Percy Mayfield Lost Love: The Singles As & Bs 1947-1962

Percy Mayfield
Lost Love: The Singles As & Bs 1947-1962
Jasmine (UK)

Another English public domain reissue of vintage rhythm and blues brings us Percy Mayfield's first 27 singles (whether 78s or 45s) and a previously unissued couple of tracks. While Mayfield's Specialty recordings were subject of classic reissues some time ago, they may hard to find. Furthermore, here are his recordings for Gru-Tone and Supreme that predate his joining Specialty, and also are recordings Checker, Cash, Imperial, 7 Arts, and Tangerine.

The album opens with the two part jump and jive "Jack You Ain't Nowhere," and then his first recording of "Two Years of Torture," both with an unidentified band although his vocal is under-recorded on the latter two. When he signed with Supreme he had a pair of singles including a remake of "Two Years of Torture," with a band that included Maxwell Davis, Marshall Royal, and Chuck Norris and much better recorded presaging the time with Specialty. His first record for Specialty, with a band that included Maxwell Davis as well as Jack McVea, Gene Phillips, Red Callender and Lee Young, had the classics "Please Send Me Someone To Love," and "Strange Things Happening." So many classics are here including "Lost Love (Baby Please Come Back to Me)," "The Hunt Is One," "The River's Invitation," "The Bachelor Blues," "My Heart Is Crying," with Maxwell Davis being a constant on these. Besides his tenor saxophonist, I suspect Davis was responsible for the arrangements and leading the studio band.

 While Davis is not present on the recordings for Cash and Checker, those sides produced gems like "No.43 (My Story About A Woman)," with a choice Fred Clark tenor saxophone solo, and the moody "The Bluest Blues." "Please Believe Me" is an unusual ballad recording with a sweeter sound than earlier selections, while he produced a urban blues gem "My Heart is a Prisoner," with the guitar more prominent in the backing along with some tough tenor sax. One of his last Specialty singles was the jazzy cocktail ballad, "When Did You Leave Heaven" while for 7 Arts he recorded "Ha Ha In The Daytime, Boo Hoo At Night," a tune he would remake a bit more emphatically later. A Tangerine coupling included Ray Charles, Hank Crawford, Teddy Edwards and Chuck Norris include the hard swinging big band groove of "Never No More," which would also be on his LPs that he recorded for Ray Charles' label. Mayfield would continue to make strong music beyond the singles documented here including albums for Brunswick and RCA Victor along with a single for Atlantic.

Besides one of the great songwriters of the blues leading him to be called "The Poet Laureate of the Blues," Percy Mayfield was a suave, sophisticated singer and a major touring attraction until his face was heavily disfigured in an automobile accident. While his career as a star was over, the music here shows that his music remained original and distinctive. Some of the material (the non-Specialty recordings) on this is rare and even those having the Specialty reissues might want this to fill-in gaps in their collection of his recordings. There is a discography of the songs here and astute notes from Dave Penny. For those not having much by him, this does present the core of his recorded legacy.

I purchased this. Here is a later recording than that on this collection of "The River's Invitation."

Phillip Walker Going Back Home

Its been way too long since Philip Walker had a new studio album. Delta Groove has just issued Going Back Home, that finds the Gulf Coast native and longtime West Coast bluesman in solid form. The strength of the disc is Walker’s characteristically strong vocals (with just a hint of sandpaper in his voice and his guitar playing which rock and swing at the same time.

Producer Randy Chortkoff has selected a solid backing band that includes guitarist Rusty Zinn, Jeff Turmes on bass (and sax for a few tracks, Richard Innes on drums as well as provided Walker with a diverse range of material from the pens of Percy Mayfield (the opening Lying Woman), Lowell Fulson (Mama Bring Your Clothes Back Home), Lightnin’ Hopkins (Don’t Think ‘Cause Your Pretty), his old friend Cornelius Greene aka Lonesome Sundown (Leave My Money Alone and If You See My Baby), Ray Charles (Blackjack), Champion Jack Dupree (Bad Blood), and Frankie Lee Sims (Walking With Frankie) along with several originals from Chortkoff (although Honey Stew is suggestive of a Lightnin Hopkins recording).

Eddie Snow’s Mean Mean Woman features an accompaniment derived from Junior Parker’s Mystery Train. The backing is a bit too upfront at times and the music loses some of its regional flavor with the somewhat anonymous groove. One wishes the rhythm section was not right on the beat at times such as on the two Lonesome Sundown blues where more of the laconic Excello groove would have been beneficial. The band might also have limbered up on some of the grooves of Lightnin’ Hopkins’ Jewel Recordings at times.

