Rubber City Review

Stevie Ray and Jimmie Vaughan

Want to stare into the very depths of someone’s soul, or at least find out if a long drive together is a bad idea? A few of the following questions about music preferences might help. Beatles or Stones (which we covered here)… Jimmy Cliff or Bob Marley… Loretta Lynn or Tammy Wynette… Allman Brothers or Lynyrd Skynyrd… John Coltrane or Miles Davis… Radiohead or Coldplay… Captain or Tennille…

And don’t let your subject off the hook. If someone can’t take a stand either way, that just means he/she is unworthy of your trust.

I’ll throw another one into the mix – Stevie Ray or Jimmie Vaughan… The former, obviously, is one of the most celebrated guitarists of the last 30 years. A guitarist who, for better or worse, had an impact on virtually every blues-based stringbender who followed. A once-in-a-generation talent who might even be more popular dead than he was alive.

But put me down for Jimmie, and not because I didn’t have utmost respect for his brother. Like thousands of other students of the instrument, I made several pilgrimages to see SRV live and left convinced that I’d witnessed the Most Amazing, Death-Defying Act Under the Big Top. But Jimmie’s the guy you come across on your way to the parking lot… He’s sitting on the edge of a rail car playing gutbucket blues through a broke-dick amp as a few strippers and circus freaks slow-dance nearby. In other words, a little closer to the blues according to Charlie Patton and Robert Johnson.

Actually, one of the first times I heard Jimmie Vaughan’s guitar was back in ’81 at a strip joint in Newport, Kentucky – across the river from Cincinnati. Of course I was dragged there by my friends to see Miss Nude Memphis (which seemed slightly more promising than paying to see Miss Nude Paducah across the street). And I have to admit, Memphis didn’t disappoint. Most of the other girls danced to bad ‘80s rock, but the Memphis Belle whipped out The Fabulous Thunderbirds’ first album and what seemed like an entire vat of massage oil, and I’ve been a fan ever since – of Vaughan that is… not sure what happened to Belle, or the oil. Rich Woman

Eventually I caught Vaughan and the T-birds at a small club in Dayton. Even though the band went on to become a minor sensation in the mid-‘80s with songs like Powerful Stuff and Wrap It Up, they always seemed a little uncomfortable playing larger theaters and summer “sheds.” They were right at home in that Dayton dive, though… and I was a little worried at one point that Vaughan’s thick, smoky guitar would set off the club’s fire sprinklers. I’m a Good Man

Vaughan eventually left the T-birds behind – which I always respected because I’d already lost interest in the band when they torqued up their sound for a major label. And at least from a creative standpoint, his career as a solo artist has been far more rewarding than even I would’ve predicted.

First, we found out that he has a soulful and expressive voice – an instrument that he never used with the T-birds (granted, Kim Wilson is a tough act to follow). Here’s one of his early forays into lead singing: Love the World

He also had the extreme good taste to hire Bill Willis on organ and George Rains on drums.

Rains, Vaughan and Willis

Willis is a guy who clearly deserves his own blog post, having served as a staff bassist at King Studios and contributed to many of the label’s legendary recordings by James Brown, Freddie King, Little Willie John, Bill Doggett (responsible for one of the great instrumentals of all time, Honky Tonk) and many others. Here Willis lays down the low end for one of Freddie’s signature songs: I’m Tore Down

Willis eventually persuaded Doggett to show him a few tricks on organ, and he’s been ridin’ the B3 ever since, recording and performing with the likes of LaVerne Baker and Floyd Dixon. He does it Jimmy Smith-style, kicking out funky bass lines on the B3’s foot pedals. Here he locks in tight with Vaughan and Rains (and special guest Joe Sublett on sax) on a tune that recalls the glory years of the organ combo: Tilt A Whirl

Vaughan’s other secret weapon, Rains, should be considered a legend simply for joining the San Francisco lineup of the Sir Douglas Quintet back in ’68. The Texas expat helped made border-rock history on cuts like Mendocino and Nuevo Laredo before moving back to Austin and joining the city’s fertile blues scene back in the Seventies. Rains served as de facto house drummer for Clifford Antone’s record label and club, where he probably sat in with Vaughan more times than he can remember. Clearly, he never met a shuffle he couldn’t nail down tight: Kinky Woman

That’s the solid core Vaughan started with back in ’94 with his first solo release, “Strange Pleasure.” Everything else was gravy. Rich, tasty gravy. Gospel/doo-wop vocals, second guitar (including flamenco on one tune), vibes, sax… and one very dangerous blues mama, Lou Ann Barton, who adds plenty of spice to a few of Vaughan’s best moments as a solo artist: In the Middle of the Night

