Big Beat Steve

So what is a "great" jazz name (given that real names and nicknames are happily mixed here)? Maybe the below fictitious line-up that appeared in the Swedish jazz magazine ORKESTER JOURNALEN in 1957 in a columnist's somewhat sarcastic comment on those endlessly, often aimlessly rambling "blowing" sessions that abounded on LP at those times? Joe Atom Bomb Blowingboy (his brother) Moe Blowingboy Jackie Machine-Gun Cincinnati Chicken-Feather Donaldson Okmulgee Huckleford (b) Artie Messenger (dr)

The kind of name where you wonder whether "great" (or should I say weird) names are just as well found in other areas. Or are Hutch Davie Tupper Saussy really jazz people? FWIW this thread and the names that are rattled off here has me wondering anyhow where the line would be between "great" jazz names (that somehow evoke the personality of the person) and just ODDBALL names.

True ... an inexcusable oversight. Do we therefore add Hot Lips Levine too? (Yes, he actually existed too) And while we're at facial details, how about: GATEMOUTH BROWN as well as his brother WIDEMOUTH BROWN Which of course leads to Gatemouth Moore ...

Royal Crown Revue, one of the major bands on the "Neo-Swing" musicians of the 90s (and beyond) includes one Mando Dorame, actually. Talking about great jazz names from that period, I've often wondered who inspired whom (if at all) or how some names came about. There was one Corky Cornelius and a wee bit later there was one Corky Corcoran Coincidence?

"a few" ---the master of understatement :tup In fact a local vinyl seller told me more than once that he had been "commissioned" by one or two of those business upstarts who had just finished furnishing their newly bought or built house "in style" to assemble them a selection of Blue Notes to go with the living room furnishings. And these upstasrts definitely were a bit older than 1/4 the age of the thread starter. OTOH I'd freely admit that some really cool covers can be a big incitement to try out this or that music in the first place (which is why many 70s reissues of cool 50s music with their outright garish 70s covers are a big nuisance) but you'd better progress beyond the covers fast. Not all hope is lost with the young'uns, though. While making the rounds at a clearout sale at about the only local vinyl shop left the other day, the buyers' crowd usually includes a huge share of youngish ones. In fact I noticed a girl (early 20s, I'd guess) who eagerly picked up vinyl by names such as Dorsey, Sinatra or Al Hibbler (!!), etc. (not exactly "cool" covers either but probably budget LPs at their time). You really have to be know your way around to go for names like this at that age! And she definitely did not look like she was into the "retro scene" either,.

So the "Svensk Jazzdiskografi" online discography (where these two concerts are listed as two separate entries with two separate and unrelated releases - 1960 on vinyl, 1959 on CD) was right after all! Had checked there yesterday but a conflicting entry in the Bruyninckx discography (which might have been interpreted as the 1960 date being erroneously listed as such for the LP release and then corrected as a 1959 date for the CD release) made me hesitate ....

But there is no need to perpetuate factual errors (to the point where these errors become "facts" just because they have been repeated ad nauseam often enough for them to appear to be "engraved in stone" forevermore). Has happened often enough and is totally senseless. Like Dan Gould suggested, would some discreet straightening out of those glaring errors (that, judging from what all of you say, seem to abound) by knowledgeable editors (without interfering with the narrative as such) really have lessened or "falsified" the impact of oral histories and personal reminiscences such as this and made them less "authentic"? I don't think so. So IMHO Larry has nailed it in every respect.

Sorry - I NEVER saw your posts of June 2011 as they arrived while I was on our annual holiday and of course I never got around to catching up on all posts that had been posted in all these forum sections in the meantime. Contact me by MAIL and we will see what can be done ...

Excellent find, Jeffcrom! :tup My recent finds: An office colleague of a friend of mine will shortly be moving so she decided to do a huge clearout (including of the records her late husband had accumulated). I was therfore able to pick up the below 10-inchers (all in pristine condition) FOR FREE: The downside, however, was that there were a lot more 12in LPs but unfortunately the sleeves of ALL OF THEM were MISSING! No idea why that gent had discarded them all but though I did take along quite a few LP just for the music it was a real pity as there were lots of collectible goodies in there, and all of them with almost NM vinyl throughout: Original/early late 50s/early 60s deep groove pressings of The Ray Charles Story Vol. 1 on Atlantic, various Everly/Buddy Holly/Fats Domino/Johnny Horton/Marty Robbins LPs, Meade Lux Lewis "Yancey's Last Ride" on Verve Down Home Series (AFAIK the original cover would have had DS Martin Artwork ... grrrrr), various 50s big bands (Ray Anthony et al.), etc. O.K., most of them not the really rare stuff but collectible enough (e.g. one original German pressing of a Johnny & The Hurricanes LP which was in the lot recently netted some 160 euros en eBay - with the cover of course, though ...). Galling, really galling ... Oh well ... After all they were free for the taking so who am I to complain after all. (It was just such a useless waste, though ...)