These are still very good recordings, with Walker first rate throughout and his take on Blackjack, Leave My Money Alone, Bad Blood and Walking With Frankie are particularly outstanding, and if not a perfect date, there is still plenty to enjoy.

This review appeared in the April 2007 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 292) and my review copy was sent by either Delta Groove or a publicist for them.  


Here is the late Phillip Walker in performance.

The Legendary Maxwell Davis Was A Wailin' Daddy.

One of the unjustly forgotten giants of post-war rhythm and blues was the late Maxwell Davis. Its been about four decades since the tenor saxophonist, composer and arranger passed away and his legacy is quite substantial and those that remember him speak at times in awe of his musical genius. The late Jerry Leiber was quoted, “… Maxwell Davis … I doubt if you’ve ever heard that name — but Maxwell Davis made records, he was the quiet producer / arranger for the Mesner Brothers at Aladdin; the BIhari Brothers at Modern and Art Rupe at Specialty. Maxwell Davis must have made a hundred hits, not 12 or 17. And nobody knows who Maxwell Davis is.” The quote os from Dave Penny’s liner essay to a new three CD compilation devoted to Maxwell Davis, Wailin’ Daddy: The Best of Maxwell Davis 1945-1959. This reissue is part of The Architects of Rock’N’Roll series on Fantastic Voyage. One CD is devoted to recordings under Davis’ own name, and the other two to recordings he played on during the forties and the fifties. On the latter two there are ,mostly obscure collaborations by Davis. There is a follow-up volume planned that hopefully will include many of the greatest of the hundred hits, although with impending changes to European copyright law that may not happen.

As indicated, Disc One is devoted to recordings made under Maxwell Davis’ name and display the same authority on tenor that those familiar with his solos behind T-Bone Walker, Amos Milburn, Percy Mayfield and others know. Davis had a fat tone and could have a slight bit of honk in his sound but also play with a warmth on a ballad. If he had toured and not been a hired gun for countless sessions, one suspects he could have been as big as some of the best known rhythm and blues tenor saxophonists of his time. And of course on the blues, his solos still sound timeless. Under his name he had a coupling of Lonesome Road Blues and Honey Dripper that featured vocalist Marion Nichols. Then there is the driving honk of the swinging Hung Out, or a session co-led with alto saxophonist September in the Rain, where his playing exhibits elements of the approaches of both Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins. There is the 2AM mode of Belmont Special, a lively instrumental cover of Hank Williams’ Hey, Good Lookin’, and Blue Shuffle, an instrumental reconstruction of Lloyd Price’s Lawdy Miss Clawdy.

The second CD includes 28 selections of him in a sideman role, opening with an instrumental from a Helen Humes date and ending with Amos Milburn’s Pot Luck Boogie. There is shouter Jo Jo Adams singing Hard Headed Woman Blues, while Helen Humes delivers the swing-jive It’s Better To Give Than Receive. There is Davis as part of Charles Mingus Sextet, wailing behind Gene Phillips on Big Legs, and less familiar recordings from Crown Prince Waterford, Lloyd Glenn and Gatemouth Brown. Then his tenor enlivens Joe Turner (with Pete Johnson on piano) on Don’t Talk Me To Death, a reworking of the classic boogie woogie Roll ‘Em Pete, as well as Pete Johnson’s Half Tight Boogie that has the great boogie woogie and blues pianist more to the front before Davis takes a terrific solo. On on this second disc are a Jimmy Witherspoon jump blues, early Lowell Fulson, and Davis on a date led by drummer Lee Young, Lester’s brother.

The third disc opens with Calvin Boze’s bouncy jump blues Waiting and Drinking, and closes with Little Willie Littlefield’s K.C. Loving (titled here Kansas City after the later Wilbert Harrison hit). Others on this include Floyd Dixon in his Amos Milburn vein in a duet with Mari Jones, Real Lovin’ Mama; Helen Humes handling He May Be Yours with Davis and a hot big band; and Joe Liggins with Going Back To New Orleans. Davis had played on Ellis Walsh’s original. He could fit in on such different sessions as an atmospheric instrumental by Red Callendar, the relatively unsophisticated blues of Peppermint Harris and the suave, modern jazzy blues of T-Bone Walker. A session with Mabel Scott produced the blues that gives this compilation its title and then he can be heard soloing behind June Christy and Ray Anthony. Less surprising is his work behind Jimmy Nelson on Cry Hard Luck, and Percy Mayfield for Loose Lips. Dave Penny notes his close association with Davis, noting that he set Mayfield’s poetic lyrics to music. While only one B.B. King recording is included, Davis was responsible for most of King’s recordings until the late sixties. There is also Cordella De Milo’s I Ain’t Gonna Hush, an answer to Joe Turner’s Honey Hush, with slashing Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson guitar, a track from Louis Jordan, and also Young Jessie and George ‘Harmonica’ Smith.

