Big Road Blues

Junior Parker was an extraordinary blues singer and harmonica player who laid down some superb material over the course of a twenty year career (1952-1971) before his life was cut short just prior to his fortieth birthday. It’s inexplicable, then, why he has such a low profile among blues aficionados. He hit the charts a fair bit through the 1960’s for Duke, retained a strong following among the black club audience but failed to break through to a wider audience. As such he was virtually ignored by the new white blues audience of the 1960’s. If Parker is mentioned at all these days it’s usually in association with his 1953 number “Mystery Train” which was picked up by Elvis.

Parker died in November 1971 during an operation for a brain tumor. Before he passed he sailed into the 1970’s in promising fashion cutting a pair of terrific albums; You Don’t Have To Be Black To Love The Blues circa 1970/1971 for Groove Merchant and I Tell Stories Sad And True for United Artists which was released in 1972. Parker’s singing on these albums, to quote critic Tony Russell, “could be used as a manual of blues singing;” his singing is a model of control and phrasing, almost delicate with it’s high, fluttering range, with every line placed perfectly for maximum effect. His harmonica playing is quite and melodic, parceled out in small but effective doses.

It sounds old fashioned, maybe even trite, but Parker really knew how to put across a song. He was a marvelous interpretor, a skill ably demonstrated on You Don’t Have To Be Black To Love The Blues a collection of mostly standards and revivals of his old numbers. The gorgeous “Five Long Years” sets the tone with his languid, delicate phrasing matched by a stripped down, very mellow backing group. Parker takes his time on exquisite versions of “That’s Alright”, “Tin Pan Alley”, “Sweet Home Chicago” and the fluttering vocal of “Man Or Mouse” a revival of a 1967 chart hit for Duke. “Way Back Home” is a funky, infectious soul/jazz instrumental sporting some fine, nuanced harmonica playing from Parker. Neither the album or the recent Blues Discography has a listing for the band but I was told that it was The Crusaders. This jibes with the overall sound, the fact that the song “Way Back Home” was written by member Wilton Felder and that The Crusaders also backed B.B. King during this period.

The date on I Tell Stories Sad And True is 1972 which means this must have came out posthumously and marks this as Parker’s last date. As such it makes one acutely aware of what a loss Parker’s untimely passing really was. Parker’s singing is every bit as good as the previous album as he once again puts his deeply personal stamp on a set of blues standards and stretches out quite a bit more more on harmonica which is certainly welcome. He’s backed by crack band including Wayne Bennett on guitar, Phil Upchurch on bass and a horn section that includes James G. Barge and Willie Henderson. The highlight is easily the nearly eight minute cover of Joe Hinton’s “Funny How Time Slips Away.” Parker delivers this as a hip, spoken rap, intermittently singing the song’s poignant lyrics in a hushed, gorgeous delivery. As the album opener it nearly overshadows the rest of this fine album. Parker puts across everything else in classy, intimate fashion including the Percy Mayfield numbers “Stranger In My Home Town”, “My Jug And I” plus standards like “Going Down Slow” and “The Things I Used To Do.”

As befitting his undervalued status, Parker’s recorded output seems to slip in and out of print. You Don’t Have To Be Black To Love The Blues seems to have been recently reissued on CD and can also be found in it’s entirety on Way Back Home: The Goove Merchant Years. I Tell Stories Sad And True has not been issued on CD as far as I know.

Show Notes:

From 1949 through 1971, Prestige Records, owned and run by Bob Weinstock, was among the most famous and successful of the independent jazz labels. Perhaps only Blue Note, which had its reign during roughly the same period, provided Prestige with significant competition. By the late 50’s the company was looking to branch out and new categories were created within the Prestige catalog. There was the Folklore series, there was Moodsville, Swingsville and then there was Bluesville. The birth of Bluesville came at a time when when a young white audience turned their attention away from folk music to acoustic blues.

An important factor was the release in 1959 of Samuel Charter’s ground breaking book The Country Blues. In 1961 Charter’s hooked up with the label and played a important role getting talent for the label and did much of the producing. In addition to Charters there were a number of others whose dedication helped the label grow including Mack McCormick of Houston who provided a slew of Lightnin’ Hopkins records,Chris Strachwitz who would form Arhoolie Records, Art Rosenbaum who recorded Indianapolis artists Scrapper Blackwell, Shirley Griffith and J.T. Adams and Chris Albertson who was instrumental in getting Lonnie Johnson back in the studio.

Bluesville’s roster grew quickly including artists such as Reverend Gary Davis, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Roosevelt Sykes, Big Joe Williams, Jimmy Witherspoon and Memphis Slim among numerous others. A number of older artists such as Tampa Red and particularly Lonnie Johnson found a new home at Bluesville in which to revitalize their careers. In addition the label also caught some important artists on record for the first time or who recorded very little including Pink Anderson (except for two sides cut in the 20’s), Baby Tate, Wade Walton and Doug Quattlebaum to name a few. The Bluesville label tended to take a mainly folkloric approach to blues recording primarily acoustic artists. In line with this the label also cut records by folk singers such as Tracy Nelson, Dave Van Ronk, Geoff Muldaur and Tom Rush among others. There were some notable exceptions including LP’s by urban artists such as Otis Spann, Billy Boy Arnold and Homesick James.