My favorite Vaughan album – “Do you get the blues?” – had the unfortunate distinction of being released on September 11, 2001. But it didn’t take me long to appreciate its many joys, which probably served as little subconscious reminders that all was not lost post-9/11. Let’s put it this way – it damn sure gave me more of a healing feeling than Charlie Daniels’ “This Ain’t a Rag, It’s a Flag.” I especially latched onto this soulful little number that finds Vaughan settling into a slow groove with his son, Tyrone, on rhythm. In fact, I’d like to hear more of Vaughan exploring that same sweet spot that his idol, Johnny “Guitar” Watson, found between blues and funk: Without You

Speaking of Watson, I’m not sure if anyone captures the bite and sass of that bluesy-funky sound better than Vaughan. Exhibit A: Motor Head Baby

Vaughan recently followed up on his fine 2010 release, “Plays Blues, Ballads & Favorites,” with “Plays More Blues, Ballads & Favorites.” OK, maybe not the most innovative marketing concept… but definitely more vintage Vaughan – smart, in-the-pocket blues-based goodness. And definitely a few cuts above your standard contemporary blues fare. Here’s a taste from the earlier release – a blazing instrumental that proves Vaughan is only getting better with age: Comin’ and Goin’

Vaughan live, with his tribute to brother Stevie Ray. Abrupt ending, but pretty sweet slice of JLV in action…

It’s time to bring back the funk of Johnny “Guitar” Watson.

Why not? You can hear Seventies funk of every stripe on TV commercials and movie soundtracks by everyone from The Isley Brothers and Betty Wright to Curtis Mayfield and The Staple Singers. But sadly, Johnny G’s funk gems remained mostly buried in the past. As the man himself famously asked in the title of his ’79 album, what the hell is this?

And what about a Watson biopic? How can Hollywood green-light the Bobby Darin story “Beyond the Sea” and ignore one of the most storied musical careers of the 20^th century? I mean, Watson died on stage in the middle of a guitar solo. How can you come up with a more dramatic ending than that?

Alright, I’m done ranting… Let’s head over to RCR’s “happy place” and dive right into some of these mind-blowing songs.

Now I’m no music scholar, but I’ll go out on a limb by breaking down Watson’s career into three distinct eras:

1. The Early Blues Years
2. The Transition Period
3. Superpimp Funkdaddy

Born in Houston in 1935, Watson started out on piano but eventually took his place in a long line of great blues guitar slingers with strong ties to Texas, including Blind Lemon Jefferson, Lightnin’ Hopkins, T-Bone Walker, Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, Albert Collins and Johnny Copeland. In terms of Watson’s early blues years, I’ll defer to our good friend The Hound, who did a fine job of rounding up the best of those recordings here.

But I’ll throw in a couple observations about the radioactive blues numbers that Watson waxed in Los Angeles (where he moved as a teenager) back in the mid ‘50s for the RPM label. First, if you don’t have a collection of those songs – and several good ones are still available, including one you can order at the end of this post (“Hot Just Like TNT”) – then you need to right that wrong immediately. Here’s a little taste of what you’re missing… Too Tired Also, as Hound rightfully points out, Watson laid down some pretty fearsome tracks both before and after he recorded for RPM. And you’d be hard-pressed to find a better slow burner from the early ‘60s than Cuttin’ In. At the risk of melting your laptop speakers, I’ll pack as much as I can into this next sample… Cuttin’ In

We’ll place Watson’s transition period (which we touched on here) in the early to mid ‘70s, when he recorded a couple albums for the Fantasy label, home of Creedence Clearwater Revival. Some view this era as Watson’s sweet spot, when he found that perfect mix of blues and funk. I’m guessing that was the late blue-eyed soulman Robert Palmer’s opinion – he covered this next song on his “Some People Can Do What They Like” album from ‘76. I like the slow grind of Palmer’s version, but you can’t top the sweet caress of Watson’s guitar solo on the original: You’ve Got a Hard Head

Which brings us to Watson’s most commercially successful period, when he came into is own as the ultimate pimp-hustler-gangster-soulman-funkdaddy. And, from what I’ve read, it wasn’t necessarily a role that Watson played to give his act a little “street cred.” As music writer Peter Guralnick puts it in his book “Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke,” Watson was “a star on the L.A. r&b scene whose talent was exceeded only by his panache and his ambivalence about whether he wanted to be a singer or a pimp.” And Hollywood still hasn’t picked up on this??

Watson’s string of hit albums released on the DJM label in the ’70s started with “Ain’t That a Bitch” in ’76. And at this point, you might be wondering how an unreconstructed blues nut such as me could appreciate these records, which were produced and orchestrated to within an inch of their lives with lush horns, precise yet funky rhythms and the occasional string section and synthesizer.

