For all who have ever been curious about the notion what binds large numbers of humans together, there is an obvious answer. Language and speech. Now let’s think of a less obvious link between people of various types. What could be more compelling, more entrancing, than music? Sure, poetry is cool, painting profound, sculpture sexy – not to mention business, medicine and law – but think a moment, dear reader. 
Have you ever stopped to consider the utter enthralled gaze of the AMERICAN IDOL contestant, be they boy or girl, as they pour their very souls out before Simon, Kara, Randy and the other more-or-less glazed over judges of this very raw but oh so heart felt talent. And make no mistake about it, in the final elimination rounds, baby, you’re gonna see and hear far more oomph and chutzpah from those ‘kids’ than their scowling evaluators could ever lay down. Take DAT to the Bank, baby. Our intrepid guide through the galaxies of real Rock and Roll, namely Billy Hancock, intruded upon the columnists’ musings on the meaning of all this, in the following fashion.
“Did you notice how the real good ones always, and I mean always do those great old covers?” Hancock, whom this column last month aptly dubbed the “Baron of Boogie,” (Is that the first time that phrase has been employed to describe Bill’s polymath attributes to his mastery of rock knowledge?) spurted out how any unknown, with even half a voice and some real eye control to the crowd, can knock ‘em out of their chairs with a good solid round of “It’s Only A Matter Of Time,” or “Piece Of My Heart,”, or how ‘bout “That’s the Story of, That’s the Glory of Love.” Wow, if you want a genuine audial treat, try listening to Billy Hancock’s own version of that last title, as we did, while playing the stage of El Boqueron II in outer Rockville on one sweltering night in 2002.
Here’s the real deal, good friends. Billy and the authors of this column, who proudly wear the epithet “Musician” on our right sleeve, without a shadow of a doubt solidly affirm more loyalty to the hits of 1962 than those of our time (with the concomitant electronica that seems to be a given nowadays) – is there really a choice? Here’s the amazing thing. From his windowless, but lofty, ‘nerve center,’ lined with stacks of books on Elvis, Bowie, Jerry Lee, Broadway show tunes, Wanda Jackson and the women of rockabilly, and one of Billy’s personal faves of all – jazz guitarist/singer Eddie Condon’s lavishly illustrated autobiography, Hancock prevails.
What manner of effulgence issues forth from this tiny kingdom in Barcroft, one may ask? Well, as Billy likes to start out, “we’ll tell ya.” Turkey Mountain, Hancock’s beautifully produced and meticulously researched homegrown record label lives in this crowded little room. Not content to give the listener the acme of his own output, that is, releases like “PASSIONS,” and the more recent “OUT OF THE DARKNESS,” Billy Hancock, since 2009 has embarked on a mission of mercy. With the help of his ebullient and full-throated confrere Bobbie Howard, the Turkey Mountain team is ripping out a seemingly endless series of archival CD’s.
If their debut offering, “THE KID,” is any indication, the lid on the “DC Scene” of the 1960's will really blow wide open and let out a veritable Pandora’s box of simple, easy-to-sing along titles like Howard’s ground breaking cut from early ‘64, “Girl Can’t Help It”! Going back further into (or out of) the ‘box’, when you encounter weird, slinky cuts like “Stupid Pony,” with a weaving bass throb coupled with floaty organ and crackling sax, why it’s no different than a real ‘gone’ time warp of the late Joe Stanley and Link Wray, his brothers and Shorty Horton, wailing wild in some forgotten but classic dump like Vinnie’s or the Boondocks behind the old Downtown bus station or the Sea Shell out in South East DC. Just as of the ‘Ides of March’ 2010, Bill got on the horn with us to announce he’s expanding the series to include the Chartbuster’s and the Hangmen, and he’s jockeying for the opportunity to wax afresh the best work of the now sadly forgotten Jimmy Eller and the Little People. “I played in that band,” Bill proclaims, and “Arlington AM band WEAM always announced their shows every weekend!”
As we pen this piece, the background noise du jour is a particularly loud and frantic live show of Bill Haley and his remaining Comets as played in some anonymous venue deep in Sweden, circa 1975. A quarter century into their schtick, Mr. Spitcurl and company were still wowing lots of screaming fans with largely Country and Little Richard covers, interspersed with a smattering of their old “Rock-a-Beatin’” originals. We have our retro-loving friend Derek Lynn from Birtley, Leeds, England to thank for this tidal wave of sound. In fact Mr. Lynn is largely responsible for the outpouring of Elvis and Scotty Moore obscurities which helped to fuel our smoldering love note to Elvis in the February GIGS & DIGS. Point is, as with another Derek, a blind and challenged Savant in England who was recently featured on 60 Minutes and who can literally conjure any piece, any style at all on the piano before throngs of tens of thousands, Mr. Lynn, Mr. Hancock and Messrs. Shaw and Hill all possess a unique tidal wave of musical knowledge that can, and will– yes, MUST be plumbed. Especially at this peaking era of total know-nothingness.