Even though most of these selections are ‘obscure,’ there is a consistency of quality and throughout Davis leaves a strong imprint from his strong saxophone and his arrangements where heard. Certainly anyone who loves jump blues and where the blues and jazz idioms intersect will enjoy this. The only possible quibble is the lack of session personnel. Dave Penny’s perceptive liner essay adds to the value provided by the music. This is an important reissue and hopefully there will be a follow-up of his better known recordings.

This was a purchase. Here from You Tube is one of the recordings that can be found on Wailin' Daddy.

The Singular Genius of Ray Charles

Singular Genius: The Complete ABC Singles is the aptly titled box set issued by Concord of all of the singles issued by Ray Charles after he left Atlantic Records and signed with ABC Paramount. This complements the reissue of Charles’ Atlantic singles, The Birth of Soul that was issued a number of years ago and takes us through 1970 and through some very familiar and iconic recordings. The 106 tracks are spread over 5 physical CDs and contain a booklet with an overview of the music from Billy Vera and session information about the selections included. As Vera notes, some of Charles’ latter recordings.

As Vera observes, fans of Charles often are divided between those with a preference for the early R&B singes with the legendary eight piece band and those who enjoy his latter recordings often with a big band or full orchestra that cover a wider variety of material. It should be noted that even Charles Atlantic singles and recordings transcended the blues, rhythm and blues to include jazz. And while with Atlantic, he recorded the brilliant album The Genius of Ray Charles which indicated his future direction with big band and orchestral charts from Quincy Jones and Ralph Burns.

One reason perhaps some prefer the Atlantic period is the more homogenous material and musical framework of those recordings. ABC gave Charles greater leeway in the material he recorded and Sid Feller oversaw Charles recordings, as opposed to pro due them. So there was considerable variety in the material including pop and country songs as well as blues and jazz classics. He would, in some cases, be backed by a big band, on others with an orchestra with strings, and there also were some small combo recordings. Furthermore on some recordings there would be a vocal chorale as opposed to gospel-based Raeletts.

While his earliest recordings were on ABC Paramount, Charles was able to have his own label, Tangerine where he could record musical idols like Louis Jordan and the sophisticated blues of the songwriter Percy Mayfield who contributed the signature Charles recording Hit the Road Jack, along with The Danger Zone, At the Club and Hide Nor Hair. There are the duets with Betty Carter including Baby Its Cold Outside, which was a bit more sophisticated than either the Louis Jordan and Ella Fitzgerald recording or Hot Lips Page and Pearl Bailey.

While with ABC, Charles would record his pathfinding albums of country music and many of those classic recordings are also included as are his singular interpretations of The Beatles’ Yesterday and Eleanor Rigby. Standards such as Without Love and “Without a Song” (in two parts, one a vocal, the other instrumental) are mixed with the Harlan Howard classic that Charles invigorated “Busted,” and he never forgot his roots in the blues withWorried Life Blues (the flip to Sticks and Stones), Sam Cooke’s Laughin’ and Clownin’, and the Chuck Willis classics Feel So Bad and What Am I Living For. The latter number has a country flavor in the backing (which also evokes Sam Cooke's Bring it Home To Me) with the choral backing and the steel guitar in the orchestral backing along with a nice bluesy guitar solo. Not that long after he would record his classic rendition of America The Beautiful.

Its fascinating that on his last singles he would cover Silas Hogan's Every Saturday Night, with a smoldering big band rendition, and Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire. One might argue that the performances as a whole are not as consistent as the Atlantic recordings. Perhaps its the wide range of material he covers and not everything comes across with the emotional gravity of his best work. With a few rare exceptions, Charles was able to invest so much of himself in his music and placed his own stamp on his recordings and performances. On occasion he would not be able to transcend the sentimentality of a few songs, but that is the exception as can be heard here.

