William Clarke retrospective, with Paul Barry

Paul Barry joins me on episode 64. Paul is our resident expert on William Clarke, and is currently writing a biography about him.

Bill (as he was known to his friends) was born in a suburb of Los Angeles, and starting going to the blues clubs in the south of the city, age 17. Bill met his great inspiration, George ‘Harmonica’ Smith, in 1977, with George showing Bill how to play that big old chromatic harmonica . 

Bill released his first album in 1978, with other albums following where he always featured original material. He then signed for Alligator records in 1990, releasing his superb album: Blowin’ Like Hell. The four albums he released with Alligator gave Bill the chance to fully shape the sound he had been developing, influenced by jazz players and including a horn section. 

Sadly Bill passed away at age 45, but he has still left us with an essential body of work for both diatonic and chromatic blues harmonica.

Links:

Paul Barry’s band website:
https://www.paulbarryblues.com/

LA newspaper interview with Bill 1991:
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-05-16-vl-2586-story.html

Tom Ellis: William Clarke Memorial article in Blues Access magazine:
http://www.bluesaccess.com/No_28/Clarke.html

Bob Corritore: William Clarke Remembered photo gallery:
https://bobcorritore.com/photos/william-clarke-remembered/

Interview with his wife: Jeanette Clarke-Lodovici
https://www.allaboutjazz.com/william-clarke-now-that-you-are-gone-william-clarke-by-david-king

HarpTranscripts: for transcription of Blowin' The Family Jewels: (under 'G harmonica')
http://www.harptranscripts.co.uk/diatonic.html

Videos:

Hitting Heavy album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsgucIjixtI

William Clarke playing Lollipop Mama:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrXrsmUWAGM

William Clarke playing Pawnshop Bound:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8IJBQ5u1Zs

William Clarke playing on Bro Matt’s Bluez Shift:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YIv2Bb9f6o

Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com  or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS
and Blows Me Away Productions: http://www.blowsmeaway.com/

Chapters

• 1:30 Paul Barry is our resident expert on William (Bill) Clarke
• 1:35 Paul met Bill after his band opened up for him (and George Smith) at a club in 1983
• 2:08 Paul is writing a biography about Bill, out in 6-9 months time
• 2:25 Was working on an instructional book before Bill died
• 2:52 Biography is due to be called Blowin’ Like Hell
• 3:15 Liked to be known as Bill to his friends
• 3:51 More about Paul: who is a harp player and released an album called Blow Your Cool, including Mitch Kashmar also on harp
• 5:00 Bill is one of the great Blues chromatic players
• 5:25 Bill was born in Los Angeles in 1951, started playing harp age 16 and started playing in the LA blues clubs aged 17
• 6:30 Dropped out of school age 17 to pursue his goal of being a bluesman
• 7:04 Had a day job as a machinist before he became a full-time musician
• 7:20 Bill came from a working class background
• 7:40 His song Pawnshop Bound reflects real events in his life
• 8:19 Wife Jeanette was a big supporter of Bill’s career
• 9:59 Inspired to take up harmonica after hearing the Rolling Stones
• 10:23 Discovered the great harp players like Junior Wells and Walter Horton
• 11:12 By age 18 was playing with Shakey Jake Harris, who released Bill’s first album in 1978, Hittin’ Heavy
• 12:35 Met George ‘Harmonica’ Smith in 1977
• 13:35 Bill learned from George by watching him, not from formal lessons
• 15:17 George Smith was a pioneer on blues chromatic, especially the use of octaves
• 16:03 George Smith also pioneered third position playing
• 16:50 Blowin’ The Family Jewels is a great third position song by Bill
• 17:07 Went on tour with George Smith in 1983, shortly before George died
• 18:02 Bill was a fan of jazz organ groups, and brought horns into his sound as his albums progressed
• 18:46 The Night Owls was Bill’s early band, used on his Blues From Los Angeles album in 1980
• 19:46 Bill’s instrumentals and his love for jazz shaped his sound
• 21:11 Was very hard-working on his music, and demanded a lot from his band members
• 22:08 Bill made sure that each live show was spontaneous, so band played a different solo each time and didn’t use a set list
• 23:25 Released several live albums
• 24:12 Can’t You Hear Me Calling album from 1983, where he had more control over the production
• 25:23 Tip Of The Top album, released in 1987, shortly after he quit his day job as a machinist
• 25:38 Tip Of The Top includes a song recorded with Charlie Musselwhite
• 26:20 First live album release: Rockin’ The Boat in 1988
• 26:58 Signed for Alligator records in 1990, releasing Blowin’ Like Hell as first album with them and how he signed for Alligator
• 28:15 Bill’s toured the US, Canada and Europe
• 29:07 Must Be Jelly won he Handy Award for Blues Song of the Year
• 30:26 Serious Intentions album from 1992 with more jazz influences
• 31:51 Groove Time album from 1994, with a full horn section
• 32:48 How Bill ‘thought like a horn player’
• 33:35 Recorded several songs about being on the road, a long way from home
• 34:35 Recorded a lot of original material
• 35:16 Live In Germany album
• 35:54 Final album, The Hard Way, released in 1996, and one of his best songs: The Boss
• 37:12 More on his horn-like sound, especially on chromatic
• 38:28 Albums released after his death
• 39:19 Didn’t do much work as a sideman
• 39:28 Was a perfectionist when it came to the material he released
• 40:34 Was singing from the beginning, and played some guitar
• 40:50 Bill worked really hard at his music
• 41:08 Used Bill’s I Want To Be Your Santa Claus song in the Bad Santa 2 movie
• 41:21 Paul was putting together an instructional book with Bill before he died
• 42:08 Won several posthumous awards, 6 WC Handy awards in total
• 43:15 What was Bill like as a person
• 44:26 Played Hohner harmonicas: diatonic the 1896 and chromatic 270s & 280s (16 hole)
• 44:48 Chromatic octaves are sometimes out of tune on his recordings: don’t think this was deliberate
• 45:33 Wasn’t too keen on playing 1st position
• 46:08 Embouchre: tongue block
• 46:19 Didn’t use overblows
• 46:50 Guitar was a practise tool for him
• 47:06 Played an original 1959 Fender Bassman
• 48:25 Difference between original and re-issued Bassman’s
• 49:43 Didn’t use a small amp
• 50:15 Used an Astatic shell with a CR element
• 50:54 Didn’t do much acoustic playing
• 51:32 Used a tape delay early on and then a Boss delay pedal
• 51:56 Problems with alcohol
• 52:48 Collapsed earlier in 1996, and then he gave up drinking for the last six months of his life
• 54:40 Died November 3, 1996, age 45
• 55:39 Perhaps knew that his end was coming
• 56:32 More on the biography Paul is writing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Paul Barry joins me on episode 64. Paul is our resident expert on William Clarke and is currently writing a biography about him. Bill, as he was known to his friends, was born in a suburb of Los Angeles and started going to the blues clubs in the south of the city at age 17. Bill met his great inspiration George Harmonica Smith in 1977, with George showing Bill how to play that big old chromatic harmonica. Bill released his first album in 1978 with other albums following, where he always featured original material. He then signed for Alligator Records in 1990. releasing his superb album Blowing Like Hell. The four albums he released with Alligator gave Bill the chance to fully shape the sound he had been developing, influenced by jazz players and including a horn section. Sadly, Bill passed away at age 45, but he has still left us with an essential body of work for both diatonic and chromatic blues harmonica. Once again, thank you to Seidel for sponsoring the podcast. or on Facebook or Instagram at Seidel Harmonikas. Hello Paul Barry and welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_03: 1:28

Hi Neil, it's good to be here.

