Koko Taylor, 1928-2009

"QUEEN OF THE BLUES" KOKO TAYLOR
1928 - 2009
From kokotaylor.com

Grammy Award-winning blues legend Koko Taylor, 80, died on June 3, 2009 in her hometown of Chicago, IL, as a result of complications following her May 19 surgery to correct a gastrointestinal bleed. On May 7, 2009, the critically acclaimed Taylor, known worldwide as the "Queen of the Blues," won her 29th Blues Music Award (for Traditional Female Blues Artist Of The Year), making her the recipient of more Blues Music Awards than any other artist. In 2004 she received the NEA National Heritage Fellowship Award, which is among the highest honors given to an American artist. Her most recent CD, 2007's Old School, was nominated for a Grammy (eight of her nine Alligator albums were Grammy-nominated). She won a Grammy in 1984 for her guest appearance on the compilation album Blues Explosion on Atlantic.

Born Cora Walton on a sharecropper's farm just outside Memphis, TN, on September 28, 1928, Koko, nicknamed for her love of chocolate, fell in love with music at an early age. Inspired by gospel music and WDIA blues disc jockeys B.B. King and Rufus Thomas, Taylor began belting the blues with her five brothers and sisters, accompanying themselves on their homemade instruments. In 1952, Taylor and her soon-to-be-husband, the late Robert "Pops" Taylor, traveled to Chicago with nothing but, in Koko's words, "thirty-five cents and a box of Ritz Crackers."

In Chicago, "Pops" worked for a packing company, and Koko cleaned houses. Together they frequented the city's blues clubs nightly. Encouraged by her husband, Koko began to sit in with the city's top blues bands, and soon she was in demand as a guest artist. One evening in 1962 Koko was approached by arranger/composer Willie Dixon. Overwhelmed by Koko's performance, Dixon landed Koko a Chess Records recording contract, where he produced her several singles, two albums and penned her million-selling 1965 hit "Wang Dang Doodle," which would become Taylor's signature song.

After Chess Records was sold, Taylor found a home with the Chicago's Alligator Records in 1975 and released the Grammy-nominated I Got What It Takes. She recorded eight more albums for Alligator between 1978 and 2007, received seven more Grammy nominations and made numerous guest appearances on various albums and tribute recordings. Koko appeared in the films Wild At Heart, Mercury Rising and Blues Brothers 2000. She performed on Late Night With David Letterman, Late Night With Conan O'Brien, CBS-TV's This Morning, National Public Radio's All Things Considered, CBS-TV's Early Edition, and numerous regional television programs.

Over the course of her 40-plus-year career, Taylor received every award the blues world has to offer. On March 3, 1993, Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley honored Taylor with a "Legend Of The Year" Award and declared "Koko Taylor Day" throughout Chicago. In 1997, she was inducted into the Blues Foundation's Hall of Fame. A year later, Chicago Magazine named her "Chicagoan Of The Year" and, in 1999, Taylor received the Blues Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2009 Taylor performed in Washington, D.C. at The Kennedy Center Honors honoring Morgan Freeman.

Koko Taylor was one of very few women who found success in the male-dominated blues world. She took her music from the tiny clubs of Chicago's South Side to concert halls and major festivals all over the world. She shared stages with every major blues star, including Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, B.B. King, Junior Wells and Buddy Guy as well as rock icons Robert Plant and Jimmy Page.
Taylor's final performance was on May 7, 2009 in Memphis at the Blues Music Awards, where she sang "Wang Dang Doodle" after receiving her award for Traditional Blues Female Artist Of The Year.

Survivors include Taylor's husband Hays Harris, daughter Joyce Threatt, son-in-law Lee Threatt, grandchildren Lee, Jr. and Wendy, and three great-grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements will be announced.

