Category: Interviews

Show Notes: 

Today’s show is the second installment inspired by interviews conducted by Chris Strachwitz during his research into the music he was recording for his label Arhoolie Records as well as for his radio programs on KPFA-FM (Berkeley, CA) in the 1960’s through 1980’s. These interviews are now on the Arhoolie website and transcribed. The folks at Arhoolie were kind enough to allow me to use these on my show. Today we from Howlin’ Wolf, Big Mama Thornton, Johnny Littlejohn and Joe Pullum. Howlin’ Wolf needs no introduction and the interview we hear was conducted in 1967. Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton is probably best remembered for two songs that became huge for Elvis and later Janis Joplin; “Hound Dog” held down the top slot on Billboard’s R&B charts for seven weeks in 1953 and Elvis had an even bigger hit with it in 1956 while Joplin covered “Ball and Chain” on her debut album which became a million seller. She cut many other terrific records and we spin some of her lesser-known sides. The Johnny Littlejohn interview was conducted in 1968. Littlejohn waxed a bunch of singles for small labels before cutting his debut album, John Littlejohn’s Chicago Blues Stars, for Chris Strachwitz’s Arhoolie logo.

Wolf’s father was a farmer and Wolf took it as well until his 18th birthday, when a chance meeting with Delta blues legend Charley Patton changed his life forever. He never learned the subtleties of Patton’s guitar technique, but did learn the growl of a voice and his talent for entertaining. The main source of Wolf’s hard-driving harmonica style came when Aleck “Rice” Miller (Sonny Boy Williamson) married his half-sister Mary and taught him the rudiments of the instrument. He first started playing in the early ’30s as a strict Patton imitator, while others recall him at decade’s end rocking the juke joints with a neck-rack harmonica and one of the first electric guitars anyone had ever seen. After a four-year stretch in the Army, he settled down as a farmer and weekend player in West Memphis, AR, and it was here that Wolf’s career in music began in earnest.

After a four-year stretch in the Army, he settled down as a farmer and weekend player in West Memphis, AR, and it was here that Wolf’s career in music began in earnest. By 1948, he had established himself within the community as a radio personality. As a means of advertising his own local appearances, Wolf had a 15-minute radio show on KWEM in West Memphis. Wolf had put his first band together, featuring the explosive guitar work of Willie Johnson. Wolf finally started recording in 1951, when he caught the ear of Sam Phillips, who first heard him on his morning radio show. Phillips simultaneously leased the results to the Bihari Brothers in Los Angeles and Leonard Chess in Chicago. Suddenly, Howlin’ Wolf had two hits at the same time on the R&B charts with two record companies claiming to have him exclusively under contract. Chess finally won him over and as Wolf would proudly relate years later, “I had a 4,000 dollar car and 3,900 dollars in my pocket. I’m the onliest one drove out of the South like a gentleman.”

When Wolf entered the Chess studios in 1954, the violent aggression of the Memphis sides was being replaced with a Chicago backbeat and,and Hubert Sumlin joined tha band. He first appears as a rhythm guitarist on a 1954 session, and within a few years’ time his style had fully matured to take over the role of lead guitarist in the band by early 1958. By 1956, Wolf was in the R&B charts again, racking up hits with “Evil” and “Smokestack Lightnin’.” He remained a top attraction both on the Chicago circuit and on the road. His records, while seldom showing up on the national charts, were still selling in decent numbers down South.

By 1960, Wolf was teamed up with Chess staff writer Willie Dixon, and for the next five years he would record almost nothing but songs written by Dixon. The mid-’60s saw him touring Europe regularly with “Smokestack Lightnin’” becoming a hit in England some eight years after its American release. Willie Dixon and Wolf parted company by 1964 and Wolf was back in the studio doing his own songs. By the end of the decade, Wolf’s material was being recorded by artists including the Doors, Led Zeppelin, the Electric Flag, the Blues Project, Cream, and Jeff Beck. The result of all these covers brought Wolf the belated acclaim of a young, white audience. Chess sent him over to England in 1970 to capitalize on the then-current trend of London Session albums, recording with Eric Clapton on lead guitar and other British superstars.

As the ’70s moved on, the end of the trail started coming closer. By now Wolf was a very sick man; he had survived numerous heart attacks and was suffering kidney damage from an automobile accident that sent him flying through the car’s windshield. His bandleader Eddie Shaw firmly rationed Wolf to a meager half-dozen songs per set. Occasionally some of the old fire would come blazing forth from some untapped wellspring, and his final live and studio recordings show that he could still tear the house apart when the spirit moved him. He entered the Veterans Administration Hospital in 1976 to be operated on, but never survived it, finally passing away on January 10th of that year.

