Whether a new Guided By Voices album is newsworthy depends on the state of your fandom. They’re one of the most prolific bands of the 90s and beyond, with 24 full-length albums under the GBV name, and even more under the name of principal songwriter Robert Pollard; so does the release of their 25th merit hoopla? That depends on your love of the unpredictable twists and turns of Pollard’s songwriting – and Memphis has many fans. While you may still be absorbed with April’s double album August by Cake, today sees the release of yet more pop sonic experiments from the band, How Do You Spell Heaven?
This newest platter offers much of what GBV fans are after, in a form more concise and disciplined than this spring’s release. While I have a weakness for their earliest lo-fi ventures, they abandoned those tones 20 years ago when a revamped lineup of the band took on a more produced sound. The crunchy guitars, bizarre chord changes, and out-of-nowhere sonic flares remained, though. For some, it was more powerful than ever on the technicolor soundstage of a major studio recording. Heaven carries on that tradition, where the puzzling meets the polished, but with a more pronounced intimacy and vulnerability.
Part of the enigmatic quality comes from Pollard’s delivery of his oblique lyrics as if his life depended on it. To be sure, GBV’s songs require repeated listenings to digest. The title song is classic Pollard: “The first hand offers the hand, the first hand! The second hand offers the hand, the second hand! … Information machines closing the casket. How do you spell heaven? Is bookshelf one word?” Inquiring minds want to know.
It really comes down to Pollard’s compelling delivery, tacking between the wistful and the desperate. And in a sonic palette where anything goes, the oblique lyrics make sense. It’s a postmodern world of disconnected meaning, re-contextualized observations. At any moment, the rug may get pulled out from under you. “How to Murder a Man (In 3 Acts)” may open up with a single chugging guitar, riffing menacingly, but just where you expect a big drum intro to kick off the song proper, it goes moody, as Pollard intones, “the counterculture is soaking/We cannot be held responsible.” Okay…color me intrigued. Then the song proceeds to explode, stylistically landing on several planets at once..
Guided By Voices: How Do You Spell Heaven?
Grounding the proceedings are far-reaching musical allusions growing out of the tradition of power pop. While the experimental side is never far, neither are the melodies, weaving textures, and even acoustic balladeering of classic rock from the 70s through the 90s. These are finely crafted musings, played with the assurance of a lifer who lives and breathes the history of radio. If calling it “pop” is too generalist and vague for these peculiar song-poems, perhaps “odd-pop” captures the balance struck here, between the accessible and the idiosyncratic, the gut and the dreaming brain.
**** (4 stars)
Who among us can honestly say they’ve never fallen into the Borax factory of someone’s love? Neighborhood Texture Jam, veterans of the 80s and 90s Memphis scene, will address that musical question Saturday at the Railgarten. In a nod to their longtime fans, rejecting the ageism implicit in late night start times, they will play on the early side. The show will be walker- and hearing aid-friendly. Segways are optional.
Gestating around 30 years ago out of the rich compost of the Antenna Club scene, the group has proved over the decades that this idea has legs, with reunion shows staged every few years.
The band’s emblem, a single high-platform shoe, is enigmatic, partly because it’s just a single shoe (what’s up with that?), partly because their proclivities tend more toward industrial-strength riff rock and punk. If the shoe suggests a hint of glam, it is buried in pile-driving sounds more likely appropriated from President’s Island. Indeed, rhythmic technician Greg Easterly may have pilfered his haz-mat-approved steel barrels from such a place. For every gig, he picks a new location from which to steal his instruments, the smells of the respective 55 gallon drums contributing to the unique character of every show.
Playing the Railgarten brings with it the added benefit of a good sound system, the better to hear singer Joe Lapsley’s lyrics with. The songs, exuding a canny political awareness, might range from the history lesson of “Old South” to the happy-go-lucky “Rush Limbaugh-Evil Blimp.” Expect a rollicking good time punctuated with bizarre theatrical touches.
This weekend, Crosstown Arts will echo with the work of several Tennessee demolition experts in search of new space. Concertgoers, be advised: wear protective headgear; there will be genre-busting. You may be impacted by the shards of shattered boundaries and preconceptions. But tearing down generic walls is the whole point of the Continuum Music Festival.
