Billy Ward and the Dominos

The great thing about "the internets" is how you can think of something, then something else, then do a little research, and within minutes. come up with a fully-formed blog out of a half-baked idea. I've got a gig coming up with my work band "The DOLI Llamas." We're playing a couple of Drifters tunes that I'm learning the bass parts for. I got to thinking...Drifters...Clyde McPhatter...hmm, where did he come from, where did he get his start? A few clicks and we have Billy Ward, who died on this date in 2002. He founded the doo wop group "Billy Ward and the Dominos" in 1951, where Clyde McPhatter (and later Jackie Wilson) got their start. The group toured widely, building up a reputation as one of the top R&B acts of the era, and an audience which crossed racial divides. However, Ward's strict disciplinarian approach, and failure to recompense the singers, caused internal problems. The name "The Dominoes" was owned by Ward and manager Rose Marks, who had the power to hire and fire, and to pay the singers a salary. Clyde McPhatter was being paid barely enough to live on, and often found himself billed as "Clyde Ward" to fool fans into thinking he was Billy Ward's brother. McPhatter later left to form The Drifters, and the rest is doo-wop history. Here the Dominos perform "These Foolish Things" in 1953. I hope you like the still of the group, because you're going to be staring at it for 3:15. Thanks to www.garylessard.com and www.wikipedia.com for the trivia, and keep on rockin'!

Who are you?

On this date in 1970, the Who recorded their legendary "Live at Leeds" album, destined to become one (if not the one) of the best live albums ever. Here's a BBC TV special on the subject, hosted by Yes's Rick Wakeman. Watch it and you will find out that, if it hadn't been for a recording mixup, the album would have been called "Live at Howell" (the next date in the tour - doesn't roll off the tongue, does it?). Thanks to www.garylessard.com for the trivia, and keep on rockin'!

Long Distance Information

... get me Memphis, Tennessee...this week in rock history in 1972, John and Yoko hosted the Mike Douglas show for a week...one of their featured guests was Chuck Berry, who was still playing the guitar like "a ringin' a bell." Here John joins Chuck and his latest pickup band on "Memphis"...notice the happy hippies in the background, grinnin' like idiots - they knew they were in the presence of greatness! Thanks to garylessard.com for the trivia, and keep on rockin!

"That's What I Want..."

Born today in 1941: Barrett Strong, a Motown soul singer who hit #1 on the charts with his self-penned "Money (That's What I Want)" in 1960. Never a strong singer or vocal talent, he continued with Motown as a staff lyracist, teaming with producer Norman Whitfield. Together, Strong and Whitfield wrote some of the most successful and critically acclaimed soul songs ever to be released by Motown, including "I Heard It Through the Grapevine"by both Marvin Gaye and Gladys Knight & the Pips, "War" by Edwin Starr, "Smiling Faces Sometimes" by The Undisputed Truth, and the long line of "psychedelic soul" records by The Temptations including "Cloud Nine", "I Can't Get Next to You", "Psychedelic Shack", "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)", and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone", amongst others. Strong received a Grammy Award for Best R&B Song in 1973 for co-writing "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone".

So let's celebrate "Money" and Strong's life today, and watch this version by John Lennon from the Peace Festival in Toronto in 1969. Check out Clapton's blistering solo on this song - just wish he'd had time to stretch out and they'd given him a closeup and more camera time! Also in the band: Klaus Voorman on bass and Alan White on drums. Oh, and by the way - that's Yoko in the bag... Thanks as always to www.garylessard.com and www.wikipedia.com for the trivia, and keep on rockin!

"We Gotta Go..."

#6 in the charts on this day in 1964 was "Louie Louie." Now what were the real lyrics to this song? (see below - they just sounded "dirty") Here are the Kingsmen performing the song in 1965...And why don't bands still do those unison dance steps... I miss those days!

The venerable Paul Revere and the Raiders, who were also from Portland, where the Kingsmen got their start, also had a regional hit with "Louie Louie". Here's their effort. The Kingsmen beat them in the race to get the song on the charts, but was their version better? You decide...

