Guitar Shorty - Topsy Turvey

A little Christmas present from our good Dr. Hepcat.

Allmusic review by Bill Dahl:

More impressive than Shorty's British venture thanks to superior production values and a better handle on his past (there's a stellar remake of "Hard Life"), Topsy Turvy made it clear that Guitar Shorty was back to stay stateside. Black Top assembled a fine New Orleans combo for the majority of the album, as Shorty proved that his act translates beautifully to record minus the crowd-pleasing acrobatic antics.

• David Torkanowsky — organ
• Ernest Youngblood, Jr. — saxophone (tenor)
• Clarence Hollimon, Derek O'Brien — guitar
• Guitar Shorty — guitar, vocals
• Mark "Kaz" Kazanoff — saxophone (baritone, tenor)
• Sarah Brown, Lee Allen Zeno — bass
• Herman V. Ernest III, George Rains — percussion, drums
• Floyd Domino — piano
• Carol Fran — vocals
• Michael Mordecai — trombone
• Keith Winking — trumpet

Guitar Shorty - The 1950s Recordings

Given the recent Guitar Shorty love fest here, I wanted to make a post of his early recordings.  While Guitar Shorty's career already spans seven decades, somehow he hardly had a chance to record until the mid-1980s.   We can be grateful, however, that he had the chance to record 8 precious tracks in the beginning of his career in the 1950s.  I believe that these eight tracks are the only Guitar Shorty recordings until the mid-1980s (please correct me if I am wrong).

This interest of these recordings is not at all just historical.  There is true brilliance here.  In fact, they are far and away my favorite Guitar Shorty recordings.  The first thing that hits you are the vocals.  Guitar Shorty has always been a fine singer, but his voice in the 1950s was truly fabulous - clear, booming, and very blue.  Then there is the guitar playing - the evidence here will make you believe Guitar Shorty's claims that a young Jimi Hendrix used to idolize him.

The first recording opportunity was for Cobra records, producing one 45 in 1957.  These are pleasing R&B-infested blues.  But the cream is clearly in the tracks that Shorty was able to record for Pull records in 1959 - Hard Life, Ways of a Man, How Long Will It Last, Love Loves, I Never Thought...   Timeless classics, in my view! Enjoy.

Discography

a) Chicago, 1957: Guitar Shorty -g,v, John Tinsley-ts, Lafayette Leake-p, Willie Dixon-b, Odie Payne-d (Cobra Records)

1) Irma Lee
2) You Don't Treat Me Right

b) Los Angeles, 1959: Guitar Shorty-g,v, Bob Tate-b, unknown band (Pull Records)

3) Hard Life
4) Ways of a Man
5) How Long Will it Last
6) Love Loves
7) I Never Thought
8) Pumpkin Pie

Guitar Shorty - We The People 2006

"One of Texas' most venerated blues guitarists, Guitar Shorty and his guitar "Red have stoked the engine room for Ray Charles, B.B. King, Guitar Slim, T-Bone Walker and countless other stars of rhythm and blues. Next year, he'll celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of his debut single. In the meantime, on his second release for one of Chicago's premier blues labels, he and Red burn white-hot and blue.

"We the People opens with a reference to the preamble of the US Constitution, then stomps through a scalding electric blues about how tough it can be to just keep on keepin' on that stops just short of an open call to class warfare. Its lyrics might be funny if they didn't hit so sadly close to home, though it's almost impossible to resist smiling at words like these: "I grab my guitar, try to bend a note / I look up at my neck and even my string's broke! But there's nothing funny at all about this raging electric blues, matched by the roughhouse intensity of his lead vocal, which sounds spat out of his mouth like the hot and bitter thick taste of his own blood.

"Cost of Livin' continues the theme of current economic and political times but reaches back into blues history, a solo electric blues where his foot stomps out the rhythm and his guitar and vocal sound metallic and dark and anguished, resurrecting the ghost of Howlin' Wolf.

We the People also shows the influence of Shorty's Texas guitar style on such well-known rockers as ZZ Top and the Rolling Stones. The jagged riff churning within "What Good is Life? splits the difference between the hooks to "Jumpin' Jack Flash and "It's Only Rock and Roll, and every Stones guitarist from Jones to Richards to Wood has loved to play in the style of Shorty's mid-song solo, which drags rock and roll through heavy Mississippi blues mud.

The thick meaty chords and ripping hot leads of the explosive "Sonic Boom and "Can't Get Enough continue the tradition of such fine Texas roadhouse blues as "La Grange, ZZ Top's famous whorehouse song."  CHRIS M. SLAWECKI, All About Jazz

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Track Listing: We the People; What Good is Life?; I Got Your Number; Runaway Train; Down that Road Again; Fine Cadillac; Can't Get Enough; A Hurt So Old; Who Needs It?; Blues in My Blood; Cost of Livin'; Sonic Boom.
Personnel: Guitar Shorty: lead guitar, lead vocals; Jake Andrews: rhythm guitar; Wyzard: bass, acoustic guitar; John "JT" Thomas: keyboards; Alvino Bennett: drums.

Guitar Shorty - Get Wise To Yourself (1995)

Artist Biography by Bill Dahl

When he's not turning somersaults, doing backward flips, and standing on his head -- all while playing, of course -- Guitar Shorty is prone to cutting loose with savagely slashing licks on his instrument. Live, he's simply amazing -- and after some lean years, his latter-day albums for Black Top, Evidence, and Alligator have proven that all that energy translates vividly onto tape.

Born David Kearney on September 8, 1939, in Houston, TX, he started playing guitar at an early age. His early influences included fellow blues guitar slingers B.B. King, Guitar Slim, T-Bone Walker, and Earl Hooker. By the time he was 17, Kearney was already gigging steadily in Tampa, FL. One night, he was perched on the bandstand when he learned that the mysterious "Guitar Shorty" advertised on the club's marquee was none other than him! His penchant for stage gymnastics was inspired by the flamboyant Guitar Slim, whose wild antics are legendary. In 1957, Shorty cut his debut single, "You Don't Treat Me Right," for Chicago's Cobra Records under Willie Dixon's astute direction. Three superb 45s in 1959 for tiny Pull Records in Los Angeles (notably "Hard Life") rounded out Shorty's discography for quite a while. During the '60s, he married Jimi Hendrix's stepsister and lived in Seattle, where the rock guitar god caught Shorty's act (and presumably learned a thing or two about inciting a throng) whenever he came off the road. Shorty's career had its share of ups and downs -- once he was reduced to competing on Chuck Barris' zany Gong Show, where he copped first prize for delivering "They Call Me Guitar Shorty" while balanced on his noggin.

Los Angeles had long since reclaimed Shorty by the time things started to blossom anew with the 1991 album My Way or the Highway for the British JSP logo (with guitarist Otis Grand in support). From there, Black Top signed Shorty; 1993's dazzling Topsy Turvy, 1995's Get Wise to Yourself, and 1998's Roll Over, Baby were the head-over-heels results. In 2001, the appropriately titled I Go Wild was released on the Evidence label, proving that Guitar Shorty had no intentions of slowing down, as he clearly remained a master showman and lively blues guitarist. Watch Your Back appeared in spring 2004. A single-disc overview of his career, The Best of Guitar Shorty, appeared from Shout! Factory in 2006, as well as a new studio album, We the People, from Alligator Records. A second Alligator release, Bare Knuckle, appeared early in 2010.