“It’s kind of different from what you think of as classical chamber music,” muses festival organizer Jenny Davis. Several ensembles will be performing, at times collaborating with local songwriters or hip hop artists, and all with a regional provenance. “They’re actually all based in Tennessee,” says Davis, director of Memphis’ own Blueshift Ensemble, who will close the festival. “Which is kind of surprising, because you think of all this stuff happening in New York, and L.A., and Chicago. But actually it’s doing really great here as well.” Many heard Blueshift’s recent collaborations with the New York-based ICEBERG composers collective, with several shows in and around the Crosstown Concourse in June. This week’s festival brings the collaboration closer to home.
Nief-Norf
“Nief-Norf are more of an experimental ensemble, based in Knoxville,” she notes. “The director, Andrew Bliss, is the percussion director of the University of Tennessee. They do a big festival every summer for two weeks, where they host a bunch of student composers and performers, with a ton of premieres and performances. This weekend at Continuum, they’ll just have cello and electric guitar. So a small little subset of the ensemble. They’re doing a Steve Reich piece, Electric Counterpoint, for electric guitar and recorded tape.”
Readers familiar with Reich’s Different Trains may recognize the title as the Pat Metheny-performed piece that finishes that album. “And there are two other pieces on the program for cello and electric guitar. Those are both world premieres, actually. One is by [California Institute of the Arts’] Nicholas Deyoe. And the other, “Sequenza for cello,” is by Luciano Berio. His sequenzas – I think there are 14 or 15 of them – explore the extreme ranges of what the instruments can do. So whenever I see those on a program, I definitely get excited.”
chatterbird
Nief-Norf’s opening set will be followed by a “secret show” by one of the more exciting new music ventures in the city. Hint: their shows last year, recorded for an LP released this January, had the whole city raving. The following night keeps things local with the Luna Nova ensemble, major supporters of new composers via their long-running Belvedere Chamber Music Festival. “They do lots of commissioning of new pieces, and they have their festival every June where they have a student composition competition, and they premiere several pieces there,” says Davis. They’ll be followed by a new kind of Nashville sound, chatterbird. “So chatterbird have been around since 2014. They are directed by a flutist, Celine Thackston, who I go way back with from Middle Tennessee State University. Their mission is to explore alternative instrumentation and stylistic diversity. I think they’re really all about inventive experiences, using flute, soprano, bassoon, piano, and percussion. AMRO is donating a really beautiful Steinway piano for the event.”
Rob Jungklas
The festival culminates with two shows on Saturday that take the genre-busting to new heights, including collaborations with local recording artists. Rob Jungklas, whose Blackbirds album arrived earlier this year, will be reinterpreting his new songs in duets with Blueshift cellist Jonathan Kirkscey. Then Blueshift will take center stage. “We’re premiering a piece by our artist in residence, Jonathan Russ, and that’s for 13 musicians – string quartet, plus winds, plus rock band, essentially,” says Davis.
The grand finale will be Blueshift’s performance with local hip hop auteur and visual artist Lawrence Matthews, a.k.a. Don Lifted. “I graduated with a painting degree [from the University of Memphis]. But I also did photography, sculpture, painting, drawing, ceramics,” says Matthews, whose musical shows often include a visual element. “I don’t do shows unless I can do a self-curated event in an alternative space. And I try to completely transform the space. So you might come into a space and see three projections, all in sync with the music. I’m just trying to curate a whole experience.” Expect the same multimedia aesthetic to permeate Saturday’s show, where Blueshift will add new musical elements to Don Lifted tracks. “I’m excited to hear what it sounds like and excited to play with it – to the point where I kinda want Jenny and Jonathan to put strings on the album that I’m working on. I’m definitely excited about how this could work.”
Blueshift Ensemble
For her part, Davis is also excited by the possibilities. “I always thought new music was like, very experimental, no melody, maybe kind of hard to listen to sometimes. But that’s just not the case, and I think there’s really something for everybody in the world of new music now.”
The Continuum Music Festival will take place at the story booth and Crosstown Art Gallery spaces, starting at 7:00 pm, Thursday, August 3rd – Saturday, August 5th.
Austin band The Hex Dispensers were a delicious mix of punk and pop that won over a lot of Memphis fans. They had a good run and even played Gonerfest a couple of times. How things have changed. Tomorrow, one of the band members will be passing through town while touring up to New York for a Goner-sponsored event. But it’s not what you’re thinking. He won’t be playing the Hex Dispensers’ “Pile of Meat,” he’ll be serving it, and you should get on out and git you some.
