Little Richard - The Formative Years

Those of you who recall my earlier take on Little Richard may well be surprised to see this here, so am I. The links for this set were sent to me by Morris who is an author over at Bolden's Backroom. He sent them back in August and at the time I wasn't all that interested, I had decided that the 18 months of brilliance in New Orleans were all that was worth the time.

Even once I had finally managed to download the file it sat in my inbox unopened until this morning. I finally gave it a listen today and I must say I was pleasantly surprised, these tunes are better than I remembered. Perhaps it is the lovely Bear Family remastering or perhaps my ears are better educated to the influences that he is reflecting here but I must say that even though nearly all the material is directly derivative of Billy Wright or Roy Brown, it is easy to see why they were recording him. Richard's voice is more powerful than Wright's and more facile than Brown's, he was only the proper material and circumstances away from a hit in this style but somehow that never really happened. Instead fate waited for him to have Bumps Blackwell hear him ape a filthy bar ditty in the style of his friend Eskew Reeder (Tutti Frutti), and a clean-up rewrite later, history!

The first 12 songs here are with RCA and while they did not sell, a) they did pay him $750 for each session which was quite good money then and b) they attracted the attention of Don Robey who was impressed enough to literally beat Richard into signing a contract. If Robey hadn't given up on him, history suggests that Richard would have been there until Robey died. The remainder of this material was recorded for Robey's Peacock label.

I would still say that nothing in the set is earth shattering by any means but the blues ballads in particular show a side of Penniman that would later be lost. Much like James Brown, Little Richard was forced to stop being such a good singer in order to cross over to the pop market.

We have Morris to thank for this lovely flac rip.

The Story Of Vee Jay: America's Premier Black Music Label

I am really enjoying these label comps, and the Vee Jay story is a heavy one.  Great music throughout...  enjoy!!

"America's Premier Black Music Label" says the small print on the front sleeve, and while that's highly disputable, Vee-Jay was undoubtedly one of America's premier black music labels from the mid-'50s to the mid-'60s. This two-CD, 50-song set is a strong and varied selection of their wares, focusing mostly but not exclusively on their hit singles and better-known performers. Vee-Jay went into every area of black music, and though their jazz roster isn't represented here to keep the scope more manageable, every other genre is: R&B, doo wop, blues, gospel, rock & roll, and early soul. As with any select condensation of a huge vault, there's bound to be some argument among knowledgeable fans as to what tracks were selected; it seems odd that Billy Boy Arnold's "Rockin'itis" is here rather than his seminal blues "I Wish You Would," for example. But you can't argue with the bounty of hits that are present, from Jerry Butler, Betty Everett, Jimmy Reed, the El Dorados, Dee Clark, John Lee Hooker, the Spaniels, the Dells, Gladys Knight & the Pips, and Gene Chandler. Hits like "Duke of Earl," "The Shoop Shoop Song," "For Your Precious Love," "Every Beat of My Heart," "Raindrops," and "Boom Boom" (all here, of course) might be expected from any Vee-Jay compilation, but to its credit this also has a lot of smaller hits or non-hits that have escaped oldies rotation. There's Fred Hughes' fine midtempo soul-popper "Oo Wee Baby, I Love You," for instance, a number three R&B hit in 1965 that barely made the pop charts; Memphis Slim's mordant blues "Mother Earth"; Hank Ballard's first version of "The Twist," predating both his own hit version and Chubby Checker's cover, recorded in 1958 but not issued until 1985; Little Richard's mid-'60s single "I Don't Know What You Got But It's Got Me," with Jimi Hendrix on guitar; Betty Everett's "You're No Good," just a moderate hit in 1963 but a much bigger one for Linda Ronstadt in the '70s; Jay McShann and Priscilla Bowman's jump blues "Hands Off"; Rosco Gordon's oft-covered R&B classic "Just a Little Bit"; and Gene Allison's early soul ballad "You Can Make It if You Try," covered by the Rolling Stones on their first album. Perhaps it might have made more sense to make the stylistic tone more even and not include gospel cuts as well. But the gospel acts represented here are undeniably important, including the Original Blind Boys of Alabama, the Swan Silvertones, and (on the mid-'50s sides) the Staple Singers.  - by Richie Unterberger /AMG

Little Richard

Like most of you I have heard the constant 'line' that Little Richard (Richard Penniman) was an early R&B original, the architect of Rock n Roll, and such. The wiki bio echos that take. I have a somewhat different view.

