RIP Harmon Bethea, Albeit Belated

Maskman & The Agents - Put on Your Shoes and Walk

During the unfortuante period in which this blog was inactive, R&B's "Maskman," Harmon Bethea, passed away at the age of 86. Bethea was no stranger to this blog, and various recordings of his under his name or "Maskman & The Agents" appeared in features or in podcasts. Bethea's '60s and '70s soul and funk records generally took on a humorous slant, as best demonstrated by his hit "One Eye Open" and a slew of follow-ups, but he could also deliver the goods on more serious material.

Today's selection is an example of a non-comic side. "Put on Your Shoes and Walk," as recorded by Clarence Carter in 1973, was featured in the earliest days of this blog, but I have since learned that Maskman & The Agents recorded the song in 1970. Although the stepping groove of the Carter record makes it a slight favorite of mine between the two, I do think that Maskman and company handle the song's lyrics better, and the tune's funky groove is appealing.

Goin' Back to the Well!

Joe Simon - Music in My Bones

It's not uncommon for an artist to follow a big hit with a soundalike. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but when the artist brings a certain artistry to the follow-up or something about it "just clicks," the former is more likely to occur.

Joe Simon earned his third Billboard R&B #1 in 1975 with the disco-tinged "Get Down, Get Down (Get on the Floor)," and today's selection was the follow-up. To be honest, it sounds like "Music in My Bones" is really just extra material from the "Get Down" master tape (a la "My Part - Make It Funky, Pts. 3 and 4" by James Brown), as the groove is virtually the same, Joe seems to be carrying on the ad-libbing he was doing at the end of "Get Down," and the backing vocalist's use of a "music in my bones and I can't sit down" refrain provides the only substantive variation. To my ears, however, the tune still works, because the groove was so good and Joe's really getting into the "let's have a ball" flavor of the lyrics. Joe's fans agreed, and the song made it to #9 on the R&B chart.

I've read the In the Basement feature from 2008 on Bishop Simon, who left R&B behind for the ministry in the 1980s, and he mentions several times that at the time he was recording his hits he actually hated R&B. Although I respect his stated views and would by no means say that he is being insincere, the fun sound of "Music in My Bones" seems to belie such a sentiment!

Howlin' Wolf's Soul Message

Howlin' Wolf - She's Looking Good

TGIF, so says your ever-lovin' Stepfather of Soul, and I am glad to bring another groove your way to take into the weekend!


Chess Records' attempts to "modernize" the sounds of (and increase record sales on) Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters have been discussed on this blog previously, and today's selection comes from the second "modern" Howlin' Wolf album Message to the Young. Alongside the interesting but somewhat corny title track, in which Wolf encourages the love crowd to be themselves ("if you wanna wear your hair long, wear your hair long ... you girls, if you wanna wear your dresses short ... I'll appeciate it if don't nobody else will") but also to "love your mother and father," acid rock-tinged stuff like "Miss Jane" and funky tracks like "I Smell a Rat" is Wolf's cover of Rodger Collins' "She's Looking Good." With assistance from the hot track laid down by the Chess house band, especially Gene Barge's horn charts, Wolf actually pulls off a great reading of the song and even manages to get some of his trademark howlin' in there.

Get on Down With Mel & Tim!

Mel & Tim - Good Guys Only Win in the Movies

The Chicago- and Southern-soul duo Mel & Tim have been featured on the blog before, so I'll dispense with biographical details. Today's selection was a Bamboo 45 by the duo and also the title track of their sole Bamboo LP. "Good Guys Only Win in the Movies" opens with the archetypal, laconic guitar riff from western movies and some horse sound effects but then slides into a nice Chicago soul groove, over which the two really deliver the song's sad-sack story. About mid-song, the "cowboy" riff comes back, but this time as the basis for a great breakdown. Get on down with this one!