I can imagine their looks ... About a dozen years ago I've had the pleasure of moving my own collection (then approx. 3,500 LPs plus hundreds of 45s, 78s and CDs) just one flight up inside my house, and even that was a chore. No desire to repeat that either (my collection has increased considerably since), though a friend (a collector himself) has offered to assist: "One box goes upstairs, one goes outside into my car, one goes up, one goes outside ... etc."... Ha! What I would like to know too, though, is the idea or advantage behind the "spine-up" storage of the LPs in those boxes recommended above. I cannot see the point either and also have misgivings about inner sleeve damage.

BTW; no need to go oversas for you: There are more of the same: http://www.vinylsolutionrecords.com/ and there seems to have been another one in London at one time: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinyl_Solution

The Electric Fetus was born in 1968 so it's a name that is reflective of its time. I've been to 2 of their 3 locations and they are pretty cool stores. Speaking of signs of their times, I suppose it is not hard to see where the (stylistic) origins of the SICK WRECKORDS store in Frankfurt (Germany) lie either ...

No matter how (dis)tasteful these names are, they invariably do achieve one major goal of any self-respecting publicity action: They get TALKED ABOUT and stick in one's (customer's?) mind. Mission accomplished.

I can speak only for very few regions in France that I visit relatively regularly, but I was surprised to find special-interest books aimed at a collector audience not only in Strasbourg (outside FNAC, mind you) but even in bookshops in smaller Alsatian towns such as Haguenau. And judging by what you normally would expect from the "book" section in shopping centers such as Hyper U, the selection I recently came across in their outlet near Beziers in Southern France seems to indicate that there still are enough customers who buy not only the most trivial fiction, novels or pop musician bios but also much more specialized books in those outlets. Or else the books departments would not stock this kind of items. Overall things may be on the decline in France as well but somehow I feel they still are soldiering on better than elsewhere indeed. So the article linked initially does not come as a total surprise.

No. Discounting which you find mainly online is limited to 5%. Correct me if I am wrong, someone. You are not wrong, and things go even further. FNAC and other bookstores will often discount by 5% too so you won't even save anything buying online. It's just a matter of convenience for those not living near any decent bookshop. Many books do go into heavy discounting some time after their initial marketing period has elapsed, though (they do not necessarily have to have gone out of print for good yet, however), and even there major cities have a very decent and well-established network of bookshops that carry these reduced-price books and therefore attract business to their "main" line of books too (because nowhere near all books will end up on discounters' tables so no use waiting if you WANT that book).

On my travels through France (and always on the lookout for more stuff of interest to cram my bookshelves with, either new or secondhand), I have had similar experiences. What the author says needs to be qualified in one aspect, though: While large chain bookstores such as FNAC or Cultura are omnipresent in larger cities and no doubt do take up an immense share of the overall market (not least of all because they do carry a very in-depth range of books), smaller neighborhood or specialist brick-and-mortar bookstores do seem to hang on much more tenciously and manage to survive indeed. As far as I can see they are aided by one major aspect of the book market that I have often observed in my collecting/hobby areas: French publishers seem to be ENORMOUSLY more willing and able to take risks on real niche subjects, both in the way they publish books that CAN only appeal to a very select and discerning target audience and in the way they venture to have (mostly English) books catering to these niche markets TRANSLATED into the French language (for domestic marketing). Both aspects, for example, are in marked contrast to the German book market, and while it is true that all too many French are at odds with any foreign language skills, mastery of English cannot (and is not) that more common in Germany to the extent that translations would not be worth the effort, particularly since many potential buyers are not even aware of the existence of the books in question. I would not count the number of cases where during my visits to French bookstores I have come across French versions of highly interesting special-interest books that I had no idea they even existed in their original language! In the same way, the range of special-interest niche books they publish on their own really is amazing, and I feel this also helps real-life bookstores to hang on as it allows them to carry a range of books off the trodden paths of the typical mass-consumption articles.

