April 2010 Issue

For all of you folks who live in cold climates, hopefully as you are enjoying this new issue of B.C.B., the harsh, snowy winter’s tundra is thawing and the weather is changing into warm, sweet spring! I myself love the springtime. It’s like a new birth, and yes, even a rebirth of our spirits. Plus it’s a calling for love. Yes, love, the thing that can and will save us. I heard a guy in a candy store once say that—or was it Guitar Slim?

Before I go on, Cathy and our band signed with VizzTone, and our new CD “Lemonace,” with guest artists Kid Anderson, Tommy Castro, David Maxwell, Paul Oscher, and Ron Thompson, will be out in May 2010. We’re very proud of this new effort and hope you check it out.

Now, my friends, I’m going to take us all back to a very cold winter’s night, way, way back to 1969. I really can’t remember the month, but I do know I was with an old friend who I haven’t seen or heard from since. I don’t want to use his real name; I don’t want to incriminate him. Of course the statute of limitations is up by now. So, for the sake of truth, justice, and the American way—hey, wasn’t that from the intro to the old Superman TV show?—anyway, I digress, let’s just call my old friend “Porky.”

It was about 1:00am in the morning. Porky and me were hanging out in the wings of the now way gone and glorious rock ‘n roll palace, The Fillmore East, in NYC’s Lower Eastside. From the darkness of the Fillmore’s backstage Porky and me were watching a fine jam session take place on stage. The great B.B. King, who was the headliner that night, was in charge of the jam. My mind vaguely remembers seeing Johnny Winters playing on that stage. But my eyes were glued to the great Otis Spann and T-Bone Walker.

The Fillmore’s house was still packed. Their shows were very special and people new it. No one was going to go home until the last note was played. The sweet smell of Acapulco Gold and Lower East Side ditch weed laced with oregano was rising in clouds over everyone’s heads. The music sounded glorious. B.B. as always was in top form, ripping out his perfectly spaced licks and filling the auditorium with his rich, warm, but also biting guitar tones. As B was wailing away, I could see that he was very concerned about T-Bone who had had too much to drink. T-Bone was standing to the far right of the stage with his back turned to the audience. He was wearing a dark brown tailored suit. The band was playing a slow blues, and T-Bone was directing the large horn section of jammers with very heavy and exaggerated hand and body movements. When T-Bone wanted the horns to play loud, he’d very slowly begin to raise his hands from way below his hips, palms facing up, and he would jiggle them like he was fondling a woman’s gigantic breasts or milking a cow, and he’d continue to lift them in this manner all the way up past the top of his head. When T-Bone wanted some dynamics or wanted the horns to play their parts quietly, he’d quickly turn his hands over to face the floor and this time starting from the top of his head, do the same slow shake all the way down way below his hips. The over exaggerated expression T-Bone had on his face I could only compare to Richard Pryor when he was doing one of his old wino characters. This is by no means an insult to T Bone. Seeing this I knew I was watching a master. It was poetry in motion with a very bitter sweet flavor. But yes folks, it was very funny.

Then there was Otis Spann. What do I have to say? MERCY! Spann was playing on a new Fender Rhoads electric piano which back then was a very popular instrument. But it wasn’t in any way a real piano! It didn’t have the rich deep sound. But this was the electric age. Literally! Blues for hippies! You know, it really didn’t matter. Anything Otis Spann did was the blues! DAMN! Otis Spann WAS THE BLUES!

After about an hour the great jam ended. Porky and me were still backstage which was now mobbed with tons of glittering, vampire-like groupies all wanting to get their hungry jaws into Johnny Winters. No way did they want the company of me and Porky. As we were watching this electric circus, Otis Spann very coolly walks over to Porky and me. He was a short man, medium build, wearing a very old, faded, black suit jacket, old black slacks, with an old, white, slightly wrinkled dress shirt. Otis’s dark brown eyes were glazed from a lifetime of drink, but he had a very warm, sweet vibe. He also had a bit of the con artist-hustler about him. But big deal, so did we. With no waste of words, Otis came straight to the point. He looked us up and down, sizing us up in one New York second. Boom, boom, boom! His eyes darted to us to and then to the stage—and then to the piano. With a tired, heavy, gravelly voice he asked us both, “Can that piano travel?” His voice was so low pitched, plus with all the backstage noise, Porky and me could hardly hear him. We had to ask him to repeat himself. Otis looked a bit upset and almost embarrassed. He repeated the question with a heavier, raspier voice, showing some impatience: “Can that piano travel?” I gave Porky a fast glance and with my eyes I asked “Should we do Otis this solid or what?” Porky instantly smiled with those big, brown, puppy dog eyes and out of his bucked teeth said, “Sure!” Otis smiled at us with deep pleasure and gratitude. We both looked around the backstage area to see if it looked safe. There was so much noise and confusion it looked easy as ABC! The backstage door to the street was about 90 or so feet away from the stage. We asked Otis if he had a car to put the piano in when we got it outside. He didn’t. We told him not to worry; that there was always a million cabs out there in the naked city and with plenty of hungry drivers.

With total confidence and calmness we all walked over to the stage. Porky and me grabbed the piano like we were Otis’s roadies. Otis led the charge to the exit door. When we got outside there was a cab waiting. In one fast move we had the cabbie pop the trunk while Porky and me put Otis’s new Fender Rhoads into it. While the cold air hit our faces like a million ice cubes, Otis looked sincerely into our eyes and thanked us. Porky and me smiled and proudly said good bye. Another job well done! Porky and me then rushed back into the warmth of The Fillmore thinking Johnny Winters no way could take ALL those groupies back to his hotel. There had to be leftovers. As we were eyeballing the situation like two hungry wolves in heat, out of nowhere Bill Graham, The Fillmore’s owner, walked up to us. His eyes were on fire. He was foaming at the mouth. His face was turning into a deep shade of red. At the top of his lungs he screamed at us, with the veins bulging out of his neck, “DID YOU TWO STEAL THAT F_ _ _ING PIANO?” With the best choir boy faces, Porky and me just looked at Bill Graham like he was insane, and then I very calmly asked him, “What piano?” He looked baffled and immediately turned his back on us and stormed off. Hey, he made his money that night.

From that night until this moment, I’ve never felt guilty about Porky and me lifting that piano for Otis Spann. Otis Spann should have been living in a huge mansion filled with pianos, with butlers, maids, and pretty women catering to his every whim—and with an endless flow of money at his disposal. But none of that ever came to Otis Spann .

I always thought that Otis was just going to take that piano and sell it. Big deal! I asked my dear friend Paul Oscher, who lived with Otis when they were both working in Muddy Waters’ band, about the piano. Paul told me that Otis kept it in Muddy’s basement and played it until the day he died at the age of 40 in 1970, just one year after we stole it for him. R.I.P. Otis Spann. There will never ever be another.

Johnny Ace can be reached at aceobass@earthlink.net
Websites: http://ww.lemonace.com ; http://www.myspace.com/cathylemonsandjohnnyace ; or visit us at Facebook: Cathy Lemons Johnny Ace Blues Band