Tom Micklethwait was always passionate about food, and had a day gig baking for an Italian restaurant. But around 2012, he began delving into the world of barbecue, and it has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. Though based out of small food truck, Micklethwait Craft Meats has developed quite a reputation in Texas. As Food & Wine wrote last month, the eatery has been “turning heads at its Austin trailer. Unorthodox offerings like pulled goat, brisket Frito pie, and pork belly kielbasa helped put Micklethwait on the BBQ map.”
Goner co-owner Zac Ives says, “His BBQ is insanely good, totally unlike anything you can get in Memphis.” At Memphis Made on Friday, you can find out for yourself, while Ives and Hot Tub Eric spin vinyl on the wheels of steel. Oxford’s Tyler Keith will be there as well, playing a solo set. While it may not shake everyone’s faith in Memphis’ reign as king of the ‘cue, it could do us all some good to get some strange for once. It’s free and family-friendly.
From Hex Dispensers to BBQ glory: Goner hosts Austinite’s food trailer tour
“Hey, I”m looking forward to this! It’s a full band and everything. It’s exciting to me!” Don Bryant can barely contain his mirth, contemplating another show with old-school soul masters the Bo-Keys. With a new album out this year – his first since his 1969 debut LP on Hi Records – he’s been leading the band through several performances lately. But Friday’s show, dubbed “Poppa Willie’s Night” in honor of Hi’s longtime manager and producer Willie Mitchell, will be especially notable: it marks Bryant’s return to Royal Studios, where he worked for many years as a hit songwriter for Hi. He’ll be kicking off a series of three concerts being staged to celebrate the studio’s sixtieth anniversary.
It was as a songwriter that Bryant gained his widest fame, having co-written the hit “I Can’t Stand the Rain” with Ann Peebles, who he married soon after. And it could only have been in the Hi Records milieu, bursting with talents like Al Green, Otis Clay, and others, that a singer of Bryant’s caliber would be relegated to writing rather than recording hits. And he wrote many – 154 by one account.
It started early. Having begun his career leading a vocal quartet, the Four Kings, he had a song of his, “I Got to Know,” recorded by the 5 Royales when still in his teens. “When they recorded the song it was at a studio down on North Main,” he recalls. “And I wasn’t even allowed to go in the studio, I had to sit out in the lobby. That was one of the biggest deals I could have had in those days, because they were one of the most famous groups. My group was always trying to imitate them, dance-wise and song-wise. They had a lot of popular songs.”
Poppa Willie’s Night: Royal Studios kicks off 60th Anniversary Celebration
Soon after that, the Four Kings began fronting Willie Mitchell’s band. This proved fortuitous for Bryant’s solo career. “My group had problems and broke up. So I told Willie, ‘If you would accept it, I’d like to try doing solo.’ Because singing was my thing. And he said, ‘Okay, I’ll try you out.’ And that’s how I got to sing vocals with Willie Mitchell and band.” Bryant started by contributing vocal parts to some of Mitchell’s singles for Hi.
Boo Mitchell, heir to Willie’s throne as manager of today’s Royal Studios, says “He sang on some of my dad’s instrumental recordings. My favorite is a song called ‘That Driving Beat’, which he sings. It’s a Willie Mitchell song and Don is singing it. It is badass. It’s from like ’66, I think. And there’s a song called ‘Everything’s Gonna be Alright’, and it’s a Willie Mitchell song, but Don is singing. And I only found this out after my Pop passed, ‘cos it has harmony vocals throughout the whole song, and Don said, ‘That’s Willie singing harmonies.’ I was like, ‘No Shit!’ I never knew it, man! And then, Pops wasn’t around so I couldn’t give him any shit about it, and say, ‘How come you never told me it’s you singing?’”
