(Editors note: Since I let the old Smashin' Transistors site at Homestead laspe I have been occasionally posting some of the interview and articles I did over there. Here's a doozy of one I did with Dale Beavers a couple years back. The photos included are ones I took too.
-Dale)
-Dale)
Strike a
conversation with a blues fan about the music and many topics are likely to come up. It may be about regions of its birth
such as New Orleans, Memphis and the Mississippi Delta. It could possibly
be about how the sound moved north to Chicago and Detroit during and
after World War II in search of work and
better life away from the swamps and cotton fields and where it adopted a louder and tougher sound to match its
surroundings.
Possibly it could be about how in the 60's British bands
like the Rolling Stones, Cream and Led Zeppelin took the sound, refitted it
and sold it back to white American teens who probably who were, most likely,
not familiar with the sound anyway.
Or it's quite possible
you may hear a rant about how most people today think the blues is a middle age
white guy standing on a stage with more money tied up his guitar and amp than
some of his apparent old time heroes ever made off their most famous songs due
to “the man” ripping them off blind of everything.
One thing that
usually doesn't come up though is any association to punk rock.
Both the blues and
punk rock, in their original essences, were music of the downtrodden. Both were pure expression and raw
emotion.
Both howled,
wailed and took very little to make a very big noise.
Born and raised
the son of a honky tonk bar owner and Baptist preacher in Arkansas Dale, aka
the Polecat (a name that was bestowed upon by a musical mentor one night after
some rowdy revelry ) cut his musical teeth playing in assortment of punk
rock-n-roll bands. It wasn't until he met and started playing with down home
and old raw cats like Junior Kimbrough, Cedell Davis and others though that
made up the foundation of what would be Oxford, Mississippi based record label
Fat Possum that he found his inspiration of the kind of music he wanted to play
“for the rest of my life.”
“It's people that
grew up on punk rock, alternative rock are the one's today that are turning on
to blues these days”, states Dale “The Polecat” Beavers.
“I think blues is
the original punk rock anyway, man. I mean, you listen to that Live On Maxwell
Street album (Robert Nighthawk's record
from 1964). Holy shit! Is that thing out of control. I remember seeing the
album cover and Johnny Young's in the background with a battery powered
amplifier and there's Robert Nighthawk with a super reverb in a beat up old
recliner sitting out by a fire hydrant” he laughs. “And they're just rockin'
it, man. It's always about Muddy Waters when people talk about blues going
electric, man but Nighthawk had a few years on him. His stuff was just too wild
for most people at the time and still is now.”
At six and half feet tall and speaking in an accent as
southern as BBQ sauce and thick & deep as swamp made of molasses Mr Beavers
pours himself a Fighting Cock bourbon on the rocks and talks of the early
1990's. He was in his late 20's and discovered the kind of music that touched
the way nothing else had before
“I was roommates
with Bruce Watson (co-owner of Fat Possum) in college down in Louisiana and he
was working in this department store there. Then he got transferred to Oxford,
Mississippi. He always had a recording studio going on and started hooking up
with Matt Johnson (Fat Possum Records main man). They ended up recording what
became Junior Kimbrough's All Night
Long. He calls me the next day saying, “You have got to hear this guy. This is
the most insane blues music I've ever heard” and he starts going on and on for
about an hour about it y'know. You have got to come up here and check this out.
He's got a jukejoint (The legendary Junior's Place in Chulahoma, Mississippi,
which his family ran two years after his death by heart attack followed by a
stroke until the place burned to the ground in 2000) and you gotta come up here
and hang out.”
At first Beavers
just hung around the scene, checking it out, soaking it in, getting up on stage
and occasionally jamming with these elder statesman.
“Then Bruce and
Matt and them guys starting working on Junior's 2nd album "Sad Days,
Lonely Nights". I was called in to help out as an engineer and whatever .
They were recording it at Junior's jukejoint so here we were in pretty much a shack,” he laughs “I mean,
the place was a mess but I ended up playing bass on the record and it was
great.”
“The thing is with
those guys is they'd never rehearse. Going out and playing with those guys was
what we'd call paid rehearsal”, Dale speculates on why one could consider
particular styles of blues direct correlation to punk rock. “None of them ever practiced before a gig. It
was just go out there and do it y'know. Live gigs we're like a free for all.
They were great! You'd go out on the road in Mississippi stopping by to pick up
Junior or RL Burnside or whoever y'know, get them in the van and spend days
playing these little joints all over the place for whoever would want to
listen. And you watch these guys playing, and it was a hell of a lot different
than listening to the records.”
“Well, that seems
to be the case with most live music”, I said to him “It's the atmosphere of it,
right?”
