Blues Pilgrimage The Story, Part 4

Standing at THE crossroads after midnight, there was no sign of the Dark Prince. Of course, maybe he’s entered the food services industry and owns the Delta Donut shop. The police are accompanying people making late deposits at the bank, and not a lot of people in Clarksdale are driving the new Lexus. Cotton may not be the only work anymore, but the 1 A.M. shift at Burger King is no great improvement. Throw in a lover that ignores you and the conditions are still ripe for the blues, music’s function as a healer is still essential.

Sunday, final day for the KBBF, seemed almost an afterthought. It seemed odd that there would only be four acts total on the Main Stage. Ending early to allow people time to return to their homes made sense, but more would be expected on the weekend. Was it just Sunday in the Bible belt? Did the promoter figure that everybody would be wiped out after Saturday? Everything became clear with the first sighting of a "No beer sales on Sunday" sign.

Beale Street, Memphis

Parking was much simpler, no doubt there, but temperatures were creeping up again, and non-essential structures were being disassembled. Eddie Vaddas took a relaxed posture on stage as he and his trio opened the day to a sparse assemblage.

Paula and the Pontiacs took the second slot, bringing a classic R&B feel and big, fat sound to the proceedings. Paula Rangell is the perfect example of a big voice in a small package, but vocals were just one facet of the multi-talented front woman of this New Orleans band. Taking regular turns on harp and alto sax as well, there seemed to be no stopping this dynamo. The guitar work of Jack Cole, and Bob Andrews’s deft keyboard skills on piano or Hammond B-3 sent a sonic wash across the grass and maybe even pushed the river to flow a little faster in its wake.

Sunday’s ambassador from the Bay Area was Roy Rogers and the Delta Rhythm Kings. At times while Rogers played, it was easy to forget the other two musicians. This is not meant to slight there talents; it’s just that, considering what Rogers was accomplishing with a slide guitar, it was no stretch to imagine that he could make it sound like a bass and drum set as well.

It was just as well that there was no other stage to investigate, walking away from the passionate playing on the main one would have been near about impossible. Rogers produced John Lee Hooker’s guest laden CDThe Healer, and was in Hooker’s Coast to Coast Blues band in the mid-eighties. He has also done some excellent work with harpist Norton Buffalo, including "No bread in the breadbox", regularly played by the Jerry Garcia Band, and found on the R & B CD, a stripped down affair of guitar, harp, and voice.

This wasn’t a musical performance as much as hypnosis on a mass scale. Both Rogers’ guitar and the audience made noises bigger than either would seem capable.

Festival host Sonny Payne was positively gushing over all aspects of Rogers’ character, and called him back for the only encore I witnessed. The guitars ranged from wood to steel, acoustic to electric; but the level of excellence never wavered. Investing in one of his recordings is money well spent; the most recent is Pleasure and Pain.

Time had us hurtling towards the inevitable conclusion of the festival; time to get low down and raw. No more teases, time for the real thing, baby. Not that R&B [sic] that wins Grammys these days, but classic soul in the tradition of Otis Redding and Wilson Picket, provided this afternoon by Terry Evans. Preaching to the converted? Perhaps. All were spent at the end.

There was no where left to journey. From quiet to rowdy, stripped down to big and brassy, the musical journey had twisted itself through many corridors. The gospel stage was never even possible, ditto the kid’s stage. Free rarely give so many so much.

The weekend was over, but the music never stops. Like the Mighty Mississippi, it keeps rolling along. The banks may change, the course may shift, but the basic essence remains.

The river is the highway here; like all highways, it leads to the big city; the big city in this case is Memphis.

The bluesmen that didn’t make Memphis their destination still probably passed through on their way to Chicago or St. Louis. Most cityscapes look appealing against a body of water. Approaching Memphis from the west in the late afternoon the eyes are treated to a vision of a warm, inviting collection of buildings rising from the river’s edge.

"Home of the blues. Birthplace of rock and roll." The slogan of the official visitor’s bureau in this city rings truer than most. Many passed through the doors of a small, non-descript building on Union Avenue, home of a small enterprise run by Sam Phillips and Marion Keisker, a little label called Sun.

B.B. King recorded here, Howlin’ Wolf was, in Phillip’s opinion, the greatest artist to grace the tiny studio. The first million seller for Sun Records was Carl Perkins’ "Blue Suede Shoes", the biggest was Jerry Lee Lewis’ "Great Balls of Fire."

In 1953, a young kid from Tupelo came in and plunked down his $4.00 to cut two songs, as could anyone during the day. Phillips was out at the time, so Marion Keisker was behind the board at the first recording session for Elvis Presley.

One of the most famous photos in rock history is that of the "King", the "Killer", Perkins, and Johnny Cash gathered around a piano at Sun. It is one of many on the walls today, seen on daily tours by everyone from the bored children of "Boomers" to TV actors; Michael Tucci ("Diagnosis, Murder", "It’s Garry Shandling’s Show") was present with our group.

Little has changed over the decades; the control booth is still utilized regularly. Must’ve been hot within when U2 and B.B. King recorded "When Love Comes to Town", their notes resonating off of the same tiles lining the room when King recorded here as a youngster, and Bono wasn’t even an idea.

Proper music is not just played into a tape machine, of course. It must be taken directly to the people. In Memphis, that means Beale Street. Like similar districts in other cities, Beale Street fell into neglect before being revitalized. Even on a Thursday in October, there’s a little bustle going down.

Many options lie along the pavement, from the small dives with no cover, to the omnipresent Hard Rock Café, which sprouts like kudzu across the surface of the planet. The house band was in at B.B. King’s club, but why pay four bucks for that when you can watch the guys in the park playing for tips.

The lights of Graceland flickered through the trees along Elvis Presley Boulevard as I drove past that night. He impacts the economy in death as he did in life. Graceland’s neighbors are now fast food joints and cheap motels as far as the eye can see. Although, maybe a nearby Krispy Kreme was what Elvis liked about this part of town.

The journey has come full circle in the life of one individual. Can’t really even profess to be a fan of Elvis, but he serves as an important metaphor. The music that connects to the blues has, at its core, the souls of those that bring it to us. There is honesty and living people wrapped up in those notes. No matter how much hype and smoke, the fame and the money, from poverty to privilege, even the King of rock and roll can die on the toilet.

"The thing I learned from John Lee Hooker," Roy Rogers said in Helena, "was ‘It’s got to be real. That’s the only thing.’"

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Blues