Note from Highway 99:
Koko was 80, her death was not tragic but it's sad. We saw her many times in Chicago. Super nice lady who deserved all her success and then some. Unlike too many artists and musicians, she really appreciated her audience and always made time to talk with fans, laid many hugs and kisses on many of those who approached her to sign a record or CD. She was also an active philanthropist. We met her a few times, in non-public situations where if she wasn't the person fans knew from the clubs and festivals, her true personality would bleed through. Her true personality was just slightly less energetic but at least as warm and engaging. If the world was full of people like Koko, many of the world's problems would not exist. RIP, good woman.
- Eric and Ed Maloney, Highway 99 Blues Club, Seattle

Moreland & Arbuckle, Gravel Road

Staying on our ongoing theme of 21st Century Blues... on Friday night, we had a fine bill of entertainment that warmed our hearts. Moreland & Arbuckle, the tirelessly touring trio from Kansas, brought their tasteful, vintage sound. To open the show, the Seattle-based Gravel Road made their Highway 99 debut and delivered a compelling brand of dark blues, a style which delightfully marries the traditional sounds of the Mississippi low country with a minimalist rock sensibility. As we've said, Blues, like any genre, can be a lot of things. Like fans of any art form, we long for the old masters, the pioneers who made it possible for all who followed. But we also embrace the present and enjoy those who are doing it now, honoring the forefathers (and foremothers) while bringing their own contemporary elements to the party. And that's what Friday was all about. As we think of comparisons to other genres, we love rock & roll originators like Ike Turner and Jerry Lee Lewis, and we also love modern artists on the charts today like Green Day and Kings of Leon. Speaking of good music, we've got to wrap this entry up because the Crossroads Band's I-5 Harmonica Houseparty is blowing the roof off the joint at the moment. Do you know any roof guys who work Saturday nights? (pictured above, Moreland & Arbuckle; video below, Gravel Road closes their set by paying tribute to R.L. Burnside)

21st Century Blues

You could poll 100 people on the matter of "what is the Blues?" and you'd probably get 100 different answers. Most of them would probably be right in various ways. To some, if it ain't acoustic and recorded south of the Mason-Dixon Line, it might be bluesy but it ain't the Blues. Some prefer the post-WWII electric stuff (Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Bo Diddley) and regard the earlier stuff as anything from "early country" to "folk blues." Some prefer the Blues of the Classic Rock Era, Mike Bloomfield, the Paul Butterfield Band, the J. Geils Band, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin... Then there are those who only know the stuff which made commercial radio in the 80s: George Thorogood & the Destroyers, Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble, and a Pacific Northwest treasure named Robert Cray. There are many destination points in between those, but you know what we mean. It's all a matter of taste and it's all Blues.

On the old stuff, few will argue the value and enjoyability of everyone from Robert Johnson to Son House, Magic Sam to Bessie Smith, Memphis Minnie to Big Bill Broonzy... we could yammer on for weeks about the things we love about the Blues of the 20th Century. Hell, we've got a club based on it. In this blog entry, we offer up a couple artists and labels who are, in our opinion, carrying the torch and evolving the genre into the post-2K era. And to avoid being accused of self-promotion, we'll make a point to not include artists who've played our club. So here goes:

ARTISTS:
The Black Keys - guitar-intensive blues-rock. If you dig Zeppelin and the Black Crowes, we guarantee you'll love this band. Minimal 2-4 piece arrangements, they don't try to get cute, not even when their last album was produced by Gnarls Barkley member Danger Mouse.
Rocco DeLuca & the Burden - imagine Jeff Buckley as a Blues artist. Heartfelt vocals and personal songwriting make this guy's albums a staple in your car, your mp3 player, wherever you listen to music. He's been flying below the radar but that's about to change.
Gravelroad - now we're part guilty, because this Seattle-based band is playing here w/ Moreland & Arbuckle on May 8. Gravelroad represents a new guard of Blues, fused with heavier, punk rock sensibilities. In '09, they've partnered with the legendary T-Model Ford for a road-intensive national tour.

ALBUMS:
Not the Same Old Blues Crap - the first in a series of compilations by the great Fat Possum label. They specialize in marrying traditional/older and contemporary/younger artists in ways that are awesome and more importantly, relevant. Far from gratuitous the standard "old meets new" schlock we see in other genres, this stuff is compelling and, if you fancy yourself a blues fan, necessary.

Stax Volt

Admittedly, we are not good bloggers. At least, we don't blog as often as folks who accept the term "blogger" tend to do. We're trying to get better at this, while also running a club in a rhythm-n-blues-challenged market and keeping up with all the internets (myspace, facebook, and now twitter, not to mention our own website). In this brief post, we'd just like to extol the virtues of Stax Records. We're currently digging the hell out of their nine-disc collection, The Complete Stax-Volt Singles 1959-1968. It's got all kinds of stuff you won't even find on the Best-Of compilations from the artists. If you threw a party - dinner, BBQ, nighttime, or otherwise - and only loaded this set into your jukebox of choice, you'd be a star among your friends for having such great taste in music that's sadly not been heard enough in the 21st century. Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Rufus Thomas, Booker T & the MGs, Eddie Floyd, Albert King, the Mar-Keys... If you're not feeling saucy enough to buy a nine-disc set in a retail environment, we understand. We bought it used, too. The used bins at local stores like Sonic Boom and Easy Street are the sources of many great finds. Online, we really love half.com, an ebay subsidiary where people sell used records, books, videos and such. That's all for today.