“Well, yeah there
is that but then you sit down and watch these guys play and you realize how
fuckin' simple it is. No one else can play it like them though. It's crazy
shit, man. Junior doing all this snaky almost Indian music thing coming out of
his guitar and whatever. It's more about what's going on with your rhythm hand
and the spaces than the notes you're playing with your other hand. It's this
whole percussion thing, beating the hell out of the guitar and feeling of the
music y'know. As Cedell Davis (Wheel chair bound due to a bout with polio as a
child, the 83 year old Davis is famous
for using butter knife to play slide guitar. Beavers played on his 1998 album
The Horror Of It All then toured Europe with him) said to me, “As long as you
can tap your foot to it. If you can't tap your foot to it, you ain't in time”,
and you know what? He was right.”
From there on he
got lessons on the music's spirit and soul that cannot be taught but can only
be learned finding himself going on the road with Junior Kimbrough.
When asked about
how he got the Kimbrough gig Dale recollects, “He needed a bass player to go
out and play all these shows with. Gary
Burnside (one of R.L. Burnside's 13 offspring) was playing bass for him was a
total nightmare to take on the road and Matt and the Fat Possum guys just
didn't want to have to deal with that anymore y'know. I got his first album,
sat down and learned every bass line off it one night. He's skeptical as hell
y'know because most people couldn't understand a lot of what he was playing but
I had it down! Every song he hit I had it down. “Meet Me In The City”...all of
them, man. He's like “Damn, you can play”! So then I got asked will you go on
tour with Junior and I was like absolutely.”
When thinking
about those shows which spanned coast to coast of the USA the San Francisco
Blues Fest sticks out in his mind.
“We opened up for
Booker T and the MG's and John Lee Hooker there playing for something like
100,000 people. Man, I was like “I've hit it.”
But it was a more
intimate gig that Beavers fondly remembers most.
“It was on the
same tour as that. We had a caravan of all these guys like Junior, R.L., Paul
“Wine” Jones and so on in a bus hitting all these different places. We had left
Salt Lake City and we're off to Sun Valley, Idaho. Straight though that Great Basin
Desert area up there, right? And the bus blows something in the rear end. So
here we are stranded 2 hours from anywhere pretty much. So some guys get off
the bus to go wander around amongst the scorpions and the snakes and shit and
Junior's like, “I ain't getting off the bus.”, so I sat in there with him. He's
got the air conditioner running and there's an acoustic guitar sitting there
and Junior sat there for three hours playing every song he ever knew. Stuff he
used to play a long time ago, y'know, other people's songs like “Crawling
Kingsnake” and all this old stuff but playing it all Junior style, stuff he'd
refuse to play for people at that point in his life because he had his own
songs. And I was like “Man, this is unreal”. I mean, to hear Junior on acoustic
and watching him play it was something else anyway but to hear and watch him
play all these song the public would never hear him do...That was my baptism
there. There was nothing better than that and I'll never forget it. After that
I was like 'Man, I want to be just like that dude”. It definitely changed my
life right there. I took that fork in the road and it's brought me to where I
am.”
The way Beavers
eyes light up underneath his thick as caterpillar eyebrows it's obvious he
likes to reminisce about his times with Kimbrough. He could talk about him for
hours, so I ask, “What was he like? What was it like just hanging out with
him?” Beavers is more than happy to fill
me in.
“He was awesome.
Coolest dude ever. He'd have tons of money in his pocket and never pay for
anything. He'd, like, never by himself a hamburger. “Go get me a hamburger.
I'll pay when you get back.”
He then pauses and
laughs, “He'd never pay you back. You know you weren't gonna get paid for
shit.”
Continuing on
about Kimbrough, Beavers mentions, “You could never even call Junior on the
phone. I drive from Little Rock which is 4 hours away from Holly Springs to go
hook up with him because we'd have a show coming up or whatever and I wouldn't
even call Mildred, his girlfriend, I was coming over. I'd just drive to Holly
Springs and pull in front of Akey Brothers Radio store and there he'd be
sitting out in the front parking lot in his Oldsmobile just pimpin' y'know.
Like clockwork there'd he be just hanging out all day, every day just being
cool. “We've got a gig Junior” I'd tell him. “Well, we better get going then
boy.”
In 1999, Dale
Beavers hooked up with another Dale, Hawkins to be exact. Hawkins, who passed
away in 2010, was one of the forefathers of rock-n-roll most notably for
writing and first performing one of most during songs of the last 60 years
“Suzy Q”.