"13th Floor Elevators"

The 13th Floor Elevators – as Dave Barry would say, this would be a great name for a rock band. It is, and it was…A Texan by the name of Roger Kynard Erickson (better known as “Roky,” pronounced “Rocky”) started a band by that name in 1965. He was known as a pioneer of the psychedelic rock genre. I understand that Janis Joplin very nearly joined this band (and what a different path her career would have taken then, eh?), but was convinced by a friend to move to San Francisco to find fame and fortune there instead. Anyway, the Elevators had one charting hit “You’re Gonna Miss Me,” in 1966. A stinging post-romantic breakup song, the single remains probably Erickson's best-known work, characterized by his primal vocal wailing and feral harmonica work. The band put out four albums and fizzled by 1968, when Erickson started speaking nonsense while playing a gig. He was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and sent to a Houston psychiatric hospital, where he involuntarily received electroconvulsive therapy. Well, that was it; song over for Roky, at least at that time. While he has continued to attempt to play music and write songs since that time, he has suffered from mental illness all of his life (in 1982, Erickson asserted that a Martian had inhabited his body) and only recently has been able to wean himself off his medication, play at gigs again, obtain a driver's license, own a car, and vote.

Why bring all this up? Well, I saw Roky on Austin City Limits a couple of Saturdays ago, and here’s this heavyset, gray-haired apparition playing with members of two of his previous bands and Billy Gibbons, no less, who apparently has always been a big fan. Roky, who turned 60 last July, was in fine form, belting out his hits in the afore-mentioned primal vocal wail. Discovering this dude started an investigation into his life, and the eventual discovery of an album called “You’re Gonna Miss Me,” which is the soundtrack from a 2005 documentary about his life by director Keven McAlester. It’s a good overview of the man and his music, and I highly recommend it.

It just goes to show you the lengths that some folks will go to overcome adversity, and that you’re never too old to rock and roll! Check out this video from Roky’s career, thanks to www.wikipedia.com for the info, and keep on rockin!

15 Minutes of Fame

We're all supposed to have our 15 minutes of fame; at least, that's what I've always heard. I know I'll never be a big rock star, but I had my 15 minutes sometime in the winter of 1966. At the very least, it was a brush with greatness...Let me set the stage: I was 15, playing drums in a band called "D. J. Child's Society Banned." We were gigging around NW Iowa, North and South Dakota, and Nebraska, and were booked for a week-long gig at a little club called "The Loft" in N. Sioux City, South Dakota. South Dakota's drinking age in those days was 19, so the seedly little bars in border towns N. Sioux City became the hot spots for Iowa teens trying to get liquored up within the confines of the law. Now, parents, would you let your 15-year-old play a week-long gig (all those school nights!) in a sleezy bar in a town 70 miles away? Well, it would depend on how much the gig paid... I mean, absolutely not! I expect my parents were violently opposed to it, but I went anyway...

The thing I remember most about the Loft was its tiny stage, suspended 10 or 12 feet about the dance floor, accessable only by a rickety ladder (hence the name). You try hoisting a couple of Super Beatles up those stairs...and we didn't have roadies in those days, just a sound/light guy. One night, midweek, we were playing to 4 or 5 people (hey, it was early yet!) when a dude claiming to be Elvin Bishop strolled up to the bandstand and asked to jam. Now in those days I probably didn't know Elvin Bishop from Elvin Jones, but I now know he is an accomplished blues guitarist and singer, born in Iowa, who'd played with Paul Butterfield. He's probably best known, though, for his pop hit "Fooled Around and Fell In Love," with Mickey Thomas on vocals. I don't remember too much about the tune - we probably played a slow blues progression - but he played a blistering blues harmonica. After the song was over, he turned to me and said that I was the "best little damn drummer" he had ever played with. Probably the only 15-year-old drummer he'd played with, but that was beside the point, he left me beaming with pride.

So that's my story - what's yours?

You can see what Elvin is doing these days by checking out his appearance at the "40th Anniversary Summer of Love Blues Jam," and, as always, keep on rockin!