The Bluesville series produced many releases in a short amount of time. Lightnin’ Hopkins was the label’s best selling artists but many of the lesser known artists sold only a couple of hundred copies. Because of this many of these original records are extremely rare and go for high fees on the collectibles market. Luckily Fantasy records now owns the Prestige catalog and has been reissuing many treasures from the vaults.

Samuel Charters was quoted as saying that the “Prestige/Bluesville catalog was one of the last great sweeps of the blues as social document and as the years pass this becomes increasingly meaningful as a measure of Bluesville’s achievement.” Listening to The Bluesville Years (an ongoing reissue series now at 12 volumes) make these words resonate all the more strongly. The recordings on the Bluesville label provide a vivid and entertaining snapshot of the 1960’s blues scene.

Show Notes:

For this week’s show an eclectic, wide ranging mix of blues spanning 1927 to 1977. We dust off a bunch of vinyl including two cuts from the excellent “Blues South Side Chicago”, a terrific set of Chicago blues recorded by Willie Dixon in 1964. Someone really should issue this on CD. Speaking of Chicago we feature a cut by the under recorded Kansas City Red. “K.C. Red’s Back In Town” comes from the fine LP “Bring Me Another Half-A-Pint” on the Barrelhouse label. Owned by George Paulus, the label issued some really good records throughout the 1970’s including ones by Big John Wrencher, Joe Carter, Easy Baby and others. Some of these have been reissued on the Japanese P-Vine label while others, including “Bring Me Another Half-A-Pint”, remain vinyl only. As for Kansas City Red he was a superb drummer who’s recorded legacy is slim with only a handful of sessions for Barrelhouse, JSP and Earwig. Also from Chicago a cut by the great Otis Spann from the Spivey LP “The Everlasting Blues vs. Otis Spann” recorded at the Cafe Au Go Go in NYC. Admittedly this isn’t one of Spann’s best recordings but it’s an interesting one and also features the great Johnny Young and Luther Johnson. The other guitarist is 21 year old Peter Malick who had this to say about the session: “Half way through the session, Victoria [Spivey] tripped over Luther’s guitar cord, and broke it. There was no other cord in the studio and therefore Luther is playing guitar on only half the LP. ” Spann also cut another Spivey LP called “Up in the Queen’s Pad” (recorded at Spivey’s apratment) that I have yet to hear and seems to be pretty hard to track down.

Moving over to the West Coast we spotlight a track off “Oakland Blues” on the World Pacific label. This is another great out of print record featuring excellent tracks by L.C. Robinson, Lafayette Thomas and Dave Alexander. The Alexander track we play is “Love Is Just For Fools” featuring George “Harmonica” Smith and Houston Twister (Albert Collins). World Pacific (originally Pacific Jazz) was mainly a jazz label although they issued some good blues records notably by Big Joe Williams (“Hand Me Down My Old Walking Stick”), George Smith (“Blues With A Feeling: A Tribute To Little Walter”), Luke ‘Long Gone’ Miles (“Country Born”) and “Down South Summit Meeting” by Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Big Joe Williams among others.

As always there’s a good dose of vintage blues including some fine piano players. I’m a huge piano blues fan but I seem to be in the minority as the guitar players get all the attention. Of the great boogie-woogie players Jimmy Yancey may be my favorite. He could could play the uptempo stuff as good as anybody but he also had a more thoughtful, introspective side and put so much feeling into his playing as he shows on “Yancey’s Bugle Call.” In addition we spotlight cuts by Leroy Carr, Blind John Davis and the marvelous Sparks Brothers. Aaron “Pinetop” Sparks mostly handled the piano chores while brother Milton sang. They cut 15 sides between 1933-35 including the first versions of “Everyday I Have The Blues” and “61 Highway.” They may have cut more sides but were obviously quite busy dodging the law; Milton was arrested some 50 times while Aaron only 18 times.

The guitar players get their due including Sylvester Weaver and Walter Beasley’s with their gorgeous instrumental version of “St. Louis Blues.” Weaver was a Louisville artist who made the first solo recordings of blues guitar playing way back in 1923. Nothing is known about Bobby Grant who cut one 78 in in 1927. “Nappy Head Blues” is a beautiful, haunting slide number with full bodied singing. We also hear the great bottleneck guitarist on Kokomo Arnold on his “Down And Out Blues” and prominently backing the fine St. Louis Singer Alice Moore on the risqué “Grass Cutter Blues.” Moore was a very good nasal voiced singer who cut some three dozen sides but is little remembered today.