“I was living in
Memphis for awhile but had gone back to Little Rock. I had this friend who did
a show on the local independent community radio station there. His name's David
Grace. He had been doing this show for 12 years and had never repeated a song
twice in all that time. I would record everything I had going as far as bands I
was in on 4-track. I would send him this stuff and he would play them on
theradio. He was also Dale Hawkins entertainment attorney handling his
royalties and what not. One time he said
to me “Man, You guys should go over Hawkins place and get some shit down on
tape. I was 'Hawkins? As in Dale Hawkins? The guy who wrote Suzy Q? Are you fer
real? And he's, 'Yeah. I've been telling him about you guys.' It would be
cool.”
Beavers learned
though that working with Mr. Hawkins was easier said than done as the
reputation of him being a little crazy from many years of living the not so
healthy rock-n-roll lifestyle proved
true.
“Let me tell you
something. Dale Hawkins was a scorning mother fucker. I mean, he don't like
anybody. We got to his door and here is with his cats all walking around his
legs and he's got a sawed off shot gun in his hand.” It took a little for the
“paranoid as hell and jaded as the day is long” Hawkins to warm up to the idea
of recording with a bunch of younger upstarts who wanted to do something akin
to his early wild and loose records.
After doing an
audition session for him though, Hawkins was excited about making a new record
but still had his own grand ideas floating around in his head.
“I'm going to get
Richard Carpenter (of the 70's smaltz-pop hitmakers the Carpenters) on the
phone” Dale Beavers recalls suggestion
being amongst some other outlandish and outdated ideas of who hawkins thought
should produce the record.
“A lot of people
thought he was dead. He he was getting his chest wings back and out of his
mind. Finally I said, and I had just met him 'Dale, this is the 21 century, man.
That's not how you need to it'.”
But after months of
session and dealing with Hawkin's erratic behavior and hanging out in his
studio in East Little Rock, the self
produced session were under the name Wild Cat Tamer on a label Dale Hawkins
started strictly for the album called Plumtone in 1999.
“It was pretty
cool. People were like 'He's still alive? We helped him out and he helped us”
Beavers says but also mentioned how Hawkins never paid a promised cash payment
for the work. “I called him one night and was asking him about some money. He
tells me, “I was gonna send you some money but I hit a fire hydrant with my
Lincoln and had to get it fixed'. He was probably on his to Waffle House to get
a pecan pie. So, I paid to fix the guy who wrote Suzy Q's Lincoln. It's cool,
man. I ain't worried”.
Dale Hawkins died
in 2010 at the age of 74 from colon cancer.
Beavers shakes his
pack of Marlboro Reds, notices it's empty and asks me if I have some spare
smokes. "I'll fix you another bourbon for swap" he offers.
The 00's brought a
lot of different thing to Beavers world. He married, move to Michigan and
became the father of two kids but along with a domesticated life he needed to
still get out and “lose my mind y'know.”
Getting into
Detroit's garage rock scene in the mid 90's he learned it was just like being
down home with its love for authenticity and respect, though not complete
aping, of the past. “I never even planned on moving to Detroit” Beavers tells
me “but my second (now ex) wife was from Michigan so that's where I ended
up".
Meeting people
around the town he thought “Detroit's cool. It's really rough around the edges
and all that but I like that. I can hang out with these folks y'know.”
Not long after
moving to Detroit, Memphis compatriots Jack Yarber and Greg Cartwright of the
lamented 90's blues punk band the Oblivians were in town to record their 3rd
album as their on-going country and southern soul inflected and punk rock
rooted project Compulsive Gamblers-the much acclaimed Crystal Gazing Luck
Amazing.
“I think that
album is a masterpiece, man. One of my proudest moments. I was living up here
for just a few months by then and Greg gives me a call and say's “We're coming
up there to record at Jim Diamond's
studio. Do you want to play with us? And I'm like cool-got any songs?
He's like 'Don't worry about. You'd be better if you don't know anything and
just go in and play.' Top notch band and to just go in sight unseen with some
great songs by Greg and Jack and to rip out this rock-n-roll record....That's
what it's all about. That punk rock, that's rock-n-roll. That's the blues, No
bullshit, Just play it and don't worry.”
Also in the band
was Jeff Meier, who's CV includes Rocket 455 and the Detroit Cobras and again
bandmates with Beavers in the Shanks backing up Detroit RnB legend Nathaniel
Mayer both live and on Mayer's 2005
raucous soul album for the Fat Possum label “I Just Want To Be Held”.
Meier describes
those times as “a real drunk-fest. Band, audience, stage crew, doorman...
everyone.”
When asked what
Beavers brought to the table in a city rich with its own heritage and style he
says, “He always brings a rock-n-roll
attitude and a deceptive simplicity to every group he's in. Some of the stuff
he plays seems easy, but you try playing it! There's a hillbilly sensibility,
too. Not your typical suburban wanna be redneck... he's the real deal.”