Poppa Willie’s Night: Royal Studios kicks off 60th Anniversary Celebration (3)
Poppa Willie’s Night: Royal Studios kicks off 60th Anniversary Celebration (2)
For Bryant, this culminated in the release of his solo album, Precious Soul, in 1969. But it wasn’t long before other singers in the Hi Records stable, like Al Green, eclipsed Bryant’s solo career. Part of this had to do with major changes for Hi Records, Royal Studios, and Willie Mitchell himself. Says Boo, “Right after Joe Cuoghi [Hi Records’ original owner] died in 1970, I think he willed his shares in Hi Records to Pops, and so it was a big transition for him, you know. And when Joe Cuoghi died, [Al Green’s] ‘I’m So Tired of Being Alone’ had been out for like three or four months and had only sold like 2000 records. And Pops knew it was a hit, so after the funeral and all that stuff was over, Pops basically went to Atlanta, New York, and Chicago, and just camped out at radio stations until they played it. And they finally played it. When they played it in Atlanta, it hit. They played it in NY, same thing, Chicago, same thing. And then it went platinum.”
This marked the beginning of many years of mega-hits from Green, who outsold even the classic hit makers from Stax Records. As Boo Mitchell recounts, “Stax was doing a lot of singles. And they weren’t really selling a lot of albums, you know what I mean? And Al Green was doing the opposite because Willie Mitchell came from the album world. Which was more I guess what white artists were doing. Because of Hi Records. And so when he started doing Al Green, he did it with that same mentality of the album. And you know there were songs that were selling the albums…like ‘How Can You Mend a Broken Heart’ was the song that sold the Let’s Stay Together album. ‘Let’s Stay Together’ as a song was awesome, but all the radio stations were playing ‘How Can You Mend a Broken Heart,’ which was like a six minute song. It was never a single. Neither was ‘Love and Happiness’.”
Bryant settled in as a songwriter for the Hi Records team. He married Ann Peebles and saw her star rise through the 1970s. But by the end of the decade there came another sea change. “You know, it was like a perfect storm of badness,” says Mitchell. “Stax posted bankruptcy in ’75, which was very impactful. Then Elvis died in ’77. Al Green went completely gospel around the same time. And then disco was coming in. So things were changing. Pops had partners and he was kind of outvoted to sell the label. Because his partners were business guys, you know. And on paper it probably looked like the right thing to do. Okay, our bread and butter Al Green is going gospel and the music is changing and we should get out. You know what I mean? It may not have been a good decision. But Pops made the great decision, when they outvoted him to sell the label, he made the decision to buy the studio. So that was a great decision on his part.”
Joey Miller
Royal Studios
This was a pivotal moment for Royal, enabling it to continue operating without Hi. And through all these years, the studio itself has barely been altered. “It hasn’t changed since 69. It’s the same,” says Mitchell. And this only enhances its appeal to current day artists. Lately, after the success of the Mark Ronson/Bruno Mars hit “Uptown Funk,” recorded at Royal, the studio’s star is on the rise again. Mitchell explains, “Me and my sister started Royal Records last year. And also Royal Radio. Which is an app, or on Google Play. And it’s housed at Royal Studios, and it streams mostly music that was made at Royal, but all kinds of different music. We have radio shows with Barbara Blue and Preston Shannon, they have a blues show. Al Kapone has a show. Frayser Boy has a show. Charles Hodges from the Hi Rhythm Section has a show.”
Joey Miller
Boo Mitchell
A distinct family vibe permeates the studio to this day. This will be apparent at Friday’s shindig. The in-studio party will feature homestyle cooking by Mitchell’s Aunt Yvonne, who has served soul food to most of the renown artists who have recorded there. And now Don Bryant, with his new record, Don’t Give Up on Love, out on Fat Possum Records, will return there to honor Royal’s rejuvenation. “It’s just like homecoming to me,” he says.
And no other living artist goes as far back into Royal’s history as Bryant. “It’s so awesome to have Don, because he was there with my dad almost from the very beginning, you know,” says Mitchell. He says having Bryant kick off this year’s anniversary celebrations “was really the only thing that made sense to me, historically. You know, it was just like, that’s the right thing to do. It’s a miracle he was available because he’s been touring all over the place. And, you know the stars lin ed up.”
Rhythm on the River (Poppa Willie’s Night), featuring Don Bryant & the Bo-Keys, takes place at Royal Studios, Fri., July 28, 7 p.m., $200. Future events connected to Royal Studios’ 60th Anniversary include a free show, Memphis Mojo, at the Levitt Shell on October 14th, and the grand finale, Sixty Soulful Years, featuring several international stars at the Orpheum Theatre, November 18th.