The way I see it, there are some who insist on political correctness, particularly with the benefit of hindsight, and frown upon the use of the term "hillbilly music" thoughout ANY discussion of this music today. While it is true that at some point in the early post-war years the term "hillbilly" had acquired negative connotations (particularly since many facets of country music - such as Western Swing - were far more urban than the term "hillbilly" would imply and many did not want to be associated with the "hicks in the sticks" image whereas on the other hand the "good old homely healthy small-town" image - vs that of the "city slickers" or "dude cowboys" - was exploited to the full for obvious marketing purposes of the music), I am far less sure that this would fit the bill or advance the debate when discussing this music today. Many diehard fans and collectors of the music (i.e. true insiders of the music of those times) TODAY do not see "hillbilly" as anything negative but rather as the "real thing" (correctly or incorrectly but certainly overly romanticised ) and this term is intended to set "grassroots" country/hillbilly music apart from mainstreamed/watered-down "Nashville country" music as it came along later in the 50s. It's all a matter of perspective. In short, "hillbilly" or "country", basically it's the same thing, and "Honky Tonk", "Western Swing" (our Country Jazz, Country Swing ,Hillbilly Swing, whatever ...), "Hillbilly Bop" all were variations of the same (Country) tune. As for Black musicians' awareness, the term itself probably mattered little to them in the early post-war years. Cross-fertilization worked in many ways between blues and country (to use the broadest possible denominators) musicians, sometimes to the point of making the results almost undistinguishable (e.g. Harmonica Frank Floyd who was long thought to be black).

Well, in the case of Earl Hooker one single but obvious example would be that it takes at least SOME awareness of country music if you went and recorded a smoking straight-ahead version of Leon McAuliffe's Western Swing classic "Steel Guitar Rag" (under the name "Guitar Rag") in 1953. (Yes I know this doesn't say anyting yet about lasting influences on one's playing, and the origins of "Steel Guitar Rag" go back beyond Leon McAuliffe's composition, and yet it is obvious where Earl Hooker got his inspiration from, right down to the way he transfers steel guitar licks to his guitar ... )

Tastes differ, you know. I am sort of underwhelmed by it. But that's only me. Make no mistake, though - a JAZZ string quartet would be quite something else. Take it as advanced mood music and you will be fine.

Looks like this is a representative cross-section of his recordings, but I suppose you do realize that rattling off brief titles of reissues where it is far from clear which is which and what exactly is on these releases (no labels, no numbers, let alone title listings) is not exactly helpful to guide you on if you are in a completist mood? Remember that many releases were reissued under a lot of different titles through the times and some may be preferable to others though both largely duplicate each other but one may fill gaps that the other one doesn't, but nobody can know them all by heart. Only the "Memorials" are universally obvious as this title has been used over and over again.

O.K., if this is what you were getting at, then yes - I think there were indeed a few parallel developments at work. But again - most of those "blues" artists who later turned out soul (or more or less soul-influenced) recordings leaned very heavily towards R&B in the 50s (as far as I can see it). Which - again - does not have to be a contradiction as I still feel that there was no insurmountable or clear-cut stylistic boundary between 50s blues and 50s R&B. After all, isn't R&B just ONE (major) genre within the OVERALL field of "da blooz"?