Here's a good source of

February 3, 1959

50 years ago today, "the day the music died."

So long Buddy, so long Richie, so long J.P. "Big Bopper."

And yes, the story of how Waylon Jennings gave up his seat on the plane.

Hard to believe Buddy put out all that music in such a short time. He was 22. Richie Valens was only 17. The Big Bopper was 28. Holly was living in Greenwich Village and getting involved in the burgeoning folk scene at the end of his life. This is a few years before Dylan got there. Who knows what he would have done. Rave On, sir.



From thisdayinmusic.com:

A young Bob Dylan attended the Duluth National Guard Armory show on 31st January 1959, two nights before Holly's death.

The family name was "Holley". When Buddy received his first recording contract from Decca Records in 1956, they inadvertently spelled his last name as "Holly". He kept it that way for the rest of his career.

Buddy failed his draft physical because of his poor eyesight.

Many groups from the era named themselves after insects, they did the same and choose "Crickets" as it was the only insect, which made its own "music", by chirping. (They almost named themselves the Beetles!).

Buddy had watched the John Wayne movie The Searchers. Each time that Wayne became disgruntled with something someone said, he'd mutter "That'll be the day". That catch phrase became the title of the first hit record by Buddy.

"Peggy Sue" was an actual person. Peggy Sue Gerron attended Lubbock High School and was the girlfriend and eventual wife of Jerry Allison, Buddy Holly's drummer.

Buddy Holly and the Crickets were the first all-white group to perform at New York's famed Apollo Theatre.

He was one of the first rock 'n' rollers to use overdubbing when one-track recording was the rule, and one of the first to use strings on a rock 'n' roll record.

Their tour busses kept breaking down and when they arrived in Clear Lake, Iowa to perform at the Surf Ballroom the evening of February 2, 1959, Buddy decided to charter a small plane to their next stop.

The Beechcraft Bonanza, named "Miss American Pie," took off from Mason City, at around 1:50 AM on February 3, 1959. The weather was cold and snowy. The plane crashed just after taking off. The pilot, Valens, Richardson and Holly were all killed.

Don McLean's 1971 "American Pie" is inspired by the day of the plane crash.

Rolling Stone Magazine ranked Holly No.13 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.

Paul McCartney owns the publishing rights to Holly's song catalogue.

The 1992 Nirvana video for "In Bloom" is filmed in Black and white using 1950s era television cameras and shows the band appearing in 1950s attire, (including Kurt Cobain wearing Buddy Holly style glasses) in an apparent tribute.

Weezer's self-titled debut album features the single "Buddy Holly."

On Feb 29th 1980, the glasses that Buddy Holly had been wearing when he died were discovered in a police file in Mason, Iowa after being there for over 21 years.

Tommy Is Our Homeboy

Tom Hunnewell just gave us a disc with some of his photos from 2008. Enjoy!

Guitar Julie. She's photogenic. Whatdyagonnado?


Charles White & Guitar Julie.


Duke Robillard with Eric "Two Scoops" Moore


David Vest


Harper: everything from a didgeridoo to a damned if I don't


Harper and Big Mo


Polly O'Keary & the Rhythm Method


Mark DuFresne


Son Jack Jr. at Jam For Cans


Chris Leighton, Duffy Bishop, Rob Moitoza, & Raven at Jam For Cans


Ed Maloney asks not what his blues club can do for him, but what he can do for his blues club.


Magic Dick, tellin' tales, singin' the blues, his harmonica wails and he takes us to school.


Sean Costello


Studebaker John


Lloyd Jones Struggle


Kevin Selfe. The matter of "did he steal that axe from Judas Priest?" the authorities have said some things are best left unresolved.


The Tony Coleman Band


Peter Damann


Dennis Ellis


Alice Stuart: acoustic, electric, red hot, en fuego!

2008, What a Year!

