Bobby Whitlock - My Time - 2009
From answer.com
Most notably known for his involvement with "Derek & The Dominos" co-founder and co-writer of many of the songs that appear on "Layla and other Assorted Love Songs". Raised in Memphis, Tennessee, Whitlock began his musical career while still a teenager at Stax, his first recording was hand claps on Sam & Dave's "I Thank You." Donald "Duck" Dunn and Steve Cropper were readying the very talented young Whitlock for pop success when Delaney & Bonnie, heard Whitlock perform at a club and invited him to join them in California and record on their record Home. in early 1970. His friendship with Clapton began when Whitlock was touring with Delaney & Bonnie, along with Carl Radle and Jim Gordon, whom Clapton admired greatly.
After the other band members left to join Mad Dogs and Englishmen with Joe Cocker, Whitlock collaborated with Eric Clapton in England. They played sessions together, most notably on George Harrison's All Things Must Pass, where Whitlock and Clapton sang background (as the "O'Hara Smith Singers"). Whitlock remained uncredited on certain tracks of All Things Must Pass, where he played pump organ (Harmonium), Electric Wurlitzer, Hammond organ, tubular bells and piano on various songs.
Whitlock is credited as a writer or co-writer on six tracks from the album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs. He and Clapton shared a friendship and would write together on their guitars. During the recording, the tape rolled non-stop for the entire album, with the exception of "Key to the Highway". Whitlock explains that this is why you hear this cut fading in. Originally, Jim Keltner was to be the drummer, but Jim Gordon intervened when he heard that Clapton was looking for a drummer and Keltner was busy finishing up his session with Gábor Szabó the jazz guitar player. The album saw little play for the first year, and by the time "Layla" became a hit, the band had already split up. Whitlock recorded his first solo album Bobby Whitlock/Bobby Whitlock. It included Clapton, Radle and Gordon. Essentially it was Derek & the Dominos last recording together. His second solo record Raw Velvet came immediately after. When Whitlock tried in vain to get Clapton to come out and play, realizing it was not going to happen (it took two years of waiting), he went back to the United States.
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01. You Sold Me Down the River
02. Bell Bottom Blues
03. It's Only Midnite
04. Wing and a Prayer
05. Home
06. Why Does Love Got to be so Sad?
07. I Get High on You
08. It's Only Thunder
09. Ghost Driver
10. There She Goes
11. I Love You
12. I was Born to Sing the Blues
13. Standing in the Rain
Review by Whitlock
I built a recording studio in the hill country down in Mississippi just to record this record. I sure am glad that I did too.
“Sold Me Down the River”
Brady Blade counts off this straight ahead rock and roll opener. Darryl Johnson is on bass and Buddy Miller is playing rhythm guitar. I’m playing the slide guitar and the piano and organ. My son Beau and daughter Ashley are singing background vocals on this whole record. Ashley has a lovely innocent sounding voice and Beau sounds exactly like me when I was his age and was with the Dominos. Our timbres are the same. I knew this would be the only opportunity I would ever have to sing with both of my children. Now it’s there forever.
“Bell Bottom Blues”
I couldn’t resist doing this song. I am playing a 1956 Hammond B3 thru four Leslie speakers all set differently. It is very lush sounding. Beau is singing my old part on this.
“It’s Only Midnight”
Steve Cropper and I wrote this song. After I finished recording it at I sent it to him in Nashville and he put his signature guitar on it. Jim Horn came down to Mississippi and played sax and all of the horn section parts on everything.
“A Wing And A Prayer”
The piano that I’m playing is a new Yamaha C3. Along with the Hammond B3 and a couple of Leslies and my children’s choir it sounds like the little church in the woods.