Dywane Thomas, Jr., has written out his artistic philosophy. This is convenient for writers needing to sum up the enigmatic bass virtuoso using only tidy rows of type. It’s an absurd format to describe an artist that lights out for the sonic territories, tagged with threads and a name of radiant color that cuts through the night: MonoNeon. The best we can do is make every line of his creed our starting point. Get ready for the MonoNeon Art Manifesto:
Write your own vision and read it daily. “That came from Dada, the manifesto stuff,” says Thomas. But ever since he got his first guitar at four and played it like a bass, Thomas has followed his own vision. From the start, this lefty has avoided left-handed guitars and basses, instead playing conventional right-handed instruments upside down. “When I was younger,” he remembers in typical low-key fashion, “people used to tell me, you know, flip it the other way. You’re playing it wrong. You would sound better playing it right handed or whatever. I just kept on doing it.” Nowadays his upside-down bass of choice is a five-string, or he’ll play his quarter tone bass, which allows him to play pitches between the notes of the conventional scale. His choice of material is visionary too, ranging from quirky, beat driven funk excursions to mimicking in bass tones the voices of people from random videos found online.
Have the Southern soul/blues & and funk at the bottom and the experimental/avant-garde at the top … (YOUR SOUND!). “My home base is always gonna be Johnny Taylor, Bobby Womack, Denise LaSalle, you know – funk, Bar Kays,” says Thomas. And you can hear this in most of his work: a payload of funk, heavy as a semi, taking wide left turns. “I want to sound like Mavis Staples and Stockhausen together, or something. Or at least the idea just helps me progress and create stuff.” He recalls teaching himself bass: “I practiced in my grandmother’s living room, to records, WDIA, all the old blues stuff. Eventually I started playing in church. That’s where I really got most of my skill from. Olivet Fellowship Baptist Church on Knight Arnold Road. I played with different types of gospel choirs, like Kevin Davidson and the Voices. Then after that I went to Berklee College of Music.”
Make your life audible daily with the mistakes … the flaws … er’thang. Thomas expresses his life story every time he picks up a bass. His father, Dywane Thomas, Sr., is a heavy bass player in his own right. “He still plays. He used to play with the Bar Kays, Rufus Thomas, Pops Staples. He was really like a studio ace in Memphis in the 90s.” But it wasn’t a simple case of the father teaching the son. “He moved to Europe when I was pretty young, ‘cos he was doing a lot of work over there. So I really taught myself how to play. I’d just listen to him on recordings.”
Understand and accept that some people are going to like what you do and some are going to dislike it. … When you understand and accept that dichotomy … Move on! Not long ago, Thomas began posting his videos online, with little regard for audience or convention. They found a niche audience, and one fan was especially notable. In December, 2014, his presence was requested at Paisley Park. He jammed with Judith Hill’s band, who Prince was producing, but didn’t even meet His Purpleness at the time. Eventually, on return visits, Prince joined the sessions. “He could jam all night. His rhythm guitar playing is just otherworldly,” Thomas recalls. Prince ultimately recruited Thomas for his own band. “I’m thankful for recording with him, and he released a song under my name and stuff, ‘Ruff Enuff’ on NPG Records. I guess he really liked me to do that.”
MonoNeon Vision (2)
Recalling the time before Prince’s passing in April of 2016, Thomas is understandably wistful. “Paisley was just a different world to be in. The smell just crosses my nose sometimes. Lavender.”
Embrace bizarre justapositions (sound, imagery, etc). And: Conceptual art. Minimalism. “I got into microtonal stuff when I got to Berklee. I met a guy named David Fiuczynski. Guitar player. He plays with Jack DeJohnette. Very heavy. I also started getting into John Cage when I got to Berklee. And other avant garde stuff like Iannis Xenakis, Easley Blackwood, Jr., Julián Carillo. Morton Feldman. Milton Babbit. Stockhausen. All that stuff, that I don’t understand, but I love it.”
Polychromatic color schemes. High-visibility clothing. “It was PolyNeon at first, then I changed it. I got bored. It all happened at my grandma’s house. I was reading something about solid color neon stuff. I really like neon light installations. All the avant garde stuff.”