SPEAKER_00: 1:30

You are our resident expert to talk about the great William Clark. Tell us how you knew William Clark.

SPEAKER_03: 1:35

I'm from St. Paul, Minnesota and I was playing at a club called Lepsky's Blue Saloon in St. Paul and my band, I'm a harmonica player too, my band had the good fortune to open up for George Smith on a Friday, Saturday in May of 1983 and lo and behold, William Clark happened to be in a band with George and he was on tour at that time. So Bill and I met on that night and we became fast friends. It was just good fortune. It's like a heart player's dream to see George Smith and Bill Clark in one night.

SPEAKER_00: 2:07

Yeah, fantastic. So you become close friends and that's led you, you're currently working on a biography of him, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 2:13

Yes, yes. Like I said, Bill and I became close friends in 83 and I actually lived with him and his family in Los Angeles in 1985. We were close friends his entire life and he and I started working on a harmonic instruction book And fortunately, we didn't finish that before he passed. I was going to pick it back up and try to complete it. And I decided to be much more apropos to do a biography on his life.

SPEAKER_00: 2:39

Great. And when will this biography be out?

SPEAKER_03: 2:41

I'm hoping within the next six to nine months. I'm working hard on it. It's a lot bigger project than I anticipated, but that's kind of my hope is by the end of the year or early in 2023.

SPEAKER_00: 2:51

Fantastic. Yeah, we'll look forward to reading that. So have you got a working title at this point?

SPEAKER_03: 2:56

I think the title we're going to use is Blown Like That's the title that Bill wanted to use with the instruction book. And Bruce Siglauer at Alligator gave him permission to do that. So I thought that'd be a great title to use. That was one of his signature songs. I think that'd be a great title to use for the book. So that's what my plans are right now.

SPEAKER_00: 3:15

So did he like to be known as William or as Bill?

SPEAKER_03: 3:18

To his friends, he was known as Bill Clark. It's kind of an interesting story. When Bill used to go to the clubs in South Central LA, there was a saxophone player by the name Bill Clark, with no E at the end. And to differentiate between that Bill Clark and the harmonica player Bill Clark, he decided to go by the name William Clark. So that name stuck. So professionally, he was known as William Clark, but to his friends, he was known as Bill.

SPEAKER_00: 3:43

Okay, well, I hope he doesn't mind us. We'll refer to him as Bill on this episode. So hopefully he's amongst friends here.

SPEAKER_03: 3:49

Oh, he would like that. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00: 3:50

Great. So before we get on to Bill, just a little bit more yourself. As you said there that you're a harp player yourself. You've got a good album out. I've been checking out. called Blow Your Cool. You've also got Mitch Cashmore playing on that one of the year.

SPEAKER_03: 4:03

Right, yeah, with some local musicians and Mitch is a friend of mine. He was nice enough to play on three tunes and also the great piano player Fred Kaplan's on that and the great vocalist Willie Walker is singing on there as well too. So I just was lucky to have a really great backing support on that CD.

SPEAKER_00: 4:21

Yeah, and it sounds great. I had a listen and you do your own tribute to William Clarke song on there, which is a song which a similar title of that building, which we'll get onto shortly.

SPEAKER_03: 4:48

Phil is really instrumental in helping me learn how to play, especially chromatic. We did a tribute to him on that CD that I think turned out pretty well. I think he'd be smiling down and happy with that one.

SPEAKER_00: 5:00

Yeah, superb. And as you say, he's definitely a fantastic chromatic, blues chromatic player and one of the greatest. Re-listening to all these recordings for this episode, I was just reminded about how great he is on that blues chromatic and how he gets it to swing. And I know he has a lot of jazzy influences, which we'll get onto, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 5:16

He was definitely one of the best and he learned that well. He kind of set the bar for that instrument in the blues world for sure.

SPEAKER_00: 5:25

Okay, so we'll get on to the man himself then. So he was born in 1951 in southern Los Angeles, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 5:31

Right, a suburb of Los Angeles called Englewood.

SPEAKER_00: 5:34

And that's where he grew up and obviously got then into the West Coast style of blues by playing around the the la blues clubs at the time yeah when he was what 17 years old

SPEAKER_03: 5:44

that's right you know he he moved to gardena which is which is in the south bay area of los angeles when he was i believe in grade school he started playing harmonica at 16 but he started going down to the south central blues clubs when he was 17 and started interacting with some of the the players down there

SPEAKER_00: 6:00

these are the black clubs yeah so he was going in and hanging around with those guys

SPEAKER_03: 6:04

he sure was and and he was too young to get in at the time and as you know bill was a a big guy but uh he he He sure didn't look old enough to get in, but he found his way in past the doorman and practically spent as much time as he possibly could in those clubs, learning from the guys that were in the clubs at the time. And he was well accepted. They knew that he was sincere about learning the music. They kind of took him under their wing and really helped him along, get started.

SPEAKER_00: 6:30

Is it right that he dropped out of school age 17 in order to pursue music? Was it inspired by going to these clubs? Maybe he had too many late nights and couldn't get up for school the next day.

SPEAKER_03: 6:40

Yeah. could be Neil I know he really caught the bug and once he caught it there was no stopping him he was very determined but you're right he did drop out of high school junior year he started working full time but when he wasn't working he was down in those blues clubs or practicing and trying to get as good as he possibly could and at that time he vowed that he would become a bluesman that's how he wanted to make his living

SPEAKER_00: 7:03

yeah and he was working as a machinist wasn't he during this time

SPEAKER_03: 7:06

yeah a little bit later at age 19 his dad and his older brother he had one brother and his dad were both machinists so Bill went into that trade and worked as a machinist for almost 20 years.

SPEAKER_00: 7:19

So yeah so he was from a kind of working class blue collar background yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 7:23

In the very truest sense of the word he sure was he grew up in a trailer park in Gardena yeah he came from blue collar background and certainly that was his work ethic too just a really hard working dedicated player.

SPEAKER_00: 7:37

Sure yeah and that comes through a lot in his music doesn't he he He did a song called Pawn Shop Bound, didn't he? Where he talks about having to pawn his gear. I think that's related to real events,

SPEAKER_03: 7:46

yeah? It is for sure. I know when I lived with him in 85, we made a couple of trips to the pawn shop. But in talking to his wife, Jeanette, his children, Willie and Gina, everything was in that pawn shop at one time or the other. Wedding rings, musical equipment, TVs. Put

SPEAKER_02: 8:03

the food on my table, baby I'm gonna pawn everything

SPEAKER_00: 8:15

Yeah, he certainly had the white man's blues. So you mentioned his wife, Jeanette. She was really instrumental, wasn't she? She really supported him. He met her at high school, didn't they? They were quite young and then she really supported his drive to become a blues man, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 8:29

Yeah, she was a year younger than Bill, but high school sweethearts and they were married. Bill was 19 and Jeanette was 18. So Jeanette was very supportive of Bill's wanting to become a was in his soul and heart to become a bluesman and she endured a lot of those practices where he'd go into the bathroom for hours at a time and practice and she saw how much hard work that he put into it and she knew that that's what he really wanted to do and she supported him 100%.

