 BOBBY CHARLES Last Train to Memphis: Part I: The Chess Years by Larry Benicewicz
Bobby finds that this solitary existence is especially conducive to songwriting, not that he hasn’t found inspiration in crowded places like a roadside diner after a high school gig in 1955 when his departing rejoinder “see you later alligator,” was greeted by a clever response from a customer, “after while crocodile,” a repartee which he converted into his first big hit. Amazingly enough, after all the substantial chart makers he has penned, he still doesn’t read music and regards his answering machine as a godsend. “If I’m outside the house, I’ll run the nearest phone and sing onto the tape so that I don’t forget the words and melody,” he said.
“Bobby, don’t you think it’s about time to let the public hear some of these gems?” I said. “It’s coming,” this perfectionist responded, who is always loath to let go of a song before its time. And that time has at long last arrived. Last Train to Memphis is much more than just another release. It is Bobby’s chef d’oeuvre, his masterpiece and a retrospective of his life in music. And it deserves much more than just a cursory glance; in fact, it merits a full treatment. Other celebrated artists must have also reached this conclusion and jumped on the bandwagon, gladly volunteering their services to bring his magnum opus into fruition - Delbert McClinton, Willie Nelson, Fats Domino, Maria and Geoff Muldaur, Clarence “Frogman” Henry, Sonny Landreth, and Neil Young - just to name a few of the notables. But there are also members of his stellar session men who are just as well known to aficionados of all types of music (more about them later). “Bobby, do you realize that you are coming up on a half-century after “Alligator” first made a splash. And do you think that you could ever put together another treasure like this?” I asked. “I don’t think so. I’m sixty-six now and just don’t seem to have the energy or inclination like before. I’ve lived a lot in my time and have woken up on a lot of strange couches. You can say that each song here represents a different life experience. Because I have indeed seen it all,” he confessed. Robert Charles Guidry was born on February 21, 1938 in Abbeville, LA, a town in Acadiana southwest of Lafayette. Musically predisposed at an early age, he was recruited as a vocalist by a combo, the Cardinals, composed of mostly older musicians, “college types,” like sax men Raoul Prado, Carlo Marino, and Harry Simoneaux, drummer Kenneth Theriot and pianist Ed Leblanc. Strikingly handsome with a spit curl, Bobby with his band which favored New Orleans R&B became a popular act playing teen dances, especially at his alma mater, Mount Carmel High.
“See You Later Alligator” debuted on Chess records in early 1956 and fared substantially well on the R&B surveys of the day so that it was noticed by the majors, including Decca, who had Bill Haley & his Comets “cover” the record (#29791) for the white pop market, not an uncommon practice during that era (think Pat Boone’s “Tutti Frutti,” the Diamonds’ “Little Darlin’,” or Georgia Gibbs’s “Dance With Me Henry”). Chess records, not having the distribution network or the disk jockey connections of such a corporate giant as Decca, could not compete and Bobby’s original version of “Alligator” was obliterated on the charts (even the R&B) by the multi-million selling monster by Haley. But RCA’s (another big player in the market) watered-down rendition by Otto Bash released on February 10, 1956 proved to be a flop. When tours took him into the Deep South, he was guilty by association with black musicians and forced at times to suffer the same indignities - riding in back of the bus or utilizing the ostensibly “separate but equal” facilities. “One day, I think it was Birmingham [AL] that I was doing promotion work for Chess records [well known as a race label], out of the trunk of my car and staying at an all-black hotel. I could sense something was brewing and damn if a crowd didn’t burn that building down the same night. I was lucky to get out of there alive,” confessed Bobby.