Southern Soul Struttin'

Ella Washington - You're Gonna Cry, Cry, Cry


Ella Washington's tenure with Monument's Sound Stage Seven label only resulted in one chart hit, "He Called Me Baby," which would go on to become a Southern soul standard covered by Candi Staton and others. I've always been partial to her up-tempo stuff, though, and today's selection, the flip of "He Called Me Baby," is only second to "Sweeter and Sweeter (Ray, Ray, Ray)" as my favorite of her SS7 sides. Here, Washington spins her revenge story over a nice strutting groove with lots of good horn work to push her vocals, which to me are redolent of Bettye Swann in places, along.

The Stepfather is back in stride!

Jackie's Got a Brand New Bag!

Today's post features the notorious Jackie Shane, who has featured in a prior post. Since I wrote that post over two years ago, a CBC radio documentary, I Got Mine: The Story of Jackie Shane, has given Shane's story the treatment it has long deserved. Since the program aired, soul fans have been digging, and rumors that Shane was murdered years ago have now been debunked, as it has been revealed that Shane is alive and well and living in Nashville, Tennessee, his hometown.

Fortunately for those of us who did not have the chance to see Shane do his thing, there are two resources available. In 1965 or '66 Jackie appeared on the seminal Nashville TV show Night Train (a YouTube video of the appearance is in the prior blog post), video from which is believed to be the only film footage of him. For a better record, though, there's the LP Jackie Shane Live, which presents a Toronto nightclub show in which Jackie performs his 1963 hit "Any Other Way" and covers of soul hits of the day. Jackie's colorful stage performance style is showcased throughout the album, particularly in extended monologues in "Money (That's What I Want)" and others, in which he presents himself as being proud of who he is - quite a statement to make at that time - because, as he put it, "I got mine."

His take on James Brown's "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" from the album, like his version of "Walking the Dog" on the Night Train clip, has a touch of sass but nothing short of a metric ton of soul. His version joins Otis Redding's in my list of the best James Brown covers ever made. Get on down, Jackie!

Long Time, No Joe!

Joe Tex - Get It

Lately your ever-lovin' Stepfather has been on a serious Joe Tex kick, listening to everything from his '50s sides through his disco-era stuff. Of course, I've been a Joe Tex fan for years and he is no stranger to this blog, but sometimes it's good to go back to the old favorites, you know?

Today's selection comes from Joe's Epic LP Rub Down, which has accurately been described by some music critics as seeming to consist of leftover material from the Bumps and Bruises sessions from which "Ain't Gonna Bump No More With No Big Fat Woman" emerged as a hit (the title track, for instance, borrows the structure of "Bump"). As I noted in an earlier post featuring "Leaving You Dinner" from Bumps and Bruises, Tex didn't just do the disco thang on the two LPs, though, and "Get It," an album cut from Rub Down, provides an example of a nice Southern-tinged groove that's good for a "get down" or two.

Soul on the Air #14 - "Ugly" Al Dixon, 1975

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I am thrilled to get back to business with Get on Down ... after a too-long hiatus! Honestly, between a lack of time and some personal doldrums I was about to toss in the towel on the blog, but I've found some new inspiration, my energy is rebuilding and I am ready to get back to sharing this great music! Let's start with an aircheck, shall we?

Today's feature is an awesome 37 minutes from February 24, 1975 from Rev. Alvin (aka "Ugly Al") Dixon on Montgomery, Alabama's WAPX. The aircheck is sheer fun, as discussed later, but research about the man proved to be quite interesting.

I was able to find out more online about Dixon that many other soul jocks, because in 1969 he became the national president of the National Association of Television and Radio Announcers, an organization of black disc jockeys and television personalities, after serving as a regional president. Dixon headed NATRA for two years before forming a splinter group, Broadcast and Musical Arts, whose "BAMA" acronym reflected the sentiment of its members that the concerns of southern disc jockeys were not taken seriously by the northern jocks in NATRA. (See this Jet article from 1972 about the split, archived at Google Books.) I'm not sure what happened to BAMA, but I know that Dixon became a minister in the early '80s and later founded the Montgomery-Tuskeegee Times newspaper.