SPEAKER_00: 9:02

Yeah, that's great because I'm sure it wasn't easy financially at least all the time.

SPEAKER_03: 9:06

It was very tough financially for a long time and after he quit his job to go into blues full-time, Jeanette did work full-time.

UNKNOWN: 9:15

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00: 9:29

I think he started playing harmonica at 16, but before that, he started on drums, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 9:34

Yeah, he did. He played drums, and then he played a little guitar. He didn't have much success with either of those instruments, and then on his 16th birthday, he borrowed$2.50 from a friend and bought a harmonica, and he said there was something about it. He caught on to it real quick, and that's something that he could really resonate with, and as you know, that's how he forged his career.

SPEAKER_00: 9:57

Yeah, so it's the harp that really grabbed him, yeah. I hear he was inspired by hearing the harmonica on Rolling Stones records.

SPEAKER_03: 10:04

He was. And I think that's like a lot of us back then. You hear that harmonica, you hear like the British bands or some of those bands, and then you want to dig deeper and find out where they get their influences from.

SPEAKER_00: 10:15

Yeah, sure. Then thankfully he moved on from Mick Jagger's harmonica playing to some of the greats.

SPEAKER_03: 10:22

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00: 10:23

Yeah. So he was into all the greats, the usual, I think, you know, Walter Horton, James Cotton and Junior Wells and Sonny Boy Williamson and

SPEAKER_03: 10:29

He really connected with, originally were Junior Wells and Big Walter Horton. And I know from reading some old interviews with Bill that he used to go around town writing Junior as King, like on fences and on buildings and things like that. So... Those are the two that really resonated with him. And certainly James Cotton was one of his favorites as well, as well as, like you said, Sonny Boy and Little Walter. But I think initially Big Walter and Junior Wells were the two harmonica players he looked up to from the start.

SPEAKER_00: 11:08

So he started, as you say, he started going to these clubs in Los Angeles. And then around the age of 18, he was playing with Shaky Jake Harris, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 11:17

Right, yeah. Yeah, Shaky Jake kind of... Kind of took Bill under his wing. And when he started going to those clubs, he was playing with Shaky Jake. And actually, Shaky Jake put out his first album under his own name called Hidden Heavy.

UNKNOWN: 11:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 11:44

shaky jake had a label called good time that came out in 1978 but shaky jake was instrumental in getting that that album put out under bill's name

SPEAKER_00: 11:53

and i really noticed the playing on the album is is really fantastic actually the harmonica playing it seems very mature and he was what only

SPEAKER_03: 12:00

28 i guess it's really phenomenal playing and the vocals are good but you can see over the course of bill's career how his playing developed especially his vocals but i thought for the first album out he that was a really great record and i think And for people lucky enough to get a hold of it or to hear it, I think it opened a lot of ears and eyes to who William Clarke was.

SPEAKER_00: 12:35

In 1977, you met George Smith, which was hugely influential on him, obviously.

UNKNOWN: 12:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 12:41

It was. I think that was a critical turning point in his career where, as the story goes, he was playing with Shaky Jake's band and George walked into the club. And Bill had seen George over the years, but didn't really know him. He had seen him at places like the Ash Grove, maybe said a word to him, but didn't really know him. And that's the first time that Bill had been formally introduced to George. And he was so excited when he asked George if they wanted to team up and do some things together. And that's how that association began.

SPEAKER_00: 13:12

Yeah and I've read that you know Bill said that George is like a father to him and he's also his godfather to his son yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 13:19

Yeah he's godfather to Willie and yeah George was very influential in Bill's life and they worked together for six years until George passed away in 1983 but it was a very important time in Bill's career working with George and not so much that Bill and George ever sat down and Bill or George showed Bill things it was more that Bill watched George night in and night out, could get to see him entertain the fans. And that's something that Bill got from George is what a great entertainer he was. Obviously a great player too. So... it was more from observation where Bill got to work with George like that

SPEAKER_00: 14:05

yeah right so he didn't specifically have lessons with him or anything it was just picking it up as he went along and playing with him yeah

SPEAKER_03: 14:10

correct just watching him night in and night out how we interacted with the fans and what a great entertainer he was and also one thing that Bill told me that George had told him is don't play so many notes and that's something that George just pounded into Bill's head and that really helped Bill a lot so just little things like that that made a big difference to Bill

SPEAKER_00: 14:29

yeah and that song of yours we mentioned earlier on your tribute to william clark so so that's i assume named after bill's tribute to george smith which he released on his tip of the top album

SPEAKER_03: 14:41

yeah it's kind of similar in that regard just kind of passing passing down what bill showed me and the same thing uh with with bills is what george passed down to him

SPEAKER_02: 14:52

i had the pleasure of working alongside of george for about six years and let me tell you something The cat really got me straightened out on a whole lot of different kind of things. One of them was he showed me how to blow that big chromatic harmonica. So this is our own little special tribute to George Smith, the king of the blues chromatic harmonica.

SPEAKER_00: 15:13

That's a chromatic harmonica song from Bill. And again, talking about how we picked that up off George. So George, obviously, you know, Little Walter did play chromatic, but I think George Smith is seen as a real pioneer on the blues chromatic. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 15:27

I think so. I think a lot of people regard him as, I know Bill did, as the king of the blues chromatic. And what George did that others hadn't up to that point is he played octaves on the chromatic. So he got that big fat sound. And that's something that really appealed to a lot of those West Coast players. You know Rod Piazza had taken up with George before Bill and worked with George for a long time and you can hear Rod's playing and guys like Kim Wilson and Mitch Cashmar and certainly Bill's playing so I think that was a big difference is that George would play those big octaves whereas other players like Cotton or Little Walter didn't do that on the chromatic.

SPEAKER_00: 16:03

Also George Smith is a real I think pioneer of third position playing as well which is clearly how blues chromatic is usually played so they link together yeah. Bill really picked up the third position playing from him as well yeah

SPEAKER_03: 16:15

he did for sure i think a lot of those west coast harmonica players did as well thanks to george because i know a lot of those old recordings that george did really great third position i mean little walter played some great third position as well too but george you know it's tough to top what he did on third position so

SPEAKER_00: 16:34

It is indeed, yeah. And as I've been listening to the recordings and playing along with Bill's playing, I really picked out Blowing the Family Jewels, which is a fantastic third position song.

SPEAKER_03: 16:59

It is. That's a great song. I think that's one of his trademark songs as well, too. I agree 100% on that.

SPEAKER_00: 17:06

So he went on tour with George in 1983, and I think that's the year he died. So he sort of knew him right up to the end, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 17:14

He did. I think they started that tour in February. It went through May. The last shows that they played were right here in St. Paul, Minnesota, where we were discussing initially where my band opened up and I got the chance to meet Bill. But I think that was the last public performance that George made was in May of 1983. And then he had to quit the tour and drive home due to his health condition. So that was, and he died, I believe, in October of 83. So shortly after that, he passed away.

SPEAKER_00: 17:59

Okay, so getting on to Bill's sound and as his albums developed, as you say, he improves, you know, very much like the retrospective on Paul Butterfield that did a couple of episodes. He started bringing horns into the albums, yeah, and he was very much, you know, a fan of jazz.

