 The Best Doo Wop Club On The Net The Doo Wop Cafe is dedicated to preserving the best music there ever was ... vocal group harmony of the 1950s. We also love "Oldies" of all kinds and R&B. But, most of all, we believe in having fun along the way ! Come and join us. |
|
Once upon a time, there was Charles Brown, Amos Milburn, Little Willie Littlefield and a host of lesser-knowns like Nelson Alexander, Billy Valentine and who-knows-who-else. On the distaff side, there were Hadda Brooks, Camille Howard, Mabel Scott and Nellie Lutcher. Some are still with us, but the originals are dying off all too quickly.  But we do still have Floyd. He's still performing and still sounding just great. As recently as 1996, his album for Alligator Records, Wake Up And Live, won a W.C. Handy Blues Award. He was born in Marshall, Texas on 8 February 1929. Floyd says that Marshall is "Near Tyler, Texas, 204 miles from Houston, 39 miles from Shreveport, Louisiana and 153 miles from Dallas." Let it be known right here that Floyd Dixon has a prodigious memory for numbers. He can recall, it seems, every dollar amount he's ever been paid for his services over the years as well as every address of every building he's ever entered. Floyd moved with his family to Los Angeles at age 13. The sensitive young boy cried so much over his dog Jack who was left behind that he moved back home by himself. There, he lived in a tree house in the woods and survived on nuts and berries, along with the occasional rabbit caught by Jack. For awhile, young Floyd worked in a bowling alley, setting up pins from 4pm until midnight, earning as much as $100 a week and turning most of it over to his grandmother. But when "...she took my money and ran off, that broke my heart." Thus motivated by the hard realities of dysfunctional family life, he returned to Los Angeles and his mother. High school years were spent at Thomas Jefferson High School, where he graduated in 1947. "Jeff High," as it's locally known, was famous for its music teacher, Sam Browne, who encouraged generations of stellar alumni like Dexter Gordon, O.C. Smith, Ernie Andrews, Etta James and Jesse Belvin, among others. Fellow classmate and school football star Melvin Lightsey would later cover Floyd's tune, "Call Operator 210" with bandleader Johnny Otis under his stage name, Mel Walker. "All the Lightsey brothers were great athletes in school," says Floyd.  Floyd was more of a sports fan than athlete; he rarely
misses a Dodgers game on TV. He also practiced the blues constantly on
the school piano. When some of the other kids went to Mr. Browne to
complain, the teacher reprimanded them, "Don't criticize him because he
plays the blues. You like bebop or whatever, but he might become a
famous blues singer."A fan of Charles Brown, Floyd found out where the star lived. In those days before integration afforded blacks the opportunity to live where they pleased, the black bourgeoisie lived alongside the working class. "Charles Brown lived at 1275 West 35th Street. I used to see his grandfather Conquest in the yard," recalled Floyd. "One day I asked him, `Does Charles Brown live here?' He said he did and I asked could I meet him, so he took me inside. I told him, `They say I sing like you' and he said `Well let me hear you.'" Brown liked what he heard and spent many an afternoon showing the aspiring pianist various licks and chords. "Everybody came to his house: Sammy Davis, Ivory Joe Hunter, Frankie Laine. I learned how to play in different keys from him." Brown later recorded Floyd's song, "Homesick Blues," for a #5 hit in 1949. After winning first prize three times at the Million Dollar Theater on Broadway downtown and talent shows at Johnny Otis and Bardu Ali's Barrelhouse club in Watts, it was suggested that Floyd make a record. He went to see Jules Bihari at Modern. "They were up on Robertson, near Santa Monica Boulevard [in what is now West Hollywood]. I went in there and asked if I could show him a some songs. He had a couple musicians there and told them to play behind me. I sang them one time through and Jules said, `You wanna hear it back? That's good enough to put out.' He gave me $100 and told me to go down and join the union." Before long, the tune, "Dallas Blues" was being played by disc jockey Hunter Hancock and Floyd was driving a brand new Mercury station wagon to the personal appearances he sandwiched in between his day job at a sauerkraut factory. The first record reached #10 and the follow-up, "Mississippi Blues," hit #14. By this