Thursday, February 21, 2013

Delbert McClinton: The Jealous Kind


The Blues Brothers had a Delbert McClinton song on one of their albums.  That tune was B Movie Boxcar Blues.    What a song!  The lyrics are unbelievable creative - such as...

Caught a ride into South Dakota
With two girls in a light blue Desoto
One's name was Jane, the other was plain
But they both had racing motors...

Next I caught a ride with a gamblers wife
Lay down, she had a brand new Rambler
She parked on the other side of town
She layed the Rambler down
She said she could dig if I'd knew her...

As a song-writer, he reminds of me JJ Cale a bit - based mainly on the qualitiy of songs they wrote, that many other artists performed their songs and made them hits, and where they are both from.  Oklahoma and Texas, respectively.  He was was born in Lubbock, Texas, and soon moved to Fort Worth.   Starting out in a bar band called The Straitjackets, who played backing to Sonny Boy Williamson II, Howlin' Wolf, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Jimmy Reed.  McClinton recorded several regional singles before hitting the national chart in 1962, playing harmonica on Bruce Channel's "Hey! Baby."  On a subsequent package tour in England, he allegedly taught John Lennon on the finer points of blues harmonica playing.  Late on in LA, he paired up another Texan, Glen Clark, to perform a combination of country and soul music.  Emmylou Harris had a No. 1 hit in 1978 with one of his songs- "Two More Bottles of Wine."

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thanks for commenting!