Daniel Kroha of
90's the Motor City garage soul punk legends the Gories echo's such sentiments
as well “That crazy ol' polecat!? “ he grins “He's got the fire and brimstone
of a Baptist preacher.”
Sometimes though,
the combination of Detroit and the Polecat with his fire and brimstone would
get out of hand. It wouldn't be uncommon for people to have to step back when
he decided it was time to get sideways. “He's a train comin’ round the bend, or
maybe just a trainwreck.” says Meier “But don't worry, he can take it just as
well as he dishes it out. If he messes with you, give it back to him. He likes
it.”
“How many times did
he test your patience” I ask.
“Almost every time
I've hung out with him! Seriously, Dale's a rockin’ cat...One that comes to
mind is the time he fell down the stairs at Jacoby's in downtown Detroit. He
ended up landing on top me and my wife, Gwen. Of course, it was right in front
of the editor of one of the Detroit weeklies, so it made the gossip column. He
did everything he could to keep his wife from getting a hold of a copy.”
Pennsylvania based,
cigar box guitar builder and musician Christian Beshore, who comes to Michigan
on a fairly regular to play solo gigs and to collaborate with Beavers in a band
known as the Girls From Hateville, has been a friend of Beavers for several years now. He's had his fair share of wondering “what the hell did I get myself into” moments with him as well.
“Tested my
patience?” he repeats back to me when I ask him the question.
“Every moment I am
around him, or even on the phone with him. The craziest time I ever had with Dale I
won't repeat for you to print.”
Well, how about
one I can print then?
“The first time
he ever really tested me was when we were playing the Detroit Chopper Show
and we were out drinking. He insisted we find some bar. We drove around for
about an hour in one block, circling the bar...when we left it took the gps on
my phone to get us home.”
The thing is
though is no matter how much Beavers does to drive people on the brink of
pulling their hair out and leaving him stranded somewhere is his honest to
goodness southern “charm." The guy knows how to make an impression.
Beshore remembers the first time he met him.
“He was eating a
hoagie, sitting in a La-Z-Boy and watching some cable TV crap. my impression
was that he was not that cool. That changed about a minute later when that
crazy fool opened his mouth. His “Hey, y'all” voice could not be doubted.”
Being inspired and
crazy comes with a price and Beaver's bill came due in 2010 when his wife filed
for divorce. Having two young children he knew he just couldn't pull up roots.
“New Orleans,
Memphis, Detroit, New York. They were cool but I grew up in a small town in
Arkansas. My dad did outboard motor mechanics and we were complete river rats
y'know. Telephoning catfish, Illegal deer hunting...from boats! You name it.
The thought of wanting to live on a small town on the water would always come
back to me. Y'know, being a carpenter and having fishing boat type of trip,
right?”
After several gigs
over a period of few month in Port Huron, the thought of it being that kind of
town kept gnawing at his thoughts. “I wanted to get out of Detroit. I just
wanted to get away from all that shit. I took to this place.”
At first the small
but insular underground music in Port Huron took him as a curiosity. Here was
this hillbilly who had toured the world and played with some of the most
revered unsung legends of Rock-n-Roll and the Blues and for some reason wanted
to live in small town away isolated from any big music scene. There wasn't much
to offer outside of a house party here and a dive bar gig there and it's not
exactly the highest focus of places-especially for someone who had been awarded
best Blues Artist in Detroit as he was voted in “Real Detroit” magazine in
2009.
I mean, here's 6
and a half foot cat that talks like boisterous Foghorn Leghorn standing on a
stage with a well used vintage hollow body guitar, playing through a Fender
tube amp that looks like it seen many a day in the back of a pick up truck in
sweltering and sweating in the southern sun, wailing though a mic akin to the
ones guys like Elvis sang through back in the 50's with his rhythm
accompaniment being his right foot
coming down and a homemade wooden stompin' box. He's out playing blues festivals
and what not all over the country. What would motivate him to move in a podunk
like Port Huron, Michigan?
Maybe they weren't
suspicious of him as they were perplexed perhaps.
As time went on
and people got to know him better he became accepted as one of the town's newly
adopted sons. As Benny Browsowski, singer of Blue Water Area based greaser punk
band Smackmadam put it, “Dale doesn't really fit in the local scene which is a
good part of his appeal. Instead of suburban white boys forcing themselves to
play music they like but don't feel-he's an instant elder statesman of the
blues. Playing music he feels.”
When talking about
their differences in drink of choice, Benny says, “Dale's preference for
bourbon over moonshine shows he's more of a gentlemen than a roughneck. It by
no means implies he’s not willing to get down and dirty.”
In the summer of
2010, Beavers signed a lease for a place and now his ID carries a 48060
zipcode. “This is my home now. Ya'll is cool people. You needed some trouble.
I'm finding it for you.”
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