I've been going through the Blues discography and the 8 disk Specialty set and the fact of the matter is that while he is recorded as early as 1951, all the singles prior to his first New Orleans session in September of 1955 are best described as forgettable! Until that first New Orleans session there is nothing that anyone would even bother archiving today where it not for that latter material. To take it a step further, looking forward through the sessions he has 3 more Los Angeles sessions in 1955 that produce nothing of any note then in February thru August 1956 he is back in New Orleans and a large chunk of his best hits are cut at J&M. Yet another lack-luster L.A. session is followed by a pair of N.O. sessions that produce six more singles. So from September 1955 to October 1956 Richard has nine New Orleans sessions resulting in 30 singles plus around 25 or 30 extra takes. During the same period 5 Los Angeles sessions result in 5 singles (0 hits) and a slew of rejects. In 1957 sessions in Washington D.C. and Los Angeles manage to produce 6 more singles with 'Keep a Knockin' (a composite of 4 takes in Wash.)  being the first quality tune he had ever produced outside of New Orleans!

Subsequent to that 1955-1956 golden era in New Orleans, Little Richard doesn't really do much other than to play those same songs endlessly for the next 7 years.  To be fair there is a mid 60's run with some new decent tunes but they correspond to the time he is reunited with the New Orleans guys who have come to L.A.! The rest of his career is spent re-doing his own hits and covering hits of others like Fats Domino and Elvis whilst self promoting himself into Architect of Rock n Roll he is widely considered to be today.

So what happened in New Orleans that worked so well for Richard? How did he leave here a star with giant hair, eye makeup and lipstick (he only had the hair when he got here) and a schtick and piano style that would carry him more than 50 years when he seemingly came here without much going for him? The obvious first answer is Cosimo Matassa, Earl Palmer and the J&M gang who play on all those records, producer Bumps Blackwell get some credit too but a less obvious answer lies in three young gay artists who were his friends while he was here, Esquerita (S.Q. Reeder, he didn't adopt the stage name until 1958) , James Booker and Bobby Marchan. 

Richard and Reeder met cruising for sex in a Macon, GA bus terminal and while I've never seen any documentation that Richard brought Reeder here with him, the fact is he shows up here around the same time and stays until 1963. Reeder taught Richard his piano style, and he and Marchan,( the singer for The Clowns who was also a female impersonator on Bourbon Street), likely influenced Richard on the makeup as well. Youngest of the group was was James Booker (18 or 19 at the time) who was 3 times the piano player of any of them, had been a pro since 12, and couldn't help but teach them all something.

My friend John Parsons, Booker's ex manager, has told me stories that James told him of the four of them cruising Canal street in Richard's new white convertible Cadillac, looking outrageous and hunting for action. (There was certainly no where else in the Deep South, or damn near anywhere else at that time that they could have survived such behavior. New Orleans has always shown great tolerance towards gays even when the rest of the country did not.) The stunning thing to me is that the 'public' seems to have clue that these guys are gay! When seen thru the 'gay-dar' educated eyes of one who has lived most of his life in New Orleans and San Francisco that seems incredible, but folks in the 40's and 50's saw what they wanted to see. My friend Cliff confirms that in his experience of his uber conservative Dad allowing him to see Richard in the late 50's in Chicago, something he would have forbidden had there been any thought of any singer being a homosexual.

There is another obvious important influence on both Richard and Esquerita who predates both by nearly a decade and who was well known to both of them. His name was Billy Wright. In fact Richard began his career openly imitating Billy Wright and Wright apparently used his influence in getting Penniman his first recording sessions at RCA. When I show the pictures of this guy, you won't believe it! He had the hair going in 1948!

So was at the end of the day was Little Richard really all that original, was he all that important? As to original, I'd have to say not really, almost everything about him is borrowed, but important, well clearly yes since he is the one whom everyone remembers and credits. He was the guy who was there in the right place at the right time and while his catalog of 'significant' material is surprisingly small, when it is good, it is really good.

This collection gives you the meat of the Specialty hits (I might have included a couple of the more obscure New Orleans tunes if it were me), some the best from the mid 60's Vee Jay sessions (I Don't Know What You Got is really quite good) and some of his covers of other folks hits. It is quite listenable and really about all the Little Richard one needs. (imo)