SPEAKER_03: 18:17

Yeah, starting with the first of four Alligator albums, he started working with the horn players and, you know, he did a great job bringing them in on his albums. And I think they complimented what he was doing. You know, just fantastic. I think they did a fantastic job. And I think it added a lot to what Bill wanted with the direction he was going with his music. I think that that's what he was looking for.

SPEAKER_00: 18:42

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. So we'll talk about the evolution of his albums as we go through them. So his early band was called the Night Owls. And we mentioned this Hitting Heavy album. Was that the band he did with the Hitting Heavy album?

SPEAKER_03: 18:52

There were some players that were on both albums, but that was more of A band that he was working with was Shaky Jake. The Night Owls, they were featured on the Blues from Los Angeles on the same label that came out in 1980.

SPEAKER_00: 19:06

There's a compilation album called The Early Years, Volume 1 and 2. I think that's tracks from these two albums, isn't it? The Hitting Heavy and Blues from Los Angeles. Yes, that's correct. Yeah. So those, so those, all those, those tracks are available. Yeah. So, so yeah. And then, so the blues from Los Angeles, you say that was released in 1980 and he did a song called blowing my nuts, which is an instrumental.

UNKNOWN: 19:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 19:42

I don't know if that's a precursor to Blowing My Family Jewels, but another excellent instrumental.

SPEAKER_03: 19:46

His instrumentals were great. I mean, well thought out, just the way he performed them. And yeah, he was one of the best at that.

SPEAKER_00: 19:53

Did he talk to you about the process of how he put them together?

SPEAKER_03: 19:56

He had a great love for the B3 organ players that had tenor sax players and players like Jack McDuff and Shirley Scott, Jimmy McGriff, Groove Holmes, players like that. I know a lot of the guys that I interviewed that played with Bill, they said when he was listening to music non-stop. He would listen to a lot of jazz players and a lot of his instrumentals kind of incorporate what he was hearing with other players, non-blues players, more in the jazz idiom.

SPEAKER_00: 20:24

Again, was that a little bit later or was he doing that on these early albums as well?

SPEAKER_03: 20:28

He was doing that all along. I mean, obviously he spent a lot of time listening to more of the classic blues albums and he could play Little Walter, Roller Coaster, Note for Note. I mean, he knew all that stuff and he said, that's good. You want to learn that stuff, you want to practice it, you want to store it away, but then you want to develop your own sound. So early on, of course, he was listening to all that great stuff, but he was listening to jazz organ players from as far back as the late 60s. I know that Jeanette, his wife, told me that she and Bill used to go to these house parties where they used to have jazz organ players and they would go there and listen. So Bill loved that music from way back, pretty much at the start of his career.

SPEAKER_00: 21:11

And I hear he was quite demanding on his band members when he was the band leader, but he helped sort of bring them through and he made sure they were all paid the same and everything. So what was the relationship with his band members like?

SPEAKER_03: 21:22

He was very hard on himself and he was very hard on his band members. He took a lot of these guys under his wing when they were young players like Rick Holmstrom, Zach Zunas, Henry Carvajal, guys like that, that were in their probably early 20s. By this time, Bill was mid-30s. But he was very hard on them, what I understand from talking to these guys. And he was very hard on himself, very critical of himself. But he paid everybody the same. And the reason he did that is because he wanted everybody to work as hard as he did. And he didn't want hear any excuses how he was getting paid more than they were. So they don't need to work as hard as he did.

SPEAKER_00: 22:01

So, you know, the band was practicing a lot, was it? His band, you know, he made sure there was regular rehearsals. They didn't just get together and jam it then by the sounds of it.

SPEAKER_03: 22:08

Well, it's interesting because when he started taking his bands out on tours, probably like 87 is when he started going out. He didn't practice. They played enough. He wanted things to be fresh on the bandstand. Every night, that he played. If you saw him on a Tuesday night, you saw him on a Wednesday night, the shows are going to be totally different. He expected each guitar player, because they're the ones soloing, to come up with a different solo on each night. So if he heard him playing the same solo on the same song on the second night, they would hear about it. So he expected fresh ideas each and every night, no set list, just they'd end one song and boom. He would stomp, stomp his feet on the stage or count it off and away they go on the next song. The guitar players that played with Bill told me that if he had the same harp maybe he was playing the same key if not they could pick it up after maybe two three notes because they were so good at it by this time so he expected that freshness each and every night on the bandstand

SPEAKER_00: 23:02

right so he pretty much tried to improvise on all these songs he didn't didn't play the same solos

SPEAKER_03: 23:06

no absolutely not and like i said he expected that from the other players too and if if they weren't coming through they would hear about it in no uncertain terms and they would get the message right then and there so and that that's what made him such an exciting performer is that you wouldn't hear the same songs played the same way night after night.

SPEAKER_00: 23:25

Yeah, and it's interesting because he did release a few live albums, didn't he? So that makes it much more critical to listen to those live albums, do you think, to really capture his essence, do you think?

SPEAKER_01: 23:49

Oh, let me blow my harmonica! Oh, let me blow my harmonica!

UNKNOWN: 23:52

Yay!

SPEAKER_03: 23:54

Oh my gosh, yeah. Seeing him in person was so exciting. Even the guys that played with him told me the same thing, that they were still playing with him. It was hard work, but it was just so exciting to be on the bandstand with him. But you're right, the live shows were unbelievable.

SPEAKER_00: 24:10

Yeah, great. Yeah, so we'll get on to those. Before then, he released in 1983 an album called Can't You Hear Me Calling, which we've kind of got marked down here as his first proper release. Was that right? Was that a more significant release for him?

SPEAKER_03: 24:22

It was. I think the reason being is that he controlled the production of that, whereas the other ones were on Shakey's label. And of course, by this time, Bill had been getting better and better and better because he was such a hard worker. I don't want nobody else.

UNKNOWN: 24:40

Lie, lie.

SPEAKER_03: 24:51

1983 was his own project. He financed it with the help of a good friend of his, Joe Lodovici. They made that, they cut it in one night. And that's the first time he had gotten Junior Watson. He had Bill Stuvie on there. Fred Kaplan was on that one. So he could put it together like he wanted it to. And that was kind of his breakout album.

UNKNOWN: 25:21

¶¶

SPEAKER_00: 25:23

And then in 87, he released Tip of the Top,

SPEAKER_03: 25:26

Yeah, that was a great album as well, too. And this is about the time that he was starting to go out on his own. He had quit his job as a machinist. So that was an important album for him as well, too.

SPEAKER_00: 25:38

And on this album, there's a song with Charlie Musselwhite, Charlie's Blues, where Charlie's singing. So all these West Coast guys hung out together. And yeah, Charlie's on there.

SPEAKER_03: 25:47

Yeah, Charlie and Bill met. They were on a tour together for a couple of weeks. And that's where Bill met Charlie. And those two became really close friends. friends at that point so yes charlie did guest on this this album as well too

SPEAKER_00: 26:02

they trained a few solos as well on that that song yes it's a good one

SPEAKER_03: 26:05

yep they sure did so

SPEAKER_00: 26:20

And then he released his first live album, Rocking the Boat, in 88. We've talked about his live performances and capturing that. So was that something he was keen to do, to capture the live show?

