Sometime in 1951 he cut his first discs, four tunes recorded for Imperial, issued on two 78's which went nowhere. He made another record in '52 for Bullet Records in Nashville-- Feelin' Sad, a blues that only hinted at what was to come (Feelin' Sad would later be covered by Ray Charles on the Ray Sings The Blues LP for Atlantic in '59).
Johnny Vincent, then working as a talent scout and producer for Art Rupe's L.A. based Specialty Records signed Slim in 1953. His first session, held in New Orleans at Cosimo Matassa's J&M Studio (the place that recorded more great rock'n'roll records than even the fabled Sun Studio in Memphis) on October 23, of that year saw Slim fronting a band of first call New Orleans session players- Earl Palmer on drums, Lee Allen and Alvin Tyler on saxophones, Frank Field on bass and the aforementioned Ray Charles on piano. From this session the Things I Used To Do emerged. It took dozens of takes to nail the master, since overdubbing was impossible on J&M's primitive recording gear and everytime Slim would play a great solo he'd stop the take and say-- "Did you hear that?" or "Listen to that!". Ray Charles' audible "yeah" at the end of the tune came from relief at having finally gotten through a take, not emotional enthusiasm. An excited Johnny Vincent quickly shipped the masters to L.A. for Rupe to issue.
Art Rupe, who would become one of the most important record men in history (recording, amongst others Little Richard, Sam Cooke & the Soul Stirrers, Lloyd Price, Larry Williams, Willie Joe & his Unitar, et al), in a rare show of bad taste thought The Things I Used To Do was the worst piece of shit he had ever heard. Legend has him using those exact words-- worst piece of shit he ever heard. Still, he released the record so as not to hurt Vincent's feelings (that part of the story I don't quite buy, Rupe wasn't the type to waste money on a person's feelings, but that is how Johnny Vincent told the story and Rupe never disputed it, at least not in any interview I've read). The Things I Used To Do was a smash and Specialty would record Guitar Slim several more times, issuing a total of eight singles between 1954-56, although none would come close to matching the sales of The Things I Used To Do. Still, Guitar Slim waxed some incredible sounds while at Specialty-- The Story Of My Life might be the single most depraved blues guitar solo ever recorded, or at very least one of 'em*. It was a record Frank Zappa often name dropped in interviews, telling clueless rock writers "if you've never heard The Story Of My Life by Guitar Slim you haven't lived". Specialty wouldn't issue an LP on Guitar Slim until 1970, and later in the CD era virtually every outtake in it's vaults would find their way to plastic, including this little false start and studio chatter included version of I Got Sumpin' For You Baby which gives us a glimpse of Slim at work in the studio. Some highlights from these years -- Well I Done Got Over, Trouble Don't Last, the rocker Guitar Slim, Quicksand, Think It Over, Twenty Five Lies, and Reap What You Sow. On these tunes you can hear the church that Slim left behind in his voice, in his guitar playing we hear the future coming too fast and furious to make sense of. In fact in those days Guitar Slim couldn't find an amp loud enough so he'd plug into the P.A. head direct and turn it to the maximum setting.
Unable to match his initial hit, Guitar Slim and Specialty Records parted ways in 1956. Atlantic picked him up and recorded him for its Atco subsidiary, but either the fire was burning dim or Wexler and Ertegun didn't know how to get the best out of him because the sides he cut for Atco are decidedly mediocre compared to the Specialty recordings, although as a fan of the poultry in blues form I've always liked this rather stupid chicken rocker--- The Cackle, an outtake which didn't escape until the 1980's. Slim and Atlantic soon went their separate ways, he would never record again.
Guitar Slim was still a popular live attraction, and gigs are how musicians make their money. Guitar Slim always gave the crowd their money's worth, and usually more. He would enter from the rear of the club, being carried in on the shoulders of his bearers, playing his guitar (with the one hundred foot long cord) as they hefted him through the adoring crowd and deposited him on the bandstand. He would solo his way off the bandstand and into the street, sometimes stopping traffic.