Oddly, my only complaint is that extracting the CDs from the box they come in can be tricky at times. Singular Genius is an apt title, and one can readily doubt whether we will ever see another performer with so much soul and so much musical depth. That genius and depth is evident here.

I received a review copy of the box from a publicist or Concord. This would obviously make a great gift for the musical aficionado in your family or circle of good friends.

Specialty Profiles Evidence of Art Rupe's Hall of Fame Career

Art Rupe was just honored as one of the two Ahmet Ertegun honorees (to non-musicians for contributions to Rock and Roll) by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and will be honored along with Dr. John, Neil Diamond, and Tom Waits. Rupe was an important independent record company pioneer whose Specialty Records label produced some of the classic jump blues, gospel and early rock and roll recordings. As Billy Vera says in the booklet accompanying the 5 CD box set, The Specialty Story, “If Art Rupe and his Specialty Records, had done nothing more than give us Little Richard, he would still deserve a place in the rock ’n’ roll triumvirate along with Sam Phillips (Sun Records) and Leonard and Phil Chess (Chess Records). … In little over ten years activity, Specialty Records growth paralleled, and perhaps defined, the evolution of black popular music—from the “race” music of the 1940s to the rock ’n’ roll of the 1950s.”


Specialty issued some amazing recordings. The core of the label’s output can be found on the afore-mentioned The Specialty Story which includes (among its 130 recordings) recordings that charted as well as recordings by artists or are of songs that would later become important. The box, specifically does exclude Specialty’s jazz recordings and only provides a token representation of the important Gospel catalog of the label. After Fantasy acquired the Specialty catalog (in 1990 I believe), they began issuing a great number of reissues from the Specialty catalog. Concord Music acquired the Fantasy catalog and have some new reissues of such material as well as many of the fantasy reissues remain still available. Concord did in 2006 issue some budget reissues that I reviewed initially for the December 2006 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 289), which I am posting today in part to salute Mr. Rupe.

Those purchasing these budget reissues may well wish to check out the prior excellent reissues of these artists as well as releases by such important performers as Guitar Slim, Little Richard, Brother Joe May, The Pilgrim Travelers, Don & Dewey and Wyonna Carr.


Concord Music Group’s release of six initial Specialty Profile budget reissues hopefully will introduce some to the great music that has been issued by Fantasy Records prior to Concord’s acquisition of the label last year. Originally called Juke Box, Specialty was one of the independent labels that emerged after World War II that was central in the release of so much rhythm’n’blues, gospel and blues as well as some of the most important pioneering rock ’n’ roll recordings. These releases have 14 performances by the featured artist and a second bonus CD with ten performances by various Specialty artists.

Roy Milton, inspired by the big bands led his Solid Senders, the prototypical jump blues band, that in its tight, punchy sound captured some of the flavor of the bigger bands on a program of blues and jump numbers. Milton was a swinging drummer and an ingratiating vocalist with a terrific band that featured the wonderful pianist Camille Howard. Milton had many charting records, which became staples of the emerging rhythm and blues music. Two of his recordings Milton’s Boogie, his version of Count Basie’s Boogie Woogie and Milton’s Hop Skip & Jump were recorded by Elmore James pianist Little Johnnie Jones while such numbers as R.M. Blues and Information Blues still appeal with the strong driving swing and superb musicianship. This is terrific stuff.

John Lee Hooker recorded prolifically between the late forties and early fifties for a variety of labels including Specialty who acquired sides produced by Bernie Besman in Detroit. The 14 selections presented by Specialty capture Hooker on his driving one-chord boogies such as his revisiting of his first hit, Boogie Chillen, his slow brooding lament about a cheating woman which he would later visit for Vee-Jay, I’m Mad, and the hot duet with harmonica player Eddie Burns, Burnin’ Hell, where he proclaims “Ain’t no heaven, ain’t no burning hell” as he lays down a hot boogie guitar riff.“ There is a small combo version of Rosco Gordon’s No More Doggin’. This is this writer’s favorite period of John Lee Hooker’s recording with some of his most powerful recordings to which this disc is an excellent introduction.