SPEAKER_03: 26:31

Yeah, yeah. He used to play at this place called the Starboard Attitude in Redondo Beach, and that's where they recorded that. It did a good job of capturing his live show.

UNKNOWN: 26:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 26:55

And that was on the same label as Tip of the Top.

SPEAKER_00: 26:58

Another big turning point for him is when he signed for Alligator Records and he released his first album with them in 1990, which is Blowing Like Hell, which is the first album I heard of him. And I've loved that album ever since and still regularly listen to it. So yeah, so maybe you could tell us a story about how he got signed up

SPEAKER_03: 27:19

for Alligator. I wanted to get on a bigger label than the other albums that he had done. And he reached out to Dick Sherman. He sent him the mixes of Blown Like Hell. And Dick Sherman just loved it. And he had given that to Bruce Iglauer at Alligator and asked him to take a listen to it and really give some strong consideration. And Bruce really liked it a lot. Before Bruce signed Bill, he wanted to see his live show. Bruce had told me that before someone's part of the Alligator family, He wants to see him perform live. So he came out to California to see Bill perform. And he was wowed by his performance. That's how the association with Alligator Records started. And Bruce ended up signing Bill at that point.

SPEAKER_00: 28:11

Yeah. And so Alligator certainly then was the biggest blues label. And they really upped the game on promoting Bill and getting out there. And he started touring. I mean, touring internationally.

SPEAKER_03: 28:21

Yeah. Bill started touring in 87. Yeah. Neil, he quit his job as a full-time machinist in 87. He started touring. So he had a few years under his belt before he signed with Alligator. He was doing a lot of road work across the U.S. and Canada, you know, 200, 250 shows a year. And he was doing a little bit of overseas travel as well, too. At the same time, he was pitching Bruce at Alligator. And I think he ended up calling Bruce a lot, just trying to stay in his ear about what he was doing on the road and also how his career was going. And Dick really helped him. helped him make that connection with Bruce and get signed.

SPEAKER_00: 28:57

So on the album Blowing Like Hell, of course, his signature tune, Blowing Like Hell, we've already mentioned is a fantastic chromatic song, probably my favorite chromatic blues song. He also released a song on there called Must Be Jelly, which won him the Handy Award for Blues Song of the Year.

SPEAKER_02: 29:12

I'm in love, I'm in love, I'm in love Because a little girl's so big and fat Kiss me when you can

UNKNOWN: 29:24

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03: 29:27

You're right, he did win for Must Be Jelly for Song of the Year, which he was really so proud of that. I know him and Jeanette were at the Handy Awards, and he called Jeanette up on stage to accept the award with him because she had been so instrumental in him being able to be a full-time musician, so supportive of his career. So it meant a lot to Bill and Jeanette to win that award.

SPEAKER_00: 29:52

Yeah, so Bill wrote the lyrics for the song, did he?

SPEAKER_03: 29:54

He did.

SPEAKER_00: 29:55

His

SPEAKER_03: 29:55

uncle had written some lyrics a little bit similar to that in the past. And Bill, remember those when he was growing up, he kind of took it further and adapted some of those lyrics to that song. But that is an original song by Bill.

SPEAKER_00: 30:09

Yeah, and it's got a really interesting sound. It's some sort of organ on there. What is that, which gives it that kind of eerie sound?

SPEAKER_03: 30:14

Yeah, it's really a great song. And I'm not sure, I'll have to ask Fred Kaplan about that one. But yeah, it's a really unique sound that he gets out of the keyboard on that one.

SPEAKER_00: 30:26

Great. And then his next album, on Alligator with Serious Intentions in 1992. You know, he's starting to add more jazzy influences. For example, he records Work Song on here, which is a Cannibal Adderley, you know, sort of full-on jazz song, yeah.

UNKNOWN: 0:00

.

SPEAKER_03: 30:52

that just goes to show you the influences that that he was developing one of the real benefits with alligator outside of the recognition was that bill was given a budget to make these uh recordings so he had more leeway where he could bring in horn players he could he had more leeway to do the things that he really wanted to do and certainly the work song kind of shows you the direction that bill was heading and a little more freedom to to do things like he wanted to do them

SPEAKER_00: 31:19

yeah and another great song on that album is chasing the gator so another great instrumentically.

SPEAKER_03: 31:38

Yeah, it was kind of based on a Willis Jackson tune. It was a great, great tenor sax player, but you're right. Yeah, that's another, this shows another influence that Bill had from some of the jazz players that he listened to.

SPEAKER_00: 31:51

And then next up was Groovetime in 1994. So I think this had a full-on horn section added to it, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 31:58

Yeah, it did. And I know that I had the pleasure of talking to some of the horn players that played on those Alligator releases. Troy Jennings, one guy in particular I was talking to, and he said that Bill was thinking more like a horn player with a harmonica. They loved playing with Bill and all the tracks would be laid down so when they came into the studio they could work on the horn lines and bill was very instrumental in telling them exactly what he wanted done and they just said they loved working with him because he he was on the same page as they were as far as what what they wanted to see put in the songs

SPEAKER_00: 32:47

So you often hear it said about harmonica players that they are, you know, they try to get a horn sound or they're influenced by horn players. And, you know, we hear that said about Little Waltz. So what do you think that means? You know, maybe how did Bill apply that?

SPEAKER_03: 33:00

I think that he was thinking more like a horn player. And I know I talked to Jason Ricci, and he said a lot of harmonica players will say, like, you know, I'm influenced by horn players. And they're not, and they sound like Little Walter. But he said when you hear Bill play, you can tell he is influenced by horn players or by B3 organ players. And, you know, going way back to Little Walter, as you know, he was influenced by horn players. So I think that Bill has always taken things to a different level. And I think that was that was part of the process that he wanted to adapt into his style of music.

SPEAKER_00: 33:35

And also on this album, he's got a song called Somebody's Calling Me Home. He does a few of these sort of songs about hard traveling and being a long way from home and, you know, and it's difficult on the road. So clearly that was something which impacted him.

SPEAKER_03: 34:08

It did. And I know in talking to a lot of the guys that traveled with Bill, he was such a devoted family man that when he was on the road, it was hard being away from his children. He was really introspective in some of the songs that he wrote about his life, you know, about lack of money or being away from home. And all his songs had a lot of meaning to his life and what he experienced, and he put his heart and soul into those songs. I think that anybody that listens to it can certainly hear that.

SPEAKER_00: 34:35

Yeah, and he was really keen on doing originals, wasn't he, and not blues covers?

SPEAKER_03: 34:39

That was the number one thing about Bill, is that he was very adamant about doing originals. Like I said, I've heard him play Little Walter stuff, note for note. He could do it as well as anybody, but that's not where... He said there was already a Little Walter, there doesn't need to be another one. He was very, very keen on doing his own material I think he did it great. I know one quote I read about Billy said, I do 90% of my own material and 10% covers, but the covers I make them my own. So that was very critical to his mindset and what he wanted for his music to be an original creative player.

SPEAKER_00: 35:16

And just as we're going through his albums, we should just touch on, I think it was a little bit earlier in the 90s, he released a Live in Germany album, which I think is a really well regarded one as possibly his best live album.

UNKNOWN: 35:27

Live in Germany Thank you.