Here's a great story: Somewhere in Texas, Gatemouth Brown, T-Bone Walker, Pee Wee Crayton and Slim, all on the same show which was billed as "The Battle of the Guitar Players". Slim enters the dressing room and announces-- "Gentlemen, we have the finest guitar players in the country all gathered here tonight, but by the end of the night, ain't nobody's s gonna even know any of you was here". His showmanship was such that he knew he could steal the show even from such guitar acrobats as T-Bone Walker and his hero Gatemouth Brown.
Slim lived and drank as hard as he sang and played, and by 1959 he started missing shows (Earl King was often called in to substitute, even touring as a fake Guitar Slim), or would show up too sick to play, and on February 7, 1959, before a scheduled appearance at New York's Apollo Theater (he was one of the few blues man who was popular with the sophisticated Harlem audience), Slim's liver and lungs gave out. A year earlier a doctor had told him if he didn't quit drinking he'd soon be dead, a warning that fell on deaf (and probably ringing) ears.
Eddie Lee "Guitar Slim" Jones died in New York City at the Cecil Hotel in Harlem. 118th Street, the same street my grandmother grew up on (although she lived on the east side in what was then the Italian section, now mostly Hispanic, the Cecil was on the west side). Slim was 32 years old. Unlike the plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper four days earlier, Guitar Slim's death brought no display of public grieving, no bio pic was ever made, and thank God, nobody ever wrote an allegorical song about it. He never gave an interview, was never filmed or recorded live.
In this day of portable recording devices on every cell phone may I bemoan the fact that no live recording-- audio or visual, of Guitar Slim has ever been found. Damn shame, too. I guess we're lucky he ever got recorded at all.
* I can think of only four that come close-- Young John Watson's Space Guitar on Federal, Clarence Holliman's solo on Bobby Blue Bland's It's My Life, Baby on Duke, and Ike Turner's whammy bar workout on Billy Gayles' No Coming Back also on Federal. If we count records that weren't issued until long after they were recorded, and why not, we can include Pat Hare's I'm Gonna Murder My Baby, recorded for Sun but un-issued until the 70's. Oddly enough all these were recorded between 1953-6, over a decade before distortion pedals were invented.
5 hours ago
10 comments:
Great post. I always read about these performers who loved working their audience (Slim, Wynonie Harris et al) and wish I'd been lucky enough to have seen something like that. Oh well, I got to see the Treniers in Atlantic City playing to the elderly for a two-drink cover. They were stunningly great even then.
Yes, please blogerate about Gatemouth's Peacock sides sometime!
Great post,"the things that I used to do" is spinning as I'm writing this,GREAT RECORD.
Jeff
"Well,I done got over it"is equally cool.
totally agree, re: "The Things I Used To Do"
AND "The Story Of My Life"
wish I'd been born two decades earlier so
I coulda seen the great man in action.
great post, as per usual!!
Phenomenal post. I ADORE Guitar Slim and wish I had a time machine so I could see (and record) him live. Good call on the other solos, too, although I prefer Hollimon's work on "I Don't Believe" to "It's My Life, Baby." Take a listen and see what you think.
tom h
Great post Hound!
I read about Guitar Slim in Randy McNutt's "Guitar Towns: A Journey to the Crossroads of Rock 'n' Roll" (Indiana UP, 2002). Recommended.
I absolutely hate people talking at me on the radio...but theres a very interesting piece on Guitar Slim here..
http://www.radiofreeamsterdam.com/category/vintage-radio-vault/
Lots of folks who were there are interviewed...the list of notables is long..
Check out the previous interview with Earl King as well...
thanks, there's a lot of interesting stuff on that sight, I really like the Ernie's Record Rack spot, and always nice to see my old pal Sinclair's got something goin' on....
Great blog, and I'm astonished at how similar my and your musical tastes are. Surprised you didn't mention Sufferin' Mind though.
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