After Fats Domino, probably no New Orleans artist had the impact of one Lloyd Price whose recording Lawdy Miss Clawdy, was one of the first rhythm and blues hit recordings to cross over to a white audience in a massive fashion. Price went on to a celebrated recording and performing career. The 14 selections here come from two CDs of his music and is a reasonable sample of his earliest recordings, dating from 1952 or 1953 with the exception of 1956’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Dance. Price’s earliest recordings for Specialty had him backed by Dave Bartholomew’s legendary studio band with Fats Domino on piano for the Lawdy Miss Clawdy session while later sessions included pianists Edward Frank and Huey ‘Piano’ Smith and such horn players as Wallace Davenport and Herb Hardesty. These tracks are classic New Orleans R&B with tracks like Mailman Blues, or Where You At? being hot rockers. Price’s youth perhaps leads to some vocals sounding as a bit overwrought (If Crying Was Murder).


Larry Williams was Lloyd Price’s second cousin, and born in New Orleans although his family moved to the West Coast in his youth, returning to the New Orleans a couple of times, including stints with his cousin as driver and valet and then briefly with Fats Domino. He joined Specialty around the time Little Richard had quit music and with hits like Bony Moronie, Short Fat Fanny and Dizzy Miss Lizzy, which also influenced an imaginative John in Liverpool. He was a solid pianist, pounding out his boogie rocking licks backed by some of the best studio bands in Hollywood with transplanted New Orleans drummer Earl Palmer anchoring things. These were splendid rock and roll recordings. There is a nice rendition of his cousin’s Just Because along with Sonny Bono’s High School Dance and She Said Yeah, the coupling Bad Boy and Slow Down, covered by the Beatles, and Little School Girl, a reworking of the blues classic Good Morning Little Schoolgirl. Williams could not handle success leading to drug problems and an early death, but his legacy is these terrific recordings.

Percy Mayfield was labeled The Poet Laureate of the Blues, for his wonderfully crafted sophisticated blues. As a performer, he sang with an intimacy that matched the sophistication of his lyrics. Until disfigured in an auto accident he had the looks to make him a major star and still remained an major songwriter (hired by Rat Charles) as well as a performer who continued to make thoughtful and sophisticated recordings until his death. His songs, including Please Send Me Someone to Love, Strange Things Happening, The River’s Invitation, Lost Love (aka Baby Please) and Lost Mind, have become blues standards and his original recordings are terrific. Given that only 14 selections were chosen, Mayfield’s early demo of Hit the Road, Jack, might have been omitted along with the duet with Joy Hamilton, Sugar Mama-Peachy Papa, as they are below the level of these other included recordings.


The last of the reissues is devoted to the legendary Sam Cooke with the Soul Stirrers and includes of a nice sampling of his early gospel recordings along with several of his earliest pop recordings. Nine of the selections are Cooke as a member of the Soul Stirrers in which he shares the lead with Paul Foster whose vocals are as remarkable as Cooke’s. Listen to the closing I’m Gonna Build Right on That Shore, where Foster takes the first lead with Cooke taking the lead mid- song and then the two trade lead verses. Its a remarkable performance but just one of several classic gospel recordings here including renditions of Thomas Dorsey’s Peace in the Valley, Cooke’s Touch the Hem of His Garment and Jesus Gave Me Water. The five pop performances by Cooke include I’ll Come Running Back to You, Lovable and I Don’t Want to Cry, but Cooke’s mostly are overshadowed by his later pop recordings. Still, this is a fine overview of early Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers recordings that sound fresh even today.

Garrett's Percy Mayfield Tribute is Nice Effort

Singer-guitarist Amos Garrett latest release is, Get Way Back: A Tribute to Percy Mayfield, an affectionate tribute to the Poet Laureate of the Blues (Stoney Plain). Mayfield has long been a favorite for Garrett and his biggest influence as a singer and Garrett has chosen a nice selection of songs including My Jug and I, Stranger in My Hometown, The Country, River’s Invitation, Ha Ha in the Daytime, and “Lost Mind, among the eleven performances. He has a nice backing band which is a small scaled version of some of the bands that Mayfield recorded with for Tangerine and RCA with. Garrett’s baritone and low-key style is akin to Mayfield’s as well although perhaps it makes comparison with Mayfield harder to avoid compared with the late Johnny Adams, whose magnificent album of Mayfield compositions, Walking on a Tightrope, is arguably the definitive Mayfield tribute album. As amiable and likable as Garrett's renditions here are (and the solid restrained playing is especially praiseworthy), Garrett is simply not Mayfield’s equal (much less Adams' equal) as a vocalist, and his phrasing falls a bit short. There is much to like about this recording, and it is a good effort, but it does not entirely hit its target. sat 7 out of 10 on a ratings scale.