Thornton’s big break came through singer Diamond Teeth Mary who met Willie Mae when she was working on a garbage truck and  happened to hear her singing. Mary told her about a singing contest for Sammy Greens Hot Harlem Revue. At fourteen years old, she won the contest and began traveling with the Revue. Thornton’s career began to take off when she moved to Houston in 1948.She made her debut in 1950 cutting “All Right Baby b/w Bad Luck Got My Man” for the tiny E&W label on Houston’s Dallas Avenue. She signed a a five year recording contract with Don Robey’s Peacock Records in 1951. Thornton played at Don Robey’s Bronze Peacock club in Houston and toured the Chitlin’ Circuit. Thornton cut some solid records before “Hound Dog”, such as “Cotton picking Blues” and “Let Your Tears Fall Baby” but nothing hit the charts. Robey negotiated a deal with Johnny Otis in which he would take some of Robey’s artists on tour with the revue and that he would also record them. She was apparently a big hits as the Chicago Defender proclaimed that Thornton “stopped the show in the Tacoma, Oakland and Richmond auditoriums, as well as in Stockton, Sacramento, Bakersfield and the Elks Auditorium in Los Angeles.”

While on tour with Otis she cut “Hound Dog.” The song was written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller especially for Thornton. Otis brought Leiber and Stoller  to see her to see if they could come up with something for her. As Stoller recalled:  “we saw Big mama and she knocked me cold. she looked like the biggest, bad-ass, saltiest chick you would ever see. And she was mean, a ‘lady bear’ as they used to call ’em. She must have been 350 pounds and she had all these scars all over her face. I had to write a song for her that basically said ‘Go fuck yourself’ but how do you do it without actually saying it? ..She was a wonderful blues singer with a great moaning style, but it was as much her appearance as her blues style that influenced the writing of Hound Dog.” The song went to number one on the R&B charts and was the biggest record Peacock ever had.

Unable to follow the success of  “Hound Dog” she left peacock in 1957 and relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area, playing clubs in San Francisco and L.A. but not recording again until 1961. In 1961 she waxed 45’s for Irma and Bay Tone. During the latter session she cut “Ball and Chain” but was not released. Her fortunes took an upswing with new manager Jimmy Moore and “the big festivals and shows came back into Big Mama Thornton’s life…” Her first big festival shows the 1964 Monterey Jazz Festival which she would play again in 1966 and 1968. In 1965, she toured with the American Folk Blues Festival package in Europe. Back in the States after her European tour she cut a few singles for Sotoplay, Kent and the terrific “Life Goes On” for Galaxy. In 1966 she cut her second album for Arhoolie, Big Mama Thornton Vol. 2: The Queen at Monterey with the Chicago Blues Band. The album found her backed by a crack Muddy Waters band that included James Cotton, Sammy Lawhorn and Otis Spann among others. 1968 saw the release of the album Ball and Chain on Arhoolie.

Between 1966 and 1969 she was in great demand in campuses, clubs, folk festivals and rock festivals. She played in places like the Fillmore and the Ash Grove, sharing the stage with rock bands like the Grateful Dead and the Jefferson Airplane. It was during this period she met Janis Joplin and members of Big Brother & the Holding Company. It was at a club that they heard her perform “Ball and Chain.” As Joplin  said ” she sings the blues with such heart and soul. I have learned so much from her and only wish I could sing as well as Willie Mae.” Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company’s performance of “Ball ‘n’ Chain” at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and release of the song on their number one album Cheap Thrills renewed interest in Thornton’s career and was the song that made Joplin famous. By 1969, she signed with Mercury Records. Mercury released her most successful album, Stronger Than Dirt, which reached number 198 in the Billboard Top 200 record chart. Thornton then signed a contract with Pentagram cutting a gospel album called Saved. Thornton’s last albums were Jail and Sassy Mama for Vanguard Records in 1975.  Thornton never stopped touring until her passing in 1984, including a return to Europe on 1972

Johnny Littlejohn left home in 1946, pausing in Jackson, Mississippi; Arkansas; and Rochester, New York before winding up in Gary, Indiana. In 1951, his Elmore James-influenced slide style making him a favorite around Chicago’s south suburbs in addition to Gary. Littlejohn waited a long time to wax his debut singles for Margaret (his trademark treatment of Brook Benton’s “Kiddio”), T-D-S, and Weis in 1968. But before the year was out, Littlejohn had also cut his debut album, Chicago Blues Stars, for Chris Strachwitz’s Arhoolie logo. Unfortunately, a four-song 1969 Chess date remained in the can. After that, another long dry spell preceded Littlejohn’s 1985 album So-Called Friends for Rooster Blues. He passed in 1994.