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Philip Paul: King Records Drummer


EveryMann

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Since another lifetime ago when I was a teenager in the 1980s, I've been intoxicated by all things King. The 5 Royales and Hawkshaw Hawkins, anyone? James Brown and Cowboy Copas? What a weird and fascinating label with a roster of artists that spans the lexicon of American music, and serves as the barometer for cool by which all others are measured. Just like the time I stumbled upon my first-ever King LP in the .25¢ record bin at a junk shop @1984, "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," I still experience that very same flash of excitement whenever I chance across one of those black label nuggets of gold in "vivid sound" now, some 35 years later.

Even back in the 1980s those Freddy King, Clyde McPhatter/Dominoes, and "Battle of the Blues" LPs seemed like relics from the Bronze Age. 

Consider Mr Philip Paul, King session drummer...

Mr Paul played on Freddy King's classic guitar instro LP "Let's Hide Away and Dance Away" and the Charles Brown yuletide classic "Please Come Home for Christmas," as well as Little Willie John's "Sure Things" LP, that includes the high-dollar 45rpm northern soul cult classic "I'm Shakin.'" (They tell me there are "northern soul" clubs over in England where young women in their 20s will line up around the block to get into on Saturday nights, and then dance until 4am to old R&B records. I should like to visit such a fantasyland one day, but alas, I digress.) Further back? Mr Paul is on LWJ's "Fever," Hank Ballard's "Look at Little Sister" and "The Twist," and the turban-donning Lynn Hope's "Shockin'." Further still? That's Mr Paul playing on Bull Moose Jackson's "Big 10-Inch Record," Tiny Bradshaw's early 50s sessions that produced "Heavy Juice" and "Powder Puff," and Wynonie Harris records like "I Get a Thrill" and "Don't Take My Whiskey." Wynonie Harris...

Mr Paul is still going strong at age 94, and he gigs every Thursday night with his band at Arnold's in Cincinnati. At this late juncture, it's absolutely mind-blowing to think that the guy who played tubs on the second-ever King LP release (Tiny Bradshaw's 395-501) and Wynonie Harris sessions can be added as a friend on Facebook.

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