time, 1949, Charles Brown and bassist Eddie Williams had quit Johnny Moore's Three Blazers. Williams asked Floyd to join himself, guitarist Mitchell "Tiny" Webb and drummer Ellis "Slow" Walsh in forming Eddie Williams & his Brown Buddies. The group recorded a #4 hit, "Broken Hearted," for Supreme, a label owned by black dentist Al Patrick. They also recorded the original version of "Saturday Night Fish Fry," with Walsh singing lead. "I wish I could find the papers we signed," recalls Floyd. "All four of us were [writers] on that tune." When Supreme held back release of the song, Louis Jordan cut it for one of the biggest hits of his illustrious career. Unfortunately, the credited writers wound up being Jordan, Al Carters and Ellis Walsh. "I'm not mad," says Floyd today, "Slow was about to lose his house and he needed the money badly." Walsh also wrote "Going Back To New Orleans," recording it for London. The tune was covered by Joe Liggins and decades later revived by Dr. John. Despite having a banner year in 1949, with Jimmy Witherspoon's "Ain't Nobody's Business," Paula Watson's "A Little Bird Told Me" and the Brown Buddies' "Broken Hearted," Supreme went under "...and nobody got a quarter. Not twenty-five cents," says Floyd, "and Patrick wound up owning a bunch of office buildings downtown." Floyd was living in the home of songwriter Mark Hurley, who is credited with some of the tunes both Floyd and Charles Brown recorded. Around this time, Floyd's mother passed away and he asked Jules Bihari for $200 to bury her. Perhaps miffed over Floyd's surreptitious recordings for Supreme, Jules refused. So Floyd went to the infamous Don Robey, who "gave me $2000 to cut eight sides" for his label, Peacock. One #8 hit, "Sad Journey Blues," resulted. When payment was not forthcoming, Floyd went to Aladdin chief Eddie Mesner and asked that he buy the artist out of his contract with Robey. "They were at 451 North Canon Drive in Beverly Hills," says Floyd. Today the address is a parking lot. Mesner not only bought Floyd's contract, but his Peacock masters as well, to avoid competition with the records Floyd was about to make for Aladdin. "Eddie said, `I'm only gonna put out 500 of each,'" to fulfill the contract.  The recordings Floyd
made for Aladdin are perhaps his finest. The backing bands include
Johnny and Oscar Moore, both major guitar gods of the era, and bassist
Johnny Miller. Oscar and Miller were both members of the original King
Cole trio and their backing of Floyd is wonderful on hits like
"Telephone Blues" and "Call Operator 210," both of which charted at #4.
The Johnny Otis/Mel Walker cover of the latter also made it to #4.
Other musicians on the Aladdin dates include tenor saxophonist Maxwell
Davis, guitarist Roy Hayes (who "could play Johnny Moore's style better
than anybody," says Floyd), Eddie Williams and drummer Monk McFadden.Some of the songs on these sessions were sung by Mari Jones, Johnny Moore's mistress and a mediocre talent at best. But she had a couple children by Moore, which insured her a spot on the group's record dates. Big John Hopkins, former road manager for Floyd's friend, Sammy Davis, Jr., was now working for Lionel Hampton and suggested Floyd submit some tunes. "I already knew Gladys [Hamp's wife and manager], and she told me to bring some songs around, too. So I went down to their house on 10th and Central, near the Coca-Cola plant. That was a real thuggish neighborhood, but they had this big house," Floyd remembers. "I knocked on the door and [drummer] Curley [Hamner] asked if I was expected. Big John told him to let me in. I played about ten tunes and she liked four and told me to go in and rehearse them with Hamp. I was playing in B natural and he said, `You like them off keys, don't you Gates? Can you play in G?' So I rehearsed in G and he liked my licks. He called it `counterpoint.' I didn't know what counterpoint was! That night, I taught the songs to [Hampton's blues singer] Sonnie [Parker] and we cut `em the next day." The session for M-G-M was Sonnie, backed by Floyd, Hampton and a contingent from Hamp's big band under the name, the Hamptones. One of the tunes, "Sampson's Boogie," wound up with Floyd's name as writer, while another, "Helpless," was credited to Gladys on the label. "Hamp told me he'd tell them to fix it, but they never did." Disc jockey Joe Adams, later manager of Ray Charles, used the record as his theme song for years. In between recording and writing, Dixon toured incessantly. "Our agent, William Morris