Hill Louis who’s two sides for Big Town are included; “Bad Woman Blues” is an exceedingly tough downhome blues while “Hydromatic Woman” is fine but pales in comparison to the version he cut the year before at Sun with Walter Horton.

Johnny Fuller – Its Your Life (MP3)

James Reed – Dr Brown (MP3)

Roy Hawkins – You Had A Good Man (MP3)

Jimmy Wilson- Blues At Sundown (MP3)

Little Caesar – Big Eyes (MP3)

Willie B. Huff – I Love You Baby (MP3)