That is so, esteemed Readers, Why kill the golden goose for a single batch of eggs, when instead, it is possible to cosset and cajole the bearer of the Torch of True Knowledge endlessly? And has it not been proven, time and again, that continuous practicing of the Terpsichorean art (more than a street in New Orleans’ Garden District) creates longevity beyond belief? Forget David, who plucked on his harp long past slaying bad old Goliath. Pablo Casals and Segovia performed on world stages well into their 90's, as did guitarist Les Paul. Ray Price and George Jones are still two-stepping across America, one dance hall at a time, BB King, 85, bends string over 100 times per year despite the slowing down of his relentless tempos. Chuck Berry, 84, is duck-walking his blond Gibson somewhere even as you read this. Not to mention Billy Hancock, who at 63 has no plans to retire from his chosen calling.
And the once “Wild Bill” Hancock is preparing a fresh western tour, set to open in Chicago, this Tax day, April fifteenth, but wait... It wasn’t but 34 or 35 years ago that Billy Hancock brought a dream into a breathless reality. As he and Danny Gatton, Dick Heintze, Dave Elliott, and horn man Ralph McDuffie breathed life into the first major-league showcase of Gatton’s guitar virtuosity (the “Fat Boys”), Hancock had a vision of putting out singles of the band on a true classic vinyl label. In 1975, that was most possible, since among others, Specialty Records’ Art Rupe, Imperial’s Lew Chudd, and Eddie Mesner of Aladdin, all aging gentlemen who had basically mastered the art of selling a taste of New Orleans out of a crate in a car trunk on the streets of Los Angeles, were looking to get out of the business for a relatively small golden parachute. The big labels like Sony and Warner Elektra were gobbling up the old catalogs, and who wanted to hear the likes of Amos Milburn and Fats Domino anymore? Okay. Billy did a little research, made some phone calls (no Internet back then), and got the rights to lease the Aladdin name. Out came the Fat Boys releases “American Music,” Harlem Nocturne, and Memphis (yes, that Memphis). Soon to follow were a re-dub as “Memphis Disco Funk”, with the beloved Clovers as backup, a single by Bobby Radcliff, and the apocryphal two-sided wonder “Brand New Man With A Master Plan,” by Prince Geno and the Tailor-Mades. Geno, Sky reminded Bill, worked in a Northwest DC valet shop, hence the band name. Bill countered by adding in a mint copy of that 45' goes for a clean half-grand on eBay. Sky is digging his stacks to see where the copy might be hiding.
Meantime, the bittersweet anecdotes roll on fast and furious. Hancock recalled that his office suites in Old Town’s Doniphan Building (at King & Columbus) was the site of a fatal 1928 fire. “The only fatality was up on the fourth floor.” We inquired, “Any ghostly activity while you were there?”
“Not hardly,” quipped Hancock. Sky felt the heebie jeebies while there at a record release party in 1976, however. Having layered three high-decker Screwdrivers atop two big Gibson martinis and six Budweiser tall- boys, he now recollects Billy having to shepherd him back to Maryland early, but not before jettisoning a full load over his checkered and cuffed wool hustler pants. Meanwhile, we’ve run outta time and space, but Billy swears up and down that relatively sleepy HOPEWELL Virginia was considered seriously as a site for the Rock’nRoll Hall of Fame museum, largely due to its significance as the home of “Sticks” McGhee, whose 1949 ‘race’ hit “Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-Odee,” supposedly carried the first true “Rock” downbeat in the rhythm. “And you know this was two full years before the more famous Rocket 88 song out of Memphis [by Ike Turner and Jackie Brenston]!” Wish we had time to recount the full breadth of Billy’s pet 1976-77 Art Deco for your ears project RADIO CITY, but he went to Rock-a-Billy,” and the rest is definitely His Story. (Note: Friends are praying fervently for the recovery of Hancock’s longtime lead player Bob “Newscaster” Swenson, but a September 11, 2010 reunion of the Fat Boys – honoring Mr. Gatton, of course– will feature another fabulously accomplished ‘Tele-Master,’ Dave Chappel.) Our May issue will cover the vast universe of Broto Roy and Ganga, his East Indian family ensemble. Thanks for listening!
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