DIY! “I released two EP’s this year. I’m always just releasing stuff. I don’t necessarily consider it an official thing. It’s just therapeutic to me to just put stuff out. You know. I just try to hype it up as much as I can and then I try to just move on.” Thomas creates his music and videos on his laptop, though occasionally he’ll work with other locals. “There’s a cat named IMAKEMADBEATS. He’s the one that got me into making my own music videos. I bought a camera and everything. And a rapper from his label, A Weirdo from Memphis, he calls himself. He’s on my album too. He doesn’t know it though.” Thomas has been incredibly prolific – he’s self-releasing a new album, A Place Called Fantasy, this Thursday.
Then there are the artists who seek him out. “I’m with a band called Ghost Note. That’s like a side project of Snarky Puppy. With Nate Werth and Robert Searight. We just recorded an album, I think it’s supposed to be released this year in October.”
Childlike. And: Reject the worldly idea of becoming a great musician … JUST LIVE MUSIC! “I don’t even have goals, to be honest. I just like the journey. I don’t have a set plan. That’s really because of the support from my mom and my grandma. I’m thankful for that. I hope that doesn’t change. I’m just a kid. I’m 26 years old, but I’m still a kid.”
I recently stopped by the Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library to see a local legend at work. No, it wasn’t some superhero librarian working the stacks. I was down in the basement, where George Klein was celebrating the taping of his 150th episode of Memphis Sounds on WYPL, the library’s broadcast wing (channel 18 on local cable, 89.3 on your FM dial, and streaming on the internet).
Klein was every bit the professional and in very fine fettle as he wrapped up the broadcast. Of course, he’s an old hand at such things, having started in television with 1964’s Talent Party, not to mention his years of DJ’ing before that. He recounted to me how he first persuaded Talent Party‘s producers to integrate the show. “They said, ‘Okay, we’ll do it. But you’ve got to get a big star to start with. I called Fats Domino, who was an old friend, and he agreed. He insisted that I personally pick him up at the airport. So as we were on our way to the station, he tells me to stop at a liquor store. I told him, ‘Fats, you know that’s against FCC rules to drink on the show.’ He said, ‘I know George, but here’s what we’ll do. You get me a little paper cup and I’ll keep it down on the floor while I’m playing, and then I can take a little sip now and then’.”
Once he’d hosted Fats, it was an easy matter to get James Brown and many other great African-American artists on the show, which was on the air until 1973.
But while Klein was one of the first to take the Memphis Sound to the airwaves via WYPL, he’s now being joined by other DJ’s on the station’s radio channel. Every night of the week is dedicated to a different aspect of Memphis music, drawing on the library’s deep archive of local artists’ output. There are shows on Memphis music of the 60s, the 70s, gospel, soul, Sun Records, and current sounds. And with the radio programs live-streamed online, WYPL is taking these sounds around the globe.
“Honestly it all comes from the upgrades we’ve done in the last two years,” says station manager Tommy Warren. “The city of Memphis has put in a lot of upgrades. You can do so much more with the latest computer software; we’re actually able to do more with the same amount of staff.
“The Memphis music programming promotes the Memphis music collection that we have here in the library. Over the last few years while we’ve been doing that, I’ve had my two radio producers working on those shows, but with all the equipment upgrades and reevaluating what we do, we decided that the Memphis music programming is now what we need to focus on as far as building up. And that’s where we’ve started having people come in and start volunteer hosting these shows. And we’ve gotten really good feedback in the short amount of time we’ve been doing it. And I think the streaming of the shows has a lot to do with it. Everybody knows how much people love Memphis music. We look at ourselves as a marketing branch for both the library and the city of Memphis.”
But Warren adds that the daytime programming of live readings of current magazines and newspapers, a public service for the vision and reading impaired, is still important to the station. “We have readings 365 days a year. People overlook the significance of that program, until you need that program. The audience that we have for that depends on our programming more than other radio audiences do.”
Things were not looking positive for the Masqueraders a year ago. A vocal trio in the vein of the Impressions, who had put out records through most of the 1960s and ’70s, their last hurrah had been on Isaac Hayes’ Hot Buttered Soul label. When that business went under, so did their career. After a final album on Bang Records in 1980 failed to chart, the Masqueraders went back to their day jobs, and though they did the occasional session in the 1990s and began to sing on Beale Street by the early 2000s, they had not performed together for some time when 2016 rolled around.
