Little Boy Blue has gone

Little Boy Blue has gone

The music of Bobby 'Blue' Bland was anything but dull, but the world will be more so with his passing

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
Little Boy Blue has gone

I was eight years old when Bobby "Blue" Bland scored his final R'n'B hit That's The Way Love Is in 1963, and it would be a few more years before I bought my first 7-inch vinyl singles (Little Stevie Wonder and the Dave Clark Five were my first purchases). But once I started to get really interested in the golden years of R'n'B _ from the late 40s to the early 60s _ Bland's songs and his influential singing style quickly won me over.

Now, with the late great blues singer passing away a few days ago at the age of 83, it is time to pay tribute to a musician who was never fully recognised for his pioneering work.

Robert Calvin Brooks was born in Rosemark, Tennessee. He took his surname from his stepfather and, like other blues giants such as Howlin' Wolf, he grew up in poverty. Bland never attended school and remained illiterate all his life. A move to Memphis by his mother when he was in his early teens, however, changed his life.

In Memphis he started to sing in gospel groups, including with the The Miniatures, but the nascent blues and R'n'B scene there in the late 40s attracted the young singer to the secular. On Beale Street, he met BB King, Rosco Gordon, Little Junior Parker and Johnny Ace, who performed as the Beale Streeters.

This must have been a terrific time to be a blues musician because the music that was being created _ electrified blues in small, tight combos _ formed the bedrock for what would later develop into rock'n'roll. The music the Beale Streeters played was also being developed by other blues musicians in New Orleans, Los Angeles, Kansas and, of course, Chicago. And these musicians would change the face of popular music worldwide.

On my one trip to the US, in 1981, my travelling companion and I made a pilgrimage to Memphis with the specific aim of seeing some music on Beale Street. Sadly, the local authorities had already ripped up the street to remake it into a leisure zone or something of that ilk, so we never got to see or hear any music on Beale Street, although we found plenty of other places offering great music; after all, Memphis is a key city for blues, and later soul music.

Some of Bland's earliest recordings were with Modern in the early 50s, and Ike Turner, who wrote one of the first rock'n'roll songs, Rocket 88, introduced him to label owner Sam Philips (of Sun label fame). These early releases flopped, so Bland moved to Duke Records, a pioneering label run by fellow African-American Don Robey, which later developed into Peacock Records. Robey had to help Bland write his name on a contract he couldn't read and he also made sure Bland did not get the standard industry copyright rate of 2 cents a record; he gave him a miserly half a cent.

Despite this, from the mid 50s to the early 60 he released a series of hits (his scorecard is 63 charted singles between 1957 and 1985) that included Farther Up The Road, which became a standard for British rockers in the 1960s and 70s, Little Boy Blue, Cry, Cry, Cry, I Pity The Fool and Turn On Your Love Light. He also became famous for his version of T-Bone Walker's Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday's Just As Bad), which is often wrongly given the name Stormy Monday.

What marks out Bland as being different to many R'n'B singers is his gospel-style vocal technique and his preference for a full, big band sound _ similar to Big Joe Turner's. His profile has suffered perhaps because he was more gospel and less pop than many of his peers, but that is exactly why he had a cult following and was a favourite with female fans (before Barry White had been invented). Very few blues singers sang lovesick songs with his emotional punch as his delivery was, at times, almost like a preacher rousing his congregation.

And we have Aretha Franklin's dad to thank for that. Prior to listening to an eye-opening, ear-burning album by the Reverend CL Franklin, Bland had a high falsetto he routinely used as his trademark sound. After having his tonsils removed, he could no longer reach the high falsetto notes, so he adopted Franklin's preaching style, calling it his "squall". Watch his performances on YouTube and you'll see and hear his "cracked voice" break in the melody line and his smooth transitions (he was a smooth as Sinatra or his hero Nat King Cole). You'll hear him pleading and (musically) crying, whispering and soaring, painting a picture of tortured love, accompanied by the brass-topped, lush big band sound.

Bobby "Blue" Bland deserves his place in the pantheon of R'n'B stars who changed popular music forever. In years to come, farther up the road, music fans will still be playing the wonderful music of this blues legend. He will be sorely missed.


This column can be contacted at clewley.john@gmail.com

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