Looking back, we’re tickled over how many truly awesome nights, days, and moments have “hit the highway” in 2008. Taking a look back…

The Jam: the house band of Justin Kausal-Hayes, Scotty Harris, Lisa Ramaglia, Andrew Cloutier, and Eric Brisson brought many of our most memorable musical moments.

Resident Artists included Lee Oskar & Friends, Brian Nova, Son Jack Jr., Purty Mouth, JD Hobson & Friends, the Dudley Taft Blues Overkill, Gertrude’s Hearse, the Satellite 4, John “Scooch” Cugno’s Delta 88 Revival, the Danny Massure Breakdown, and the Belltown Soul Band.

Purty Mouth introduced us to a bunch of new (to us) artists such as Golden Robot Army, MoZo, Zoe Muth, Jerry & the Philbillies, Southbound Union, Thornton Creek, Sourmash Stevedores, the Half Brothers, Squirrel Butter, and Strange Jerome.

CD Release Parties were thrown by Kim Field & the Mighty Titans of Tone, the James Howard Band, the Red Hot Blues Sisters, Ruby Dee & the Snakehandlers, Fiona Boyes, Tim Casey & the Bluescats, Chubby Carrier & the Bayou Swamp Band, Polly O’Keary & the Rhythm Method, and Robin Moxey.

Locally-Based Artists continued to be our backbone. If our keyboard forgets you here, our heart does not. Nick Vigarino, Becki Sue & Her Big Rockin’ Daddies, Doctorfunk, Paul Green & Straight Shot, , the Crossroads Band, Brian Butler, the Type A Band, John Stephan, Double Scotts on the Rocks, Little Bill & the Bluenotes, Robin Moxey, Buckets of Rain, Tim Casey & the Bluescats, Sam Marshall, Randy Norris, Lady A & the Baby Blues Funk Band, Alex Weed, Lonesome Shack, Roger Rogers, Michael Kahler, Ratfish Bone, David Gordon, Jevon Powell, Bump Kitchen, Kim Field & the Mighty Titans of Tone, Nearly Dan, Dirty Dale, Audio Pirati, the Fabulous Roofshakers, the Dandelion Greens, the Randy Oxford Band, Chris Stevens’ Surf Monkeys, Kim Archer Band, Chris Nelson, and Junkyard Jane.

Regional / Pacific Northwest Artists included David Vest, Robbie Laws’ Bigger Blues Band, Kevin Selfe & the Tornadoes, the Joe McMurrian Quartet, the Insomniacs, the Strangetones, Kolvane aka the Rose City Kings, Lloyd Jones Struggle, the Fat Tones, and the Essentials.

We welcomed Fiona Boyes & the Fortune Tellers to the Pacific Northwest by way of Australia, and said goodbye to Johny Broomdust as he headed east.

We shared a warm hello – and had to say a sad goodbye – to Sean Costello, as his Highway 99 debut was followed by his untimely passing just a couple months later. After his show here, Sean hung out until breakfast the next morning, bulls***ing with staff, watching movies, sharing jokes, getting to know us, and we all looked forward to his next tour. We'll miss him, a remarkable young man who represented, by our estimation, an integral part of the present and future of Blues music and a good friend.

Little Bill led a memorial and benefit concert for Hans Ipsen that only those who were there will ever know about. Hans was a central part of the rhythm & blues scene in the Puget Sound for many years, and we are humbled to have hosted the occasions which honored his impact on the music community.

Musicians rallied behind Mark Whitman, threw a marathon show to kick in for his hospital bills, and our club was graced with his return to the concert stage just a few weeks later.

Roots/Americana/Rockabilly music Hit the Highway in the form of Billy Duane & the Creepers, the Juke Joint Gamblers, the Rainieros, the Souvenirs, Johnny Mercury, Dragstrip Riot, James Hunnicutt & the Revolvers, Hard Money Saints, the Load Levelers, Dr. Hellno & the Yesmen, Hot Roddin’ Romeos, Marshall Scott Warner, Wired, Little Ray & the Uppercuts, the Busted Downs, the Haul Off And Smack Somebodys, the Black Crabs, and the Whiskey Wailers.

Burlesque: Miss Indigo Blue and Kitten LaRue of the Atomic Bombsheels rang in 2008 at the stroke of midnight, and throughout the year our stage was graced with such lovely ladies as the Heavenly Spies, the Can Can Castaways, Sinner Saint Burlesque, the Shanghai Pearl, Ravenna Black, Meghan Mayhem, Drew Blood, and members of the Sockit Wenches.