SPEAKER_03: 35:38

I like that one a lot. That was released after Bill had passed away. So the story I've heard is that someone had recorded that off the board in Germany, unbeknownst to Bill, and somehow Jeanette got a hold of it and put it out. But I agree, it's a great, great recording.

SPEAKER_00: 35:54

And then he released the last album while he was still alive in 1996, The Hard Way. Yeah, and this won a Handy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album. It sure

SPEAKER_03: 36:04

did.

SPEAKER_00: 36:04

Probably his most ambitious album yet.

SPEAKER_03: 36:07

I think it is for sure. And I some of the people I've talked to in the course of me doing this book, they feel the same way that all his albums really hold up well, but I think that last one, it's just fantastic. I think especially The Boss, every harmonica I talk to about that album, they mention The Boss and their jaws drop. They're just in awe of what he did on that tune in particular. 25 years later, it just sounds so fresh and just so riveting.

SPEAKER_00: 36:35

And that's the first song on the album, isn't it? And the way it starts is he starts off with this kind of quite intricate run up and it's over this kind of really hard grooving bass and a band of belief and so yeah it really sets that tone for being really jazzy and quite intricate.

SPEAKER_03: 37:00

It does, and when you hear that, it just shows you the creativity and the powerfulness of his playing and the soulfulness. It's one of my favorite pieces that he ever did.

SPEAKER_00: 37:12

Yeah, I mean, one thing that really strikes me about his playing, and we talked about he's one of the greatest blues chromatic players, but in that sort of jazzy, bluesy way, almost like the chromatic's a horn, whereas you'll hear a lot of people playing jazz on the chromatic. Obviously, Toot Seelman's the greatest example of that, and it's quite soft-sounding, but he's going for a really hard hit sound the way he's playing it and playing it so so hard and sort of swinging he does get that sort of more saxophone like sound

SPEAKER_03: 37:37

he sure does you know and even you could even even argue that you know he's getting almost like a b3 organ sound too i mean it's just it's just hard driving and it just it's just riveting what what what he's playing just the forcefulness and the power of what he's getting out of that instrument a lot of that has to do with obviously his tone and the way he's attacking that instrument a lot of the the forcefulness is is the octaves that he learned from George Smith big meaty ballsy sound that he did like that.

SPEAKER_00: 38:04

Listening to Bill a lot over the last few weeks again it's made me really evaluate what I'm trying to do in the chromatic because when I hear him play it I think yeah he gets such a great big you know energetic sound out of it really swings and it's like yeah that just sounds so great that you know more people should try to play the chromatic like that I think.

SPEAKER_03: 38:19

I agree and I love the jazz chromatic but I know exactly what you're talking if you want that hard hitting sound that Bill gets there's nothing like it.

SPEAKER_00: 38:27

So then after he died he died in 1996 that's correct there was a few albums released after he died and alligator released a compilation the deluxe edition in 1999 and then there were a few more released we mentioned the live in germany and now that you're gone was an album released as well who was that one by i

SPEAKER_03: 38:46

think i think jeanette clark had re-released that of some earlier work of bills

SPEAKER_00: 38:52

so there's quite a few extra songs that were released you know after he died yeah and so there's quite a few albums which came out you know to give us more of his songs which which is fantastic

SPEAKER_03: 39:00

a lot of the early earlier works and you can really see the progression from those early works to that last alligator album the hard way his creativity the way he attacks those songs and his vocals you can tell how hard worker he was because you can see where he went from point a to point b and where he ended up

SPEAKER_00: 39:19

did he do much work as a sideman

SPEAKER_03: 39:21

he did a little bit here and there it's nothing nothing notable it was mainly doing his own his own recordings i know talking to uh to some the players that played with him and also the recording process. Bill was very particular about the finished works that came out of his recordings. Like Glenda Shida from Pacific Studios told me, he was beyond perfection. So he was very much perfectionist off and on the bandstand.

SPEAKER_00: 39:48

Does that mean some of his albums at least took some weeks to put together?

SPEAKER_03: 39:50

They did for sure. I know that in talking with Glenn about this, he said initially Bill would come in and they would track a groove and then come back and do the lyrics and arrangements. Some songs would take six months, over a six-month period where he'd come back in, remix, remix, remix, and finally have something that he's happy with. I mean, some songs he would remix 30 times or he would take out parts of a lick and put other parts in or replace a drum track bass track. So he was very particular about how his recordings ended up and he wanted everything to be just right because he had told some of the players I interviewed that his recordings will live on forever and he wanted to make sure that they were as good as they could possibly be.

SPEAKER_00: 40:33

You mentioned earlier on about him being a good vocalist and how he developed his vocals.

SPEAKER_03: 40:38

You could tell how hard he worked. He did play guitar as well too. He played really great kind of more delta blues guitar but he would accompany himself on guitar and work on his vocals. And like I said, Bill was a very, very hard worker. I know when I lived with him, he had spent hours in the bathroom playing and singing. And Jeanette can attest to the same thing. A lot of the guys would tell me after the gigs when they're on the road, Bill would go to his room and you could hear him in the bathroom or the room next to him practicing, you know, well into the night.

SPEAKER_00: 41:08

Did he get any TV or film work?

SPEAKER_03: 41:10

They used some of the songs. I know like in Bad Santa 2, I think they used I Want to Be Your Santa Claus.

SPEAKER_00: 41:16

Oh,

SPEAKER_03: 41:16

yeah. But as far as doing No, I don't believe so. Not to my knowledge.

SPEAKER_00: 41:21

You say you were putting together an instructional book with him before he died. Was that the first time he'd done any sort of written material or was that the sort of thing? Did he do anything else like that?

SPEAKER_03: 41:30

No, he did not. That was the first time that he had done something like that. We just started working on probably, we're in a couple of months on. So I've got some things I can share in the book, some tips that he had talked about. Yeah, he never recorded any instructional videos or had done any writing previous to that.

SPEAKER_00: 41:47

right so he didn't really teach any harmonica students or you

SPEAKER_03: 41:51

know no he helped me a lot and he was always gracious to share tips with anybody but he didn't formally teach anybody but he was going to start doing that before he died but that never came about but he had he had had some students lined up and unfortunately he had passed away before he had the opportunity to teach

SPEAKER_00: 42:07

and and as to awards we mentioned he did get a couple of awards and he won six wc handy blues awards but i think some of them were posthumous yeah after he died he won um he won a few for his last album, The Hard Way, including Song of the Year for Fish and Blues.

SPEAKER_02: 42:21

Anyone

SPEAKER_03: 42:34

that instrumentalist too.

SPEAKER_00: 42:36

Yeah. So, you know, he's got some recognition then after he died. He did.

SPEAKER_03: 42:41

And a lot of people feel that he didn't get the recognition that he so deserved. I'm hoping that will change. But I hear that from just about everybody I've interviewed, including Bruce Siglauer, who was a big fan of Bill's. So hopefully this book will bring about more recognition to him because I think everybody, any blues fan, especially any beginning harp player, any harp player that wants to learn more about blues, I think if they study William Clarke, they're going to learn a lot how to play.

SPEAKER_00: 43:06

Yeah. Absolutely. And I hope this podcast does the same. I'm a huge fan of his and he's superb playing. Any budding harp player absolutely has to check out William Clarke's albums. So, you know, we talked a little bit, obviously you knew him really well and he was hardworking. What was he like as a person?