It is clear that Dixon considered himself a "race man" first and foremost. An opinion piece he wrote for a Billboard Magazine's "World of Soul" feature in 1970 pulls no punches:

Soul music has been adulterated, castigated, renovated, analyzed, televised, utilized, used, abused, confused, directed, reflected, selected, collected, protected, affected, taken and foresaken ... [t]he destiny of soul music depends upon the Black broadcaster ... who is black enough to continue to program the real Black soul music and restore the music formats, the jazz that ethnic-appeal station owners and managers have systematically taken from the ears of Black people. (Emphasis in the original; read the entire article at Google Books and scroll through to see the entire issue, which is very fascinating.)

And here's Al commenting on why he started a newspaper:

Starting the newspaper developed out of a need for a source of information for us by us, written by black folks, controlled by black folks, seeing what the interest of black folks and doing it from a first hand perspective because I am black.

The politics of Al Dixon, however, are nowhere to be seen in this funny aircheck. Dixon holds court over some fine soul and funk from Al Green, Barry White, Bobby Byrd, Willie Hutch and others, spinning solid patter for the platters. "Here's my namesake, his name is Al, too," Dixon says as Al Green's "L-O-V-E" begins. "Oh, I don't know whether they call him 'ugly' or not ... he's one of the Green boys ... well, he may be Jolly Green Giant's brother! Or cousin or something." That's just a taste of the fun on this aircheck - his discussion later in the aircheck about being a "cocky disc jockey" and how WAPX dominates the competition is fantastic.

It's Promo Day!

I haven't done a "promo day" post in awhile, where I take a moment to talk up stuff that usually may not usually appear on this blog, but (1) I do like it and (2) kind folks have shared it with me. Today I'll feature two tracks that I'm really enjoying these days. One is by a very familiar name, the other is a hip-hop treat.

1. "Don't Know Why" - Smokey Robinson



Motown's poet laureate is certainly not a person who's out of place on Get on Down ..., and his new CD, Time Flies When You're Having Fun (Robso), a celebration of Robinson's 50 years in the business, shows that Smokey can still craft fine songs. Interestingly, though, the first track from the CD to get attention is a cover. Norah Jones' hit "Don't Know Why" gets a delightfully jazzy, "after hours" reading by Robinson, and it really works. The rest of the CD features a decidedly "quiet storm" bent, but Smokey's in good form, and guest turns by Joss Stone, Carlos Santana and Inda.Arie are also good.

2. "Don't Be Sheep (On Friday Night)" - Audible Mainframe



Hip-hop doesn't get much attention on this blog, but I do enjoy it, and I particularly enjoy stuff that's outside of the mainstream sounds that flow, unfortunately sometimes noxiously, from urban radio. I've found that hip-hop bands tend to be much more palatable, and the band Audible Mainframe's new CD, Transients, which is out tomorrow, is a great mixture of thoughtful, intelligent rap and fantastic music. The rock guitar-lead "Don't Be Sheep" is really doing it for me these days. The groove rushes along, and the catchy chorus will stick with you. It's a great slab of "get on down" that stands out on the album.

I'll try to do another "Promo Day" feature later in the week. But for now, dig these two!

Soul on the Air #13 - Bill "Butterball" Crane, 1967

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The parade of WVON "Good Guys" continues with today's "Soul on the Air" feature, and of all the "Good Guys," I have received more than a few requests for today's subject, Bill "Butterball" Crane. Although Bill Crane was not the only "Butterball" plying his trade on R&B radio in the '60s and '70s - there was a Butterball in Philadelphia, and a "Butterball Jr." in Detroit, to name two - he's the only one for whom I've found any airchecks.