up on Canon Drive, had us on 90 one nighters in a row," he recalls. Later, on a tour with newcomer Ray Charles and film star Mantan Moreland, Floyd was awakened from a sound sleep one night in Lexington, Kentucky. "At four o'clock in the morning, Ray comes knocking, wanting to know where was his money. I told him Mantan collected from the promoter. We went to his room but he'd checked out. The hotel told us he left for New York. We were broke and stranded so I called [agent] Billy Shaw and he wired us the money to get home." Another time, in Muncie, Indiana, Floyd heard Ray singing the Dominoes' "Do Something For Me" in a gospel style. "At that time, he was singing like Nat Cole and Charles Brown, so when he came offstage, I told him `You sing in that spiritual style and you'll really be gone.' Not long after that, I heard him with that `I Got A Woman' and he never looked back. I had wanted to [record in that style] but Mesner wouldn't let me."  At Frank Bull &
Gene Norman's Blues Jubilee at L.A.'s Shrine Auditorium in July, 1951,
Floyd cut a live version of a Jerry Leiber/Mike Stoller song, "Too Much
Jelly Roll," whose risqué lyrics threw the audience into
hysterics. When he sings, Some people like jelly on crackers, some like
jelly on bread But I like my crackers in a big brass bed, "They went
crazy," recalls Floyd. "Leiber and Stoller
brought me that song three days before. I can still see that first row,
peoplejust falling out their seats." Floyd's final Aladdin date was a split session with Eddie Mesner's stepdaughter, Patsy, by his wife Reesie. One side was the bawdy "Red Cherries" and the other was a cover of Little Caesar's "The River," also cut that day by Patsy. In 1953, Floyd did a pair of dates for Specialty with the fine guitarist Chuck Norris from his road band. "Hard Living Alone" is a soulful Charles Brown-type blues ballad and "Hole In The Wall" is more of an Amos Milburn jumper. The latter was revived by Rolling Stone Bill Wyman's Rhythm Kings. But none of the three Specialty singles sold well and Floyd's career track would be a downward one from here on out, with brief stays at labels of decreasing stature.  For Atlantic
subsidiary Cat, he cut his biggest money-making song, although the
money would come some twenty years later, when "Hey Bartender" was
recorded by the Blues Brothers and in 1983, by country star Johnny Lee
for a #2 hit. The Cat label reads [Dossie] Terry, but, years later,
Floyd got things straightened out and now owns both the publisher's and
the writer's share of the tune.A one-off session for Jake Porter's Combo label with Johnny Moore's Three Blazers was followed by single releases on Checker, Cash and Ebb, then even more obscure labels until Floyd threw in the towel. For Ebb in 1957, he tries to update his sound by impersonating Little Richard on "Oooh Little Girl" and, backed by Earl Palmer on drums and saxophonist Plas Johnson, almost makes it. One of the tunes he recorded for John Dolphin's Cash label, "Never Can Tell When A Woman Changes Her Mind," wound up being sung several years later by Louis Jordan on Ray Charles's label, Tangerine. Jordan also cut Floyd's "Don't Send Me Flowers When I'm In The Graveyard," "My Friends" and "Honey Bee" for the label. "Ray sends me a little check every once in awhile," Floyd remarked some time prior to the great star's passing. "I liked old Dolphin. They say he screwed everybody, but I found him comical; he made me laugh with that big cigar," recalls Floyd of the record man one songwriter, Percy Ivy, found unfunny enough to shoot him to death. To induce Floyd to record for him, Dolphin "handed me a roll of bills and said it was thirty thousand dollars. He had a fifty on the outside and a twenty on the bottom. When I got home, it was all ones inside. Next day, I told him `You only gave me $125, John,' and he said, `Don't worry about it. I'm gonna make you a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in three months. You'll be famous from here to Japan.'" In the 80s, thanks to a European bootleg of his early work on the Route 66 label, Floyd's career picked up and he toured overseas with Charles Brown and Ruth Brown, leading up to his Alligator deal and renewed interest in the States.  He continues to
perform and BMI lists three of his songs as award winners, "Homesick
Blues," "Hey Bartender" and "Call Operator 210," the favorite telephone
answering machine message of blues fans everywhere. Just don't phone
him when the Dodgers are playing.................... Billy Vera
|