“Home”
I did an acoustic radio tour across America in the mid seventies. During a live interview that I was doing in Red River, New Mexico a woman called the station on the request line and was on the air with us. She said that she had a request for me. I asked her what it was, thinking that it was going to be, what Thorn Tree was about or something like that. But that wasn’t it at all. She said that she needed help finding her son who had gone missing for some time. She said that no-one would help her because it was a domestic dispute. This conversation is live on the airwaves. I said that I didn’t know what I could do but to write a song about it and sing it. She said that she tried to get some people in Nashville to help her by doing just that but no-one would. I told her that I would do whatever I could do. After that during each and every interview that I did, and that was a lot of them, I would say to the DJ, “excuse me a second I have to say something.” Then I would say, ”Michael go home son, your Mother’s crying and she needs you and she misses you.” Then I would continue on with the interview like nothing had happened. It’s against FAA regulations to do such a thing. But it was live and no-one knew that I was going to do it. I didn’t ask their permission. I just did it. Michael did hear me and eventually went home to his Mother. After I got back home and off tour I wrote this song.
“Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad”
Big horn section and a funky track on another one of my favorite songs. I’m playing rhythm guitar and Hammond B3 and Barry Swain is playing lead guitar. With Brady Blade on drums and Darryl Johnson playing bass this song rocks!
“I Get High On You”
CoCo is singing on this one with me. I’m playing acoustic guitar and Barry is playing the lead guitar.
“It’s Only Thunder”
This is the only track on this CD that was not recorded at my studio. Jim Keltner is playing drums. Tim Drummond is on bass. Steve Cropper in playing electric guitar. I’m playing acoustic guitar and Hammond B3.
“Ghost Driver”
Ghost Driver is about me learning how to drive and wrecking my Daytona Ferrari with the speedometer stuck on 155 mph. The story is in my book “Domino”. This is a driving song just like “Let It Rain”. I used to tear down the motorway at night playing that song at full volume and I would wind the engine up to whatever key the song was changing to and then I would shift out into the next gear. Rock and rolling down the road. Awesome! Some things never change. Ferraris are finely tuned and you can actually play them if going fast and getting there very quickly doesn’t bother you. And you’ve got to have the right song on your player. Darryl Johnson plays some very funky bass on this number. Barry Swain plays lead guitar on this. It was take one on every song he played on. What a fine player.
“There She Goes”
This song came to me as I watched my daughter drive away into the night back to an impossible situation that I could not help her with. So I had to let her go.
“I Love You”
This song was written by Beau and myself. He wrote the chorus while sitting in the swing under an apple tree in our back garden when we lived in Ireland. He had just turned eight. There is a photograph of him at work in the swing. He had my white Strat in his lap and was playing an open E. He finished it and came in and said, “hey Dad listen to this that I just wrote”. And he started singing, “I love you, I love the way you always make me feel. I love you, I love you.” I finished it and recorded it in Mississippi.
I’m playing the acoustic, main electric rhythm and lead guitar and Buddy Miller is doing the fills. I love the ending. The acoustic guitar has a lovely little melody and Ashley is singing at the end, “I love you, I love you”. I can’t express my feelings with words as to what this means to me. Except that I will always be able to hear her sing and say, “I love you” to me.
“Born to Sing the Blues”
My daughter was about four and had just learned to write. One evening I was down stairs sitting on the couch playing my guitar. As usual, I was in the doghouse with her mother again. I was playing a very cool little something when up walks Ashley with pencil in hand and a piece of paper that she had been writing on. She handed it to me and said, “Here Daddy, this is you”. It read, Born To Sing The Blues. I couldn’t believe it! I wrote the song right then and there. I have written two really great songs that were both started by each of my children when they were just that. Children. What an inspiration they were.
“Standing In The Rain”
This is one of my favorite songs. I really was standing in the rain when the inspiration for this came to me. Buddy Miller plays the tenor guitar and the mandolin on this. I’m playing the acoustic guitar. The rain storm was taking place while we were recording. So I had some mikes set up on the porch recording it while it was all happening. Thunder, lightening, rain and all.
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