Then a friend heard one member of the group, Harold Thomas, singing at a Christmas party. That led to a gospel producer inquiring about back-up harmonies for an artist he worked with, so Harold called fellow band mates Robert “Tex” Wrightsil and Sam Hutchins, and soon they were back in the studio — as a favor. The producer offered them their own deal, but the group was not satisfied with the recordings. Nonetheless, they were up and running again. Tex heard that America’s Got Talent (AGT) was holding auditions at the Cook Convention Center, and, as they were well-rehearsed anyway, they thought they’d give it a shot.
On audition day, the wait was so long they almost went home, but Thomas rallied his comrades. Finally, their name was called. They had chosen Sam Cooke’s classic “A Change Is Gonna Come,” a song deep in their musical DNA, to which they applied their trademark sheen of fluid harmonies. The producers were floored. By the time the group taped their performance, AGT had added strings to their minimal backing track, making for a swelling, emotional performance. Singing for the audition audience reminded Thomas of playing a massive soul revue in Philadelphia during their late ’60s heyday, but that was nothing compared to the audience they reached when their moment was broadcast and posted to YouTube. To date, the clip has been viewed over a million times. As Thomas recalls, “My daughter said, ‘Dad, I think y’all have gone viral!'”
Even more important, the judges — clearly gobsmacked — loved them. As we go to press, the Masqueraders’ second performance for AGT, “Bring It on Home to Me,” will be airing on Tuesday’s “Judge Cut” episode, and the judges’ verdicts will then determine if they go on to perform live in the competition rounds. That will be when fans around the world can vote for them in real time and propel them into the finals.
It’s been a long, meandering road to this point. The group left Dallas, their hometown, for Detroit in the mid-1960s and auditioned for Motown. When Hitsville passed, the Masqueraders headed over to La Beat records, which released several sides of theirs. But Detroit winters were too much for them, and soon they showed up in Memphis with two-dozen songs they had written for themselves. Stopping first at American Sound Studio on a whim, they ended up working there for years. Not only did they release their own material, including their biggest hit, “I Ain’t Got to Love Nobody Else,” in 1968, they added their harmonious blend to other artists’ records. That’s the Masqueraders you hear on Arthur Conley’s “Sweet Soul Music,” on Wilson Pickett’s “I’m in Love,” and on several tracks from the Box Tops’ album, Cry Like a Baby.
Many years later, when the group was playing Blues City Cafe regularly, singing the usual batch of tourist-friendly covers, they were surprised to meet British fans who said their early work, and the ’70s material they cut for Willie Mitchell and Isaac Hayes, was popular in the “Northern Soul” scene. This ultimately led to three trips to Europe in recent years, for which they had to scramble to re-learn all their own songs. But such appreciation in the U.K. was too sporadic to support them, leading to the long spell of inactivity that preceded their AGT audition.
Thomas is convinced that this most recent success grew from their initial generosity in helping that gospel producer for free: God has seen fit to reward them. Even if they go no further, the notoriety thus far could lead to a lot more work. “We got calls from Canada, New Jersey — even my man over in Spain,” says Thomas, “but we can’t do nothing right now while we’re still involved in AGT.”
That’s fine with Thomas. He’s looking to heaven when he says, “Lord, it’s up to you. Whoever you want to win gonna win. I won’t be mad. I’ll just be happy that we got as far as we got.”
NOTE: After we went to press, the Masqueraders aired their second performance on AGT. As the show’s wiki site notes, “Howie Mandel, Mel B, guest judge Chris Hardwick, Heidi Klum, and Simon Cowell all gave the trio standing ovations. The Masqueraders’ performance was strong enough for the judges to send them to the Quarterfinals instead of Carlos De Antonis and Darcy Callus.”
They’re moving on up! Keep tabs on their progress in upcoming episodes of America’s Got Talent, when you can call in and register your vote for our hometown favorites.
Some readers may recognize the Masqueraders from their many years on Beale Street, often at the Blues City Café, sometimes playing with only a keyboard to back up their sublime harmonies. Others with a historical bent may recognize them as featured artists on rare and collectible singles from the La Beat, Wand, Bell, AGP, and Hi record labels, stretching back over 50 years. You might also know their background harmonies on albums by the Box Tops and Isaac Hayes, and even an LP of their own on Hayes’ Hot Buttered Soul imprint.