2008 also saw the club debut of belly dancing as Bella Jovan performed interactively for the Lee Oskar & the Living Dead Halloween Show, and we had calendar girls hoop dancing for the NW Pin-Ups 4 Troops benefit.

From the theatre community, hostesses Rebecca M. Davis and Anita Goodmann held things together on some our zanier nights, including our annual “A Celebration of Pride” benefit for the Dunshee House.

Zydeco – we kicked it NOLA style with the Pine Leaf Boys, Dikki Du & the Zydeco Krew, Chubby Carrier & the Bayou Swamp Band, Mark St. Mary, Curley Taylor & Zydeco Trouble, Leroy Thomas & the Zydeco Roadrunners, Captain LeRoy & the Zydeco Locals, the Zydeco Flames, Motordude Zydeco…

Raven’s 8th Annual Jam For Cans was, as always, a huge success for Northwest Harvest and one of the most memorable nights of music all year. This venerable Who’s Who of PNW rhythm & blues produces truckloads of food and thousands of dollars for Northwest Harvest every year and we’re honored to host the occasion.

Our fundraising partnerships with Home Alive and the King County Coalition Against Domestic Violence continued to raise money, awareness, and entertain the hell out of everyone in attendance.

The Delta Roadhouse Showcase featured Alice Stuart, Orville Johnson, Terry Robb, JD Hobson and Mark DuFresne in a down-home, front porch Sunday afternoon.

Seattle N.O.W. Benefit - the Red Hot Blues Sisters, Polly O’Keary & the Rhythm Method, Lady A & the Baby Blues Funk Band, LJ Porter, Stacy Jones, and Paula Maya raised money for the Women’s Voter Project.

The Harmonica Houseparty brought the mind-boggling collective of Lee Oskar, Magic Dick, Tim Gonzales, and Jay Maybin in a once-in-a-lifetime harp extravaganza.

The Road to Memphis helped send Alice Stuart to Memphis for the International Blues Challenge. The Bluez Dawgz, Becki Sue & Her Big Rockin’ Daddies, Curley Cooke & Annette Taborn, Teri Wilson & Suze Sims, and of course the Formerlys played all day and raised some dough to send Alice to Beale Street.

The West Coast Guitar Killers Showcase featured Nick Vigarino, Robbie Laws, Tom “T-Boy” Boyle, and Tim Sherman

Slide Guitar Beyond the Blues featured Dan Tyak, Orville Johnson w/ Unsanctified Gospel Quartet, Eric Madis w/ Hawaiian slack key, Kinney Alverz on pedal steel and host, Nick doing slop jar delta funk with Rob Moitoza and Chris Leighton on rhythm.


Nationally Touring Artists included our friends Bobby Rush, Duke Robillard, Lil’ Dave Thompson, Bastard Sons of Johnny Cash, Harper, Kenny “Blues Boss” Wayne, Mem Shannon & the Membership, Nathan James & Ben Hernandez, Smokin’ Joe Kubek & Bnois King, Delta Moon, Kelly Richey, Debbie Davies, Maria Muldaur, Moreland & Arbuckle, the Terry Evans Band, Eddie “Devil Boy” Turner, Phil Berkowitz & the Dirty Cats, Jason Ricci & New Blood, Sonny Rhodes, Janiva Magness, the Chris Bergson Band, the Craig Caffall Band, Mingo Fishtrap, the Tony Coleman Band, Lydia Pense & Cold Blood, Delta Highway, Studebaker John & the Hawks, Charles van Zandt…

Whew! All we can do is THANK YOU and THE ARTISTS who make all this possible. We provide a place for this stuff to happen, we work hard to schedule a well-rounded palate of American Music with an emphasis on rhythm & blues, trying to balance the traditional comfort of the familiar with the fresh energy of the new. We try to offer an environment that’s just the right balance of cozy and gritty, uptown luster sprinkled with juke joint sawdust. The menu, we hope, uses traditional ingredients to bring a mix of stand-by dishes with ones that are new and inventive. Anyway, without an audience of music lovers who are willing to keep coming out for music they know and don’t know, and without the artists and musicians who hit the road and play it on our stage, we wouldn’t have the pleasure of doing this thing.

THANKS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!