@GA Russell: I am not so sure about that "Rhythm" tag being applied to categorize "popular non-blues black music". Haven't read that Wexler book but this is the first time I've ever heard of anything like this (and I've read up on a lot about that period). What would that be, then, this "popular non-blues black music"? Gospel? The Ink Spots? The way I remember reading about this "rhythm" tag (even when referring to pre-war recordings) is that "rhythm" tunes in the repertoire of any artist just referred to uptempo, danceable tunes, that's all. Which did not make them any less "blues" as long as they were "blues" in form. After all, does "blues" have to be slow, low, world-weary? Isn't it rather so that all this "Rhythm" business came to the fore because after 1945 the instrumentation of many recordings by black artists was augmented, more horns were added and blues turned more openly, more often and more noticeably into "blues with a beat"? You stated it quite well in your above post when you said (my words) that blues and rhythm & blues are not mutually exclusive (but in fact - my interpretation again - two versions of the same basic musical style). I am not sure if we are thinking the same way here. The question of whether rock (or other post-blues influences) did make itself felt in blues/R&B is an interesting one and merits to be discussed. But "these influences" weren't "already present in blues" in the 40s/50s. They cannot have been because there was no "rock" yet, see? The way I understand it, part of what is commonly considered "blues" evolved into R&B after 1945 (WITHIN the blues idiom). When rock had established itself as a lasting popular music idiom of its own by the early 60s and when 50s R&B had evolved into soul by the 60s it might indeed be interesting to see to what extent these genres helped to influence and modify blues AGAIN. Sort of crossover ... But is this aspect really on a line with what happened in the "pre-rock" days (disregarding any question of which pre-rock recordings by black artists might make a valid claim to actually being all-out rock'n'roll songs/tunes that just weren't labeled that way yet because that term had not yet been coined )?

MG, you are largely limiting yourself to just one segment of what was commonly filed under R&B, i.e. Jump Blues. Jump Blues is fine (great, in fact), but it is not nearly all of R&B. There were MANY more subgenres of R&B, including vocal groups, vocalists-guitarists, after-hours piano combos, shouters, honkers, etc. etc. Saunders King, for example, was one of the jazziest blues/R&B guitarists around, and your pigeonholing/category distinction between Memphis Slim on the one hand and Jimmy Witherspoon on the other or Roosevelt Sykes on the one hand and Piano Red on the other (or between Archibald and Professor Longhair) really do appear extremely arbitrary to me. Unless you want to reduce it to a case of "as soon as he plays this chord or uses that inflection in his voice he is no longer blues but R&B" (or vice versa). Given your awareness of the history of Black music, I most certainly assume you are NOT falling into the trap of equalling "blues" with "true artistry" and "rhythm & blues" with "commericalism" either? AFAICS it all boils down to a case of R&B being the popular blues of the Black communities in the 1945-60 period and every artist trying to make a living in that field trying to grab a piece of the pie, and thankfully there was enough leeway under the R&B tag to accommodate many variants (stylisticall speaking), and many artists happily moved effortlessly between tunes that a diehard "authentic blues" purist would have approved of and jumping rhythm numbers that satisfied the dancing crowd and turned on the heat in the clubs. Maybe the post-1960 "folk blues revival" has clouded this fact? See the Brownie McGhee example above, and after all even Big Bill Broonzy's pre-folk blues revival recordings were FAR more citified and urban-oriented than what the college audience would have liked to believe. Agree to disagree, it remains ... @Dan Gould: Thanks for your very much to the point example.

Exactly. To rattle off just a few of those I am fairly well familiar with in your list, MG, I'd file both guitarists like Gatemouth Brown and Pee Wee Crayton on the one hand and vocalists like Big Mama Thornton, combos like the Griffin Brothers (great classic jump blues dancefloor fillers among their repertoire!) and vocal trios such as the Big Three or vocalists such as Willie Mabon MOST DEFINITELY under R&B. And Brownie McGhee's early output (long before his association with Sonny Terry) has always and by all accounts been classified as very much in the "Urban blues"/City Blues (and therefore R&B, sort of ...) vein (which is why many blues scribes have often wondered how much of a "down home" act the Terry/McGhee due REALLY was at heart (beyond of what the white college audiences clamored for). And the examples could go on ... Like I said, the stylistic boundaries were very blurred in the 1945-60 era IMO. Which is not the worst thing because there really is no need to try and pigeonhole everything, particularly if this would otherwise mean that one reverts back to the archaic thinking of those who initiated the "folk blues" revival. So, really, MG, your list does not leave very much for all those many facets of R&B. So what is it that you would classify as 50s R&B? BLACK rock'nroll only? That would miss the point IMO and is not borne out by contemporary sources either. In short, really sorry to disagree ...

Unless you instinctively keep thinking of "R&B" as another term for SOUL (as it may have been the case from a certain point in the 60s onwards), I'd guess that the boundaries between "Blues" and "Rhythm & Blues" in the 50s were relatively blurred both stylistically and under marketing aspects (at least in the years before the revival of the "real" blues - i.e. "down-home" blues - happened in the very late 50s/esarly 60s) and likely did not matter THAT much to the black community.