Bobby tried with some success to recapture the witty aspect of “Alligator” with his third Chess effort, “Take It Easy Greasy (1628),” but actually had more success with its flip, the catchy “Time Will Tell” which spent a few weeks on the hot one hundred platters in 1956. Next came “Laura Lee (1638)” in the same year followed by the rollicking Crescent City interpretation of “Put Your Arms Around Me Honey (1647)” in 1957, one of the few tunes he didn’t author himself during this period. Close on the heels of this latter disk came “You Can Suit Yourself (1658),” which sold only modestly but was regarded highly enough to be included in the soundtrack of the recent cinematic release entitled Miracle, the story of the United States hockey team’s incredible victory over the Soviets at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, NY. Bobby Charles closed out his career with Chess with one final record, “One-Eyed Jack (1670)” in 1957. Although Bobby never again with Chess enjoyed the triumph of “See You Later Alligator,” he could be justifiably proud of his achievements. How many nineteen-year-olds in the history of recorded music could brag of already having recorded seven singles? But Bobby was not the only artist of 50s who had fallen victim to this standard operating procedure regarding who the real tunesmith was. Any enterprising producer would change a lyric or two, if he even bothered to at all, and then add a name directly beneath the title, such in the case of the aforementioned J.D. Miller of Crowley, who ubiquitously employed the pseudonym, James West, in scores of his Excello releases. Miller, who had ties to Acuff-Rose publishing in Nashville, was light years ahead of most record men in understanding the importance of copyrights and royalties and, like so many of his ilk, when an opportunity arose, he took advantage of it. Now in the late 50s, he was without a label, and prospects looked rather bleak. But little did he know that his genius as a songwriter was about to issue forth big time. Larry Benicewicz
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I’ve always enjoyed visiting Bobby Charles, one of America’s best kept secrets as far as songwriting goes, at his humble A-frame abode on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico at Holly Beach, LA, a small town of closely clustered weather beaten shacks he affectionately calls the “Coon Ass [Cajun] Riviera.” And he didn’t choose this isolated village, which provides its inhabitants with just the basic needs of survival, by chance. He’s always been difficult to locate. And if you think his latest residence is a remote outpost, all the more desolate during the winter “off-season,” you should have tried to discover his former domicile near the hamlet of Maurice on the banks of the Vermillion Bayou, a destination which could only have been accessed by paying close attention to specific landmarks bordering a lonely, narrow, twisty, and willow-shaded, byway covered with clumps of Spanish moss. Bobby likes it this way. “Hey, Larry, the only gas station here just closed. That’ll discourage the tourists,” he said almost gleefully.
And he almost pathologically guards his privacy. And why not? After having been ripped off all his life by all sorts of characters he had encountered in the music industry from publishers to producers, he can justifiably be paranoid, especially of strangers who come knocking and then promising offers he can’t refuse. “My biggest fault is that I’m too kind-hearted, too trusting. It’s been my downfall,” he added.
Two years ago when I last called, Bobby had a slew of songs on a cassette that he auditioned for me, including one which would be the title track of his newest CD, Last Train to Memphis (Bogalusa 350). “This film director called me up and needed something for the soundtrack of a movie which I think was about the life of Elvis. The tune came to me right away,” he said. But no movie mogul ever followed up on the request. Of the remaining tunes he offered for my evaluation, some were brand new and others he had composed long ago and never released. Of the latter batch, he had constantly been tinkering with them and subtly tweaking them, adding instrumental passages, back-up vocals, horns, etc. But all the creations, regardless of their genre - blues, Cajun, C&W, or swamp pop - were extraordinarily crafted and expertly recorded with moving, soulful, memorable melodie - a joy to behold. I was speechless.
In 1955, head honcho of the independent Chess records, Leonard Chess (original family name, Czyz), was scouring the Deep South for blues artists to augment the roster of his eponymous label based in the Windy City, a logo which already laid claim to blues luminaries Muddy Waters, Eddie Boyd, Howlin’ Wolf, Willie Mabon, and Jimmy Rogers (and soon Chuck Berry). Stopping in Crowley, LA, west of Lafayette, he met record store owner Charles “Dago” Redlich. Figuring he couldn’t pry any musicians loose from Redlich’s brother-in-law, J.D. Miller, who also had a discriminating nose for talent and ran the Feature label (just up the same street, Parkerson Ave.) with bluesmen Tabby Thomas, Lightnin’ Slim, and Clarence “Bon Ton Roula” Garlow under contract, Chess promised him a finder’s fee and to call him collect if he found any budding blues star in the region. By the way, this was the same J.D. Miller who later leased masters of blues recordings - Lazy Lester, Lonesome Sundown, Lightnin’ Slim, Guitar Gable, Slim Harpo, etc. - to Ernie Young of Nashville-based Excello and who could boast of a legendary studio band that included horn man Lionel Torrence, bassist Bobby McBride, guitarist Al Foreman, drummer Warren Storm, and pianist Katie Webster.