Bill Crane grew up in Chicago's Ida B. Wells housing projects, where he cultivated a love of radio and electronics. Crane parlayed this interest into a radio career, and after a stint at Chicago's ill-fated WYNR he joined the WVON stable and local fame followed. I don't know much about his post-WVON career except that at the dawn of the twenty-first century he was a senior engineer for WGN radio, and I found a post on Soulful Detroit stating that he is alive and well. Hopefully I will be able to get more information after this post!

On to the aircheck itself. Today's feature finds Butterball holding court on August 25, 1967. In addition to Butterball's patter and the records, there's a lot of good stuff, ranging from the usual commercials of the era to an "On the Scene With Geraldine" segment ("On the Scene" featured ladies' fashion and homemaking advice by Bernadine C. Washington, one of the station's two female "Good Guys" - the other was Sunday gospel host Isabel Joseph Johnson) and a news break focused on the Democratic primaries in Jackson, Mississippi, in which black voters were expected to make an impact with their relatively-new freedom to vote. All of that good stuff, however, is just icing on the cake, as Butterball's slick and funny patter really shines among the great soul records that fill the aircheck. Dig Butterball's intro to Linda Jones' "Hypnotized," his plea to the engineer to allow him to play "O-O I Love You" by the Dells twice in a row, his comment about his "raggedy" "natural" hairdo during a Billy Stewart record and his shouting over King Curtis' "Memphis Soul Stew" that kicks off the second part of the aircheck. "Who's that ringing my telephone? Who's calling me?" he bellows. "Mr. Chess [either Leonard or Phil, Chess Records and WVON owners] says I can't have no company, y'all!" Although Herb Kent makes it clear in his memoirs that such a rule wasn't always followed (he mentions that sometimes he and other jocks would pay the engineer to set up long uninterrupted sets so that the jocks could, ahem, entertain), it tickles me every time I hear it. Near the end of the aircheck, Butterball hands off to E. Rodney Jones, and the first few minutes of his show close out the aircheck.

One last note about the various "Butterballs": Crane and at least one of the other "Butterballs" also were part of the parade of soul DJs who tried their hand at making soul records. Our Butterball's Lock two-parter "Steppin' Tall" is a funk favorite, but even bigger among funk fans is a "Butterball" (from where, I don't know) whose "Butterballs" is a seriously-slamming, hard-hitting, piece of funk that features some of the strongest proto-rap I've heard on any 45 by a soul jock. Both tunes are very good, though, and I will try to feature them on the blog at some point. But for now, get on down with the Butterball of WVON!

A Little Self-Promotion Never Hurt, Right?

Bobby Jones - Talkin' 'Bout Jones

Today's selection is from Bobby Jones, who I mentioned oh-so-briefly in a post from some time back featuring the Expo 45 "No Messin' Around" by Jones and Pauline Chivers (Shivers). As I noted then, Jones never broke into the big time on a national level, but "Talkin' 'Bout Jones" made a lot of noise in Chicago in '68 or thereabouts. "Jones" has a tasty Chicago soul groove over which Bobby lays down "no brags, just facts" about how great a lover he is - with touches of Clarence Carter in his voice - while a femme chorus chirps supportingly. It's a nice dancer, and I understand that the backing track also fueled Chris Campbell's USA 45 "You Gotta Pay Your Dues." Not sure which came first, but I'm sure the Campbell record also made good use of the groove. But this post isn't about Campbell - we're talkin' 'bout Jones!

Please Support "Loaves & Fishes"

Red Kelly has posted on The B-Side that Loaves & Fishes, a soup kitchen in Biloxi, Mississippi, is experiencing financial difficulties that may force it to close next month. Loaves & Fishes has provided lots to the community since its inception, including providing food for Sir Lattimore Brown. Please go to The B-Side for more info and to see a video featuring Lattimore about Loaves & Fishes. Your support would be greatly appreciated. You can make a donation through Red's site, or you can contribute below. As we roll into Independence Day here in the States, it's important to remember that as long as the "least of these" are left without help, none of us are free.