SPEAKER_03: 43:21

He was really a great person, Neil. Just really a kind person. He would do anything for you. And a lot of the guys I talked to about Bill, and I would back this up 100%, is just an honest person, a kind person. And I think if you didn't know Bill, like if you saw him in a club and he was kind of an imposing guy with the sunglasses on, the slick back hair, and a big guy, you might think he's standoffish or he's not friendly, but that's not the case at all. He was a rather shy person until you got to know him. But his daughter Gina told me if a gig ever got canceled in town, he would pay the guys out of his pocket to compensate them. And like I said, he paid everybody the same as he made on the road and at those gigs. So just a really good person, a really good family man and a good husband and a good friend. I used to get a lot of postcards and calls from him and a lot of other people I've talked to that were friends of him had the same. Mary Catherine Alden told me that he was the first guy to volunteer to play at a benefit. So just a good person, real good person.

SPEAKER_00: 44:22

So we'll get on to talking about the gear he used now. So what brand of harmonicas did he play?

SPEAKER_03: 44:29

He played the Breen Band 1896s. And the chromatics, he played the 270s and the 280s. Mainly the Breen Bands, he liked the wooden combs. And the chromatics, he liked the 280 and the 270. Early on his career, when money was a little tight, he'd basically play anything he could get his hands on. And sometimes the harps weren't always in tune unfortunately just because he didn't have ones that were that weren't flat at certain points his career but um yeah he did play the 280 a lot when i met him i do remember that

SPEAKER_00: 45:00

so yeah so the 280 was the 16th hole yeah so i did notice that you know listen some of his recordings you mentioned there that the octaves often aren't in tune and you can hear the the the beating on that so i was going to ask is that something you did intentionally because it does add a certain sound or was that just because they weren't in tune

SPEAKER_03: 45:17

my feeling is and i i I know I've talked to friends of mine that are harp players too, but knowing Bill like I did, I think that unfortunately there was just like a bad note, a flat note here and there that he didn't have a good harp or maybe that went flat on that particular song, but it wasn't intentional.

SPEAKER_00: 45:32

We've talked about him playing, obviously, a lot of third position stuff with the chromatic hand and playing third position on diatonics. Did he use many other positions that you're aware of?

SPEAKER_03: 45:43

Obviously, second position on the diatonic. First position... on occasion that wasn't his favorite he didn't like playing those high notes as a matter of fact on one of the recordings he asked mitch cashmar to come and do the high notes for him but i mean he could play him but first position wasn't wasn't a favorite position for him but obviously the second position and third position on the diatonic and mainly third position on the chromatic as well too

SPEAKER_00: 46:08

do you know what embouchure he used he would tom block okay and that was on the diatonic on the chromatic yeah

SPEAKER_03: 46:13

correct on the um the chromatic like we were talking about before a lot of octaves

SPEAKER_00: 46:18

yeah okay and uh i guess he didn't play any overblows back then i'm not sure they were very widespread back then were they

SPEAKER_03: 46:24

no he he did not i i think that's probably a good lesson for for some guys that maybe aren't into the overblows is listen to william clark he's not playing overblows if uh i don't know i don't know how you get a better blue sound than what he was putting out but no no he didn't and and also he wasn't as far as reading music and things like that that wasn't part of bill either just a great great ear player you could really pick up things and really get the sound that he wanted to

SPEAKER_00: 46:50

yeah you mentioned earlier on that he played guitar is that did he ever perform for guitar was that just a practice tool

SPEAKER_03: 46:54

he's done a little recording on with the guitar just mainly for him practicing at home just to try to get better but i've heard some of the stuff and it's it's really good i i like it a lot

SPEAKER_00: 47:05

yeah sure yeah so so on to his amplification so there's a great picture on bob corridor's website which he's got a william clark remembered page and there's a great picture of this 1959 bassman which is actually blue so um and there's some great pictures of bill on that on that page on bob's website i'll put a link to that onto the podcast page but yeah that that 1959 basement was that the one he used mainly this this blue one

SPEAKER_03: 47:29

yes he did and he recovered that but yep that that's the one that he used his whole career he told me early on that the the tenant speakers as you know that the basement has four tens in it but he said tenant speakers break up the best so he said those are great for harps whether you have one 10 inch whether you have two whether you have four. Yeah, that was just his amp of choice.

SPEAKER_00: 47:51

Do you know where he got that amp from? Was it a new one or a second-hand one?

SPEAKER_03: 47:54

No, no, that was the second one, and I think he got that for about$250, I want to say, in LA. He found an ad in one of the local papers, and he went down there, took Herrera, and they each bought a bassman from this one party. I think they were about$200,$250. Sure, and

SPEAKER_00: 48:12

so this was an original bassman, wasn't it? Not a reissue?

SPEAKER_03: 48:16

Correct, yep, a 1950 1959 a four input one you have 410 basement so Jeanette still has that basement

SPEAKER_00: 48:23

all

SPEAKER_03: 48:23

right thankfully it's still around

SPEAKER_00: 48:25

yeah great so a lot of people now play reissued basements I have one myself so are you aware you know what's the difference between those originals versus the reissues of a have you played through Bill's original for example

SPEAKER_03: 48:37

I have played through Bill's but it's been it's been a long time and I do myself have a 1959 reissue which I really like a lot I don't know what the what the difference between the two are but uh certainly i think the reissues sound pretty darn good

SPEAKER_00: 48:53

yeah i often wondered if it's just a kind of romantic notion that all the original ones are better and of course they're very expensive and the original parts and everything but yeah i've never tried an original one myself but yeah it'd be interesting to

SPEAKER_03: 49:04

try yeah i mean i remember i remember guys uh they interviewed saying that uh you know bill had this great tone of course and and other guys would come up and play through his basement and there's kind of you know what happened to that tone so you know it's uh A lot of that great tone came from Bill himself, but it's certainly nice to have a good amp too.

SPEAKER_00: 49:23

So like you say, he used this amp pretty much exclusively, did he? When he was touring around, he took it with him?

SPEAKER_03: 49:28

Yeah, when he was touring through the US and Canada, when they were driving, he certainly took it with him. But when he went overseas, I believe they just set him up with whatever was available at that time. He didn't bring it over to Europe or anything like that.

SPEAKER_00: 49:43

Yeah, yeah. And do you know if he used a small amp as well? That's

SPEAKER_03: 49:46

the only one. that i'm aware of that that bill used and um i believe he used that in the studio too i'm not i'm not sure but that's a good question i'll probably probably ask but i'm pretty sure he used that for his studio recordings too i wasn't aware of any other amp that bill had except that one

SPEAKER_00: 50:04

yeah no so again people go and check out bob corridor's web page which has got a picture of this amp so it looks quite beat up but yeah it looks great

SPEAKER_03: 50:10

yeah it well worn but a lot of a lot of good history with that amp

SPEAKER_00: 50:14

and um microphone wise what did he use He

SPEAKER_03: 50:17

used the shell of a JT-30 and he used an element from a sure green bullet. I think they're CR elements. So yeah, that's what he did. And the reason he did that is because he liked the way that it cut better and the JT-30 shell is lighter than the green bullet shell. So it just fits better in your hands. I like those myself better too, but that's what Bill did.