In short, Redlich, who was later to inaugurate his own label, Viking (with Johnnie Allan, Kenny Tibbs, Randy & the Rockets, etc.) soon got wind of Bobby Charles’ s novelty song that was causing quite a stir in the territory and quickly corralled him, having Bobby sing the tune over the telephone to Leonard Chess, who immediately grasped its potential; so much so, that he had Bobby travel to New Orleans where it was to be taped at Cosimo Matassa’s first studio, J&M, at 838 N. Rampart in the French Quarter. At the time, pianist Paul Gayten was Chess’s A&R (artists and repertoire) man in the Crescent City and Leonard Chess wanted Gayten to back Bobby with the Big Easy’s best session men, including baritone Alvin “Red” Tyler, tenors Lee Allen and Herb Hardesty, bassist Frank Fields, and drummer Charles “Hungry” Williams. But Bobby balked at the request, insisting that the Cardinals play on the record or it was no deal. In short, Chess finally relented but did prevail upon Bobby to drop his surname, Guidry.
Fortunately for Chess records, Leonard and brother/partner, Phil, had Bobby sign a songwriter’s agreement with the label and ARC publishing which involved the brothers Harry and Gene Goodman. As far as collecting royalties was concerned, “Alligator” proved to be Chess records’ best cash cow to that date and they eagerly awaited a follow up from Gayten’s young protege and, in fact, invited Bobby to Chicago, rolling out the red carpet. But the Chess brothers would be in for a big surprise.
Bobby, who by the way held his own before black audiences, could write a book about his travels in the company of R&B caravans of that day, with acts as diverse as rock and roller Chuck Berry to spiritual groups like the Five Blind Boys of Alabama, but an anecdote or two with a local flavor might suffice to best describe the tenor of the times. He related to me an appearance at segregated Carr’s Beach in Annapolis wherein he was on the same bill as Vee-Jay records’ (another Chicago-based indie) Jimmy Reed and all were backed, as was the custom, by the same (normally horn-driven) house band, usually a Choker Campbell or a Red Prysock. On this occasion it was Sil Austin, who was now a bandleader after serving a stint with vocalist Tiny Bradshaw of Syd Nathan’s Cincinnati-based King records . It seemed that so-called sophisticated ensembles of the day like Austin’s were always clashing with and looking down on such “countrified” bluesmen like Reed, claiming that they couldn’t follow him. “One day, Reed couldn’t take it no more and told the band to just get off the stage, saying ‘I don’t need you all. I can entertain by myself.’ And with his harmonica strap and guitar in hand, that’s just what he proceeded to do. And he put on quite a show without them” said Bobby. Later that night, Bobby was obliged to sleep under rather Spartan conditions in the bathhouse because, being white in that age of strict segregation, he couldn’t dare to share the same accommodations as his black counterparts.
Not only was Bobby introduced to black culture on the road, but also in the studio. It is kind of a blur to him which subsequent records (six in all) for Chess were recorded where, either in the Windy City or New Orleans, but he was always surrounded by black sidemen. Apparently it was bassist Willie Dixon who supervised his second Chess release, the plaintive “Why Did You Leave (1617),” at Chess’s headquarters still then at 4750 South Cottage Grove Ave. in Chicago and also advised him to have his copyrights in order. Bobby remembers that he also witnessed a 1956 Little Walter (Jacobs) session which yielded “Just a Feeling” on Checker (#845), a Chess subsidiary label.
Bobby wished that his parting with Chess was amicable, but it was most decidedly not. As his record sales progressively slumped, the principals at Chess became less and less patient with his demands for royalties to which he was entitled. “I never felt that I was compensated adequately for ‘Alligator, ’ considering how many copies were bought and every time I looked, someone else was sharing the writer credits with me,” he said, meaning especially Paul Gayten, who wanted and received a portion of the proverbial pie by conveniently affixing his name next to Bobby’s. “And it’s still haunting me. When that movie came out [Miracle], I could only receive singer’s credit, when I actually composed the tune,” he added dejectedly.