Either way, you may have done a double take if you happened to see them two weeks ago on NBC’s America’s Got Talent! It was heartening to see them playing before the huge studio audience, not to mention the millions tuning in on their televisions and devices. I’ll let you be the judge, but for once I tend to agree with the celebrity panel: they killed it!
Note that with the judges behind them all the way, they will advance to the “Judge Cuts” rounds, which begin on Tuesday, July 18th. Tune in to see how they fare, and we’ll keep reporting if and when they advance through future performances.
A trip to New Orleans is a regular pilgrimage for many Memphians in search of novel music, cuisine, and culture. Visiting the Big Easy scratches an itch that can’t be satisfied elsewhere. But it’s rare that we get a slice of New Orleans coming up our way. This Saturday, July 15th, will be a notable exception, when the Wild Magnolias bring Mardi Gras to Cooper-Young to cap off the Beauty Shop’s 15-Year Anniversary Party. As one of the premiere African-American “tribes” that emerge in full-feathered glory at Carnival time every year, the Wild Magnolias bring a long tradition of deep funk and street marching with them.
Karen Carrier, the Beauty Shop’s owner, has always drawn on Crescent City culture for inspiration, and music has always been central to her experience. It was at the 1976 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival that she met her future partners in the original Automatic Slim’s eatery in Manhattan, and she has attended dozens of Jazz Fests since. During one of these visits, she befriended Bo Dollis Sr., the Wild Magnolias’ Big Chief from 1964 until just before his death in 2015. Now his son, Bo Dollis Jr., leads the group. “We played when she first opened her restaurant,” he recalls. “I was young at the time, but I still remember it.”
That, of course, was before Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and scattered most members of the Mardi Gras tribes. It took little time for them to regroup. “Me and my tribe, we came right back the same year as Katrina. That was the hardest Mardi Gras ever. You saw more people crying because they thought this or that person was dead.” It was also a challenge, says Dollis, because tribes typically work for a full year readying themselves for Mardi Gras, and months had been lost. Now, with the tribes in full swing again, such preparations still preoccupy him. “Everybody’s sewing right now, trying to get ready for Mardi Gras,” he notes. “These suits take a long time. It takes all year to get these suits together. Right now in New Orleans, it’s sewing season.”
The tribe’s handiwork will be on full display this Saturday night: a five-piece band accompanied by two “Indians” in all their feathered splendor. At 6:30 p.m., they will lead a second line parade on Cooper, followed by a performance later that night at the Beauty Shop’s sister venue, Bar DKDC.
While the group naturally performs Mardi Gras parade music, they have been associated with more eclectic sounds for decades. The first Wild Magnolias album, released in 1974, was a clarion call for Crescent City funk, with the band, known as the New Orleans Project, led by the legendary Willie Tee. The sounds of percussive clavinet and metallic vocoder vocals gave a near-disco quality to their biggest hit from that era, “Smoke My Peace Pipe (Smoke it Right).”
Their releases since then have been few and far between, but 2013’s New Kind of Funk showed that the spirit of experimentalism was alive and well. By then the group was led by Bo Dollis Jr., but, as he recalls, “That last album was dedicated to my dad. Some of the songs are his that I just revamped. Some of it’s hip-hop, some of it’s country, some of it is just straight Mardi Gras Indian. There were two originals that were mine, and the rest, like ‘Coconut Milk’ or ‘New Kind of Funk,’ were songs he did a long time ago, and I just revamped them.” Unpredictable synthesizer and guitar textures abound, though all are grounded with powerful live drumming.
Dollis says the group is now working on a new album. “For the next album, it’ll be straight Mardi Gras and Mardi Gras Indian. We’re just getting in the studio. It’s been like a month now that we’ve just started working on it. I’m looking at probably Mardi Gras time that we’ll release it, so probably around January; if not that, then maybe Jazz Fest time.”
And as for this week’s performance? “It ain’t just Mardi Gras, because I put some funk into it. I might put some oldies-but-goodies into it. It’s just a big party. So I tell anybody who comes to my show, don’t never come dressed up, because you gonna be dancing. My Indians gonna make you dance. I’m gonna make you dance. I might even get in the crowd with you and dance. It’s just a big, fun type of party, but at the same time it’s the New Orleans beat behind it.” Dollis’ parting words of advice: “Let ’em know to come comfortable, because you gonna get a workout.”
Don Perry 
Joey Miller 
Joey Miller 
Joey Miller 