Well, I’ll give you three good reasons (sorry, I’m stuck on triads… seeking help): 1. Watson’s guitar – filled with Texas funk and L.A. fire no matter what he played; 2. Watson’s voice – an amazingly soulful instrument that only got better with age; and 3. Watson’s sense of humor – which makes virtually all of these tunes hugely entertaining (if a bit dated).

I probably should add that he had a great sense of drama as an arranger, which he used to create some fairly audacious openings to his best songs. Listen to how he kicks off A Real Mother for Ya with some powerful guitar riffs (cushioned by lush horns, of course): A Real Mother For Ya And that was simply an attempt to outdo the badass majesty of “Bitch”: Ain’t That a Bitch

One of the great strengths of these recordings is the tension that his down-home blues guitar and voice creates against the uptown arrangements. When was the last time you heard a guitar like this on urban radio? Superman Lover

No question, his music captures a very distinct time and place in American pop culture, with references to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s sky-hook, “makin’ milk out of powder” and hoppin’ on a “jet plane DC-10,” which today is primarily used to move Fed-Ex packages and the unfortunate passengers of Ghana Airways. It was a time when you could still find blaxploitation films at the theater (not the megaplex) and you didn’t have to explain the term “Detroit lean in a deuce and a quarter.”

He was the original Gangster of Love – a cool character whose red-hot guitar inspired a long and diverse list of artists, including Steve Miller, Bobby Womack, Frank Zappa, Sly Stone and Jimmie and Stevie Ray Vaughan. And he eventually gained a strong following of rappers/hip-hoppers with his deft wordplay and larger-than-life personality.

Watson continued to record and perform throughout the ‘80s and into the ‘90s. One of his biggest champions during this period was Zappa, who even credited the song “Three Hours Past Midnight” for motivating him to pick up the guitar. “One of the things I admired about him was his tone, this wiry, kind of nasty, aggressive and penetrating tone, and another was the fact that the things that he would play would often come out as rhythmic outbursts over the constant beat of the accompaniment,” Zappa said (from “Zappa, a Biography,” by Barry Miles). “It seemed to me that was the correct way to approach it, because it was like talking or singing over a background. There was a speech influence to the rhythm.” Watson appeared on several of Zappa’s later albums, although mainly as a vocalist.

As I referenced at the top of the post, Watson went out in a blaze of glory. He dropped dead on stage in Yokohama, Japan, right in the middle of one of his funky-ass guitar solos. Reportedly, his last words were “ain’t that a bitch.” And I ain’t makin’ that shit up.

Before I Let You Go

At this point, I need to direct you to two videos on youtube, neither of which I’m able to host on my site. They show Johnny G in and his band in their prime, filmed live at a TV studio in Bremen, Germany in 1977. And they drive home the fact that Watson was one hell of a showman. Stick with Gangster of Love through the “calling all cars” schtick up front (if only to watch Watson ask his keyboard player what city they’re in) – the song starts at about the three minute mark. And on Ta-Ta, look how far up the neck of his guitar he places his capo, a la fellow Texans Gatemouth Brown and Albert Collins. Awesome solo too. So much soul:

• Gangster of Love
• I Want to Ta Ta You Baby

This next video is a surreal treat. As Frank Zappa was dying of cancer, his wife Gail would try to boost his spirits with Friday-night “salons” at his house – eclectic gatherings of musicians and artists who had little in common other than showing up in Zappa’s rolodex. “He liked to introduce people from entirely different musical traditions and see what happened when they played together,” Miles notes in “Zappa.” Filmed by the BBC in January ’93, this one includes Zappa’s long-time friend Watson as well as a trio of Tuvan throat singers, violinist L. Shankar and members of the Chieftains. Zappa died in December of that year.

One more piece of Watsonian lore… I found it interesting that, after guitarist Jimmie Vaughan parted ways with harp player/lead singer Kim Wilson and the Fabulous Thunderbirds in 1990, both men got in touch with their inner Watsons – Vaughan with a credible version of Motor Head Baby from his ’98 album “Out There,” and Wilson with this number that gives guitarist Duke Robillard a little room to burn too… She Moves Me/Kim Wilson with Duke Robillard

I love the sound of a Hammond B3 doing a slow-boil under the bluesy guitar of Grant Green or Kenny Burrell, or wrapped around a warm, soulful sax.  But there’s a thin line between the best of these recordings and pure schmaltz, which is probably why the organ combo remains a criminally ignored sub-genre of American roots music.

The Hammond organ was invented in 1934 by mechanical engineer Laurens Hammond, who also invented the technology behind 3-D glasses (maybe he was a numerologist too).  And his namesake instrument was destined to remain a staple at churches, hockey rinks and old-timey movie theaters until Jimmy Smith transformed it into the “new sound of jazz” back in the 1950s.