Country blues never goes out of style as Joe Calicott and Houston Stackhouse prove on some superb 1967 sides. These are field recordings by George Mitchell who also recorded R.L. Burnside, Robert Nighthawk, Johnny Woods and Fred McDowell during the same period. Nighthawk’s is playing bass behind Stackhouse due to declining health and these would be his last sides. The music harks back to Nighthawk and Stackhouse’s early delta days. Tommy Johnson’s influence looms large with five of his songs being covered at this session. In a way Nighthawk’s life had come full circle; he was once again playing with Stackhouse who taught how to play guitar, Stackhouse in turn learned directly from Tommy Johnson and here were the two old friends performing the songs of Johnson together one final time. Nghthawk died less than two months after these recordings on Nov. 5 1967 of congestive heart failure at the Helena hospital

Charlie McCoy’s primary output in Chicago was that of a very busy session musician working with the top blues artists of the day. Among those he backed include: Big Bill Broonzy, Bumble Bee Slim, Jimmie Gordon, Frankie Jaxon, Curtis Jones, Memphis Minnie, Monkey Joe, Johnnie Temple, Casey Bill Weldon, Peetie Wheatstraw, Sonny Boy Williamson, Harlem Hamfats and many others. I’m not going to go through all of these sessions but it’s worth spotlighting a few notable ones. Pianist Curtis Jones was well into a successful career when he teamed up with McCoy on sessions in May and June 1938; McCoy’s mandolin is hard to hear on a remake of Jones’ hit “Lonesome Bedroom Blues No. 2” but heard in fine fashion on “Palace Blues” and the hokum feel of “Who You’re Hunchin’.” Also in June 1938 he played mandolin on on an eight song session with former sister-in-law Memphis Minnie; His mandolin is featured prominently on the pop number “As Long As I Can See You Smile”, “I’ve Been Treated Wrong”, “Keep On Eating” and “I’d Rather See Him Dead.” Monkey Joe (Jesse Coleman) was a Jackson pianist/vocalist who McCoy likely knew prior to these recordings and in fact his pal Walter Vincson plays guitar on Monkey Joe’s first session. McCoy plays guitar and mandolin on his second session from 1938; Joe is an expressive, if not overly original singer and pianist, who benefits from McCoy’s talents particularly on “Some Sweet Day” where he steals the show with some dazzling mandolin work and also shines on “O.K. With Me Baby” and the raucous “Hair Parted In The Middle.” McCoy played on a number of sides between 1935-1937 with another Jackson artist, Johnnie Temple, who moved to Chicago around the same time as McCoy. McCoy plays second guitar behind Temple much in the way he accompanied Tommy Johnson. The two make a good team on numbers like “Lead Pencil Blues (It Just Won’t Write)”, “Louise Louise Blues” and “Snapping Cat.” McCoy shows up on guitar playing on a 1941 session for Sonny Boy Williamson; McCoy is rather subdued on these sides but contributes some imaginative playing to “Black Panther Blues” and “I Have Got To Go.”

Between 1936-1939 McCoy recorded extensively with the Harlem Hamfats appearing on all their records sans the very last session in September 1939. Tony Russell describes the band this way: “The Hamfats can be described as the first group to promote a successful synthesis of jazz and urban blues – if ‘jazz’ is shorthand for the presence of trumpet and clarinet as lead voices, and ‘urban blues’ for the voice/piano/guitar blend pioneered by Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell. Herb Moran’s trumpet is the dominant horn, and the effect is of a youngish Louis Armstrong, flanked, in Odell Rand, by a vaudeville clarinetist of more than average ability, fronting a conventional Chicago blues band the 30’s. The main singer – for the first year of the band’s life virtually the only singer – is the gravelly voiced Joe McCoy.” The band also moonlighted as the Palooka Washboard Band as well as backing Johnnie Temple and Frankie Jaxon. McCoy plays primarily mandolin and is featured prominently on numerous tracks: the bouncy hit “Oh! Red”, “What You Gonna Do?”, “Move Your Hand”, “Sales Tax On It (But It’s the Same Thing)”, “Southern Blues”, “Bad Luck Man”, “My Daddy Was a Lovin’ Man”, “Growling Dog”, “Keep It Swinging Round and Round”, “I Love That”, “What’s On Your Mind?” and “Little Girl” among others.

Charlie McCoy was an exceptionally versatile musician whether playing mandolin, guitar or banjo and sounded at home performing blues, hokum, swing, in a string band setting or just about any other style you could throw at him. His sides under his own name prove he could hold his own as a lead artist but he seemed most at home enhancing other artists’ records – in that he was the perfect session musician making every record he appears on sound that much better. The war cut short McCoy’s career, and he made no more recordings after 1942, dying in Chicago on July 26, 1950. A good chunk of McCoy’s recordings can be found on the following Document CD’s: Charlie McCoy (1928-1932), Mississippi String Band & Associates (1928-1931), The McCoy Brothers – Vol. 1 (1934-1936) and The McCoy Brothers – Vol. 2 (1936-1944).

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