SPEAKER_00: 50:39

Right, but he definitely preferred the dynamic elements of the green bullet over the crystal then, did

SPEAKER_03: 50:44

he? Yeah, I know initially he did and maybe later in his his career he he may have switched that's my understanding that was his preferred setup with the microphone

SPEAKER_00: 50:54

and did he play much acoustically with you know a vocal mic and

SPEAKER_03: 50:57

i didn't hear him play much acoustic so i i would i would have to say no at least that when i saw him you know i saw many many times i never saw him play acoustically so i don't know i don't think that was a big part of his repertoire doing that

SPEAKER_00: 51:11

no there's a couple of songs on his album where he's going to get that acoustic sound but yeah that'd be like saying exclusively he's he he pretty much liked the amp sound, yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 51:19

Yeah, Pete did exactly. And I think that live too, he would put the mic away from him. So it's almost like he's playing acoustic, he's holding the back further. So I think he would experiment around a little bit that way as well too.

SPEAKER_00: 51:32

What about any effects?

SPEAKER_03: 51:33

He started out using a delay, a tape delay, and then he got frustrated because they kept breaking. And so we take them on the road, they're tough to maintain. So he kind of gave up that and he was using a boss delay. That's what he was using and over the course of his career he may have switched around a little bit but that's when i saw him that's what he was using and that's that's what i've kind of known him for

SPEAKER_00: 51:55

okay and then we'll get on to as we said already sadly died in 1996 i think was he 45 years old correct so he had these uh his issues with with alcohol yeah and i think that was a contributor to his uh to his early demise

SPEAKER_03: 52:11

Yeah, it was, Neil. When he went full-time in 1987, it was a tough go at the beginning. The gigs were kind of few and far between, and he was kind of questioning himself if he'd made the right decision. And that's when the drinking started to intensify. It got to the point where it was pretty much, in talking to Jeanette and his two children, it was pretty much starting drinking early in the morning and throughout the day. But everybody said he was a functioning alcoholic if he can be one where he could function, but obviously alcohol, he was dependent on alcohol.

SPEAKER_00: 52:48

Yeah, I came from reading about it in the last year and he collapsed earlier in the year and then he did manage to quit drinking, yeah?

SPEAKER_03: 52:56

So he had started the heavy drinking in 87 and pretty much followed him throughout his career. I mean, he recorded all his albums during that period of time, the Alligator albums, and before in March of 96 Before he was going on stage at the Slippery Noodle in Indianapolis, he collapsed and they called the paramedics and they took him to a hospital in Indianapolis. He had some heart issues, but also he went through the DTs where basically they had to strap him down and he had a detox fight. I think he was there for about two weeks and they called in Jeanette. It was kind of a life and death situation at that time. And thankfully he got over that and he basically came out a new person. He had quit drinking at that point.

SPEAKER_00: 53:40

There's an interview I found with Jeanette and she's talking about last year with Bill and she describes some of the struggles he goes through so it's really illuminating read if people want an insight into that from Jeanette his wife and she talks about the fact that he saw his biggest achievement as being able to quit the drinking but of all his musical achievements he was most proud of that

SPEAKER_03: 53:59

yeah I know that that's so heartwarming to see that and I know a lot of musicians have had problems with drugs and alcohol so Bill definitely is not alone but what makes me feel good about doing this book is that he was able to overcome that alcohol, get the demons off his back and live alcohol free for the last seven months of his life. That's heartwarming. And he was just a changed person. He was much happier. Everybody I saw and I saw him during that period too said they never saw him play better or be happier. And I'm just so happy that he was able to overcome the demons and get that monkey off his back and be the type of person that he could be.

SPEAKER_00: 54:38

Yeah. And then unfortunately, he did die later that year in 1996, November 3rd, Jed.

SPEAKER_03: 54:43

Yeah, it was a couple of days before that, Neil. I think it was November 1st. They were in Fresno and they were getting ready for the gig. He took a shower and started coughing up blood and got to the situation where they had to take him to the emergency room and to a hospital. He was admitted to the hospital and he died a couple of days later of a bleeding ulcer that they couldn't stop the bleeding during the surgery. So tragically, he died on November 3rd of 96.

SPEAKER_00: 55:10

On his last album, he does a song called Blues Is Killing Me.

SPEAKER_02: 55:14

But these blues is killing me But when I die now, baby Please bear my body

SPEAKER_03: 55:33

while

SPEAKER_02: 55:33

I'm

SPEAKER_00: 55:34

Was that part of his struggles of touring and the hard life of being a blues musician, do you think?

SPEAKER_03: 55:39

Well, you know, it's really interesting and kind of prophetic that Jeanette said when he came home from tour of that year, of that last tour before they went up to Fresno, which would have been in late October, he had bought Christmas presents for everybody, Willie and Gina and Jeanette, and she thought that was really unusual because he was like a late-minute chopper, like a lot of those guys are, you know, getting the day before Christmas. He had bought Christmas presents for everybody and he had just become more spiritual since he had given up drinking. He had run around a lot before they went to Fresno trying to get some tapes baked and trying to do some last minute things. So it's possible he knew something that we didn't, but Jeanette kind of had the feeling that maybe he knew his time was coming to an end. So I think there's something to be said about maybe what he was on that last recording. Maybe he knew something at the time that we didn't.

SPEAKER_00: 56:29

Well, great. So thanks so much, Paul, Barry, for talking to us and really looking forward to your book coming out I guess it'll be probably in 2023 now when it comes out yeah

SPEAKER_03: 56:37

I hope later this year Neil but for sure early 2023 I want to do it right I've got a lot of great interviews I talked to a lot of a lot of guys that played with Bill a lot of people in the industry like Bruce and Dick Sherman people like that that knew Bill so it's it's just it's gonna be a great book I want to do it right for Bill's sake because everything he did with his music was so great I want to do him justice with the book and talk about what a kind good person he was outside of being a great musician as well too but

SPEAKER_00: 57:05

yeah superb that sounds great and of course when that comes out people can go and get a lot more detail about Bill and his life and career from that so yeah really looking forward to that so

SPEAKER_03: 57:14

yeah a lot of great pictures too Neil Jeanette shared a lot of really great pictures with me so there's a lot of pictures that people haven't seen before and I just wanted to say I really appreciate what you're doing Neil I love listening to your podcast and thanks for doing what you do because you're helping spread the news about harmonica and the great music that these harmonica players has put out.

SPEAKER_00: 57:36

Oh, thanks so much. It's definitely a labor of love for me, Paul. So thanks so much, Paul Barry, for joining us today as the expert witness about William Clarke.

SPEAKER_03: 57:45

Well, thanks so much, Neil. I enjoyed our conversation.

SPEAKER_00: 57:48

Once again, thank you to Seidel for sponsoring the podcast. Be sure to check out the great range of harmonicas and products at www.seidel1847.com or on Facebook or Instagram at Seidel Harmonicas. Thanks so much to Paul Barry. I don't think we could have asked for a better expert witness. Also thanks to Joseph Callaghan for making a donation to the podcast. Please check out the podcast website at harmonicahappyhour.com. The outro song today is definitely one of my all-time favourite third position blues numbers, Blowing the Family Jewels. If you want to learn how to play it, then check out my free transcription at horptranscripts.co.uk. The link is on the podcast page. Now Bill... blow those family jewels.

UNKNOWN: 0:00

.

SPEAKER_01: 59:16

so so