Jimmy recorded for the Blue Note label, which found itself in a bit of a rut after a string of jazz albums that didn’t exactly light up the charts.  Upon hearing Smith for the first time at a New York City jazz club, the label’s mercurial front man, Alfred Lion, decided right then and there to sign him.  Lion eventually confessed that he wanted to sell the label to become Smith’s tour manager, just so he could hear him play every night.

Smith quickly revitalized the label by taking advantage of the new LP format with extended workouts like his take on Dizzy Gillespie’s The Champ… The Champ

At this point, it would be useful to explain that Smith is playing intricate bebop figures on top with his right hand, chording with the left, and kicking out a rock-solid bass with the instrument’s foot pedals.  So essentially, all Smith needed to fill a small club with a wall of sound was a drummer – but he created the classic B3 trio by adding a guitar, with that chair initially held by the very capable Thornel Schwartz.

But my favorite Jimmy Smith recordings are the ones that create a smoky, late-night vibe, usually with the exceptional Kenny Burrell on guitar and Stanley Turrentine on sax.  And classics like “Back at the Chicken Shack,” “Midnight Special” and “Home Cookin’” still serve as the gold standards for those who prefer the “less is more” approach.  Listen to Burrell’s perfect hand-off to Turrentine on Midnight Special… Midnight Special

Inspired by Smith’s success, many other keyboard players jumped on the B3 bandwagon and recorded their own soul-jazz classics during the ‘50s through ‘70s – most notably, “Brother” Jack McDuff, Richard “Groove” Holmes, Shirley Scott and Dr. Lonnie Smith.  Here’s McDuff jamming with a young George Benson on guitar, before Benson moved on to his own unique brand of pop-schmaltz… Scuffin’

Even jazz greats like Gene Ammons and Sonny Stitt decided they’d had enough of half-full jazz clubs and abandoned more traditional acoustic bands in favor of organ-driven soul-jazz.  And one of the finest examples of the genre features Ammons and Stitt trading riffs on this standout cut from 1971… You Talk That Talk

The organist on this cut is Leon Spencer, one of the unsung heroes of the instrument.  And his experience underscores the thin line I alluded to earlier.  Back in the day, guys like Spencer, Don Patterson, Charles Kynard, Sonny Phillips and other more obscure artists played their fair share of inner-city clubs in places like Detroit and Newark, where getting asses on the dance floor was just as important as getting your own stuff across to a new audience.  And even the best organ combo records I’ve picked up over the years have at least one tune that sounds like a second-rate version of a pop or soul standard.  Here’s Spencer cookin’ up one of his fine originals… First Gravy

And here’s Spencer toying with a watered-down version of Marvin Gaye’s Mercy Mercy Me… Mercy Mercy Me

Hey, I’m not going to begrudge anyone trying to make a decent living – but I’ll take Gravy over reheated Motown any day of the week.

If there is such a thing as a desert-island organ combo playlist, it would have at least four or five cuts with Grant Green on guitar and Big John Patton on organ.  And it would lead off with this little slice of soul-jazz nirvana from “Got a Good Thing Goin,’” a 1966 Blue Note release (the disc’s second tune, Soul Woman, is just as good)… The Yodel

On these and other cuts by accomplished players like Green and Patton, you get the overwhelming attitude that “yeah, I can burn my way through any jazz standard you throw at me… but this is what I really want to play.”

The organ combo is far from finished.  Just pick up a recent release by Medeski, Martin & Wood or even Texas blues guitar great Jimmie Vaughan, who seems to always find a way to sneak an organ-driven instrumental into the mix.  In interviews, Vaughan has expressed his admiration of Gene Ammons and other soul-jazz giants – and his own band features Bill Willis, a former house bassist for Cincinnati’s legendary King Records who learned how to play organ from Mr. Honky Tonk himself, Bill Doggett.  On this cut from Vaughan’s first solo CD, Willis uses his left hand to play bass notes on the B3… Tilt A Whirl

I’ll leave you with this cut from Medeski, Martin & Wood’s third release, “Friday Afternoon in the Universe,” from back in 1995.  If you ever find yourself kicking back with a cocktail at the space station, you definitely want to slap this one on the interplanetary hi-fi… The Lover

Blue Note Soul-Jazz Album Covers… A few favorites:

The Doctor is In… Couldn’t resist adding this youtube video of a resplendent Dr. Lonnie Smith plying his craft on the B3… I like how he dives down to play a bass solo on the foot pedals with his hands.  He may be a Doctor, but he’s not above engaging in a little schtick!