Bob "Froggy" Landers and the Cough Drops. Landers aka Bob Lenarde, had a quite unique sound. He and his partner were basically buskers but they convinced Specialty to let them cut a single in 1956. It is possible that Landers had throat cancer at the time.
A one string electric guitar, made popular in delta blues in the 1930's.
Sometimes they were made out of cigar boxes.
Little Willie Joe Duncan, who plays on this track, is credited with inventing the modern unitar in the 1950's.
Willie Joe Duncan was remembered by many folks in Chicago who saw him in the early 1950s playing on Maxwell Street with Jimmy Reed. Jimmy Reed, who called Willie Joe by the nickname Jody, reminisced about Duncan in his final interview (Living Blues #1, June 1975):"…he was doin this old crazy thing, with this one strand of wire, he wasn't lettin' me lose him nowhere; now, how he was catchin' me on that one strand of broom wire I don't know! But he was doing it all right. He could play that string of wire with a bottle, if he didn't do it with his finger he'd do it with a little old piece of leather on his finger or something he'd pick it with. But on that one strand of wire on that board he could find whatever I was playin' on that guitar. Now that was somethin' I sure hated to lose. Yeah, I hated to lose Jody because it just was a crazy old thing".The last thing Jimmy Reed heard about his busking partner "Jody" was that Duncan had taken up preaching in California. He hadn't seen Willie Joe since 1955 when Duncan left Chicago for the coast, taking his one stringed instrument with him.
Here is a pic of Willie with the rather crude and highly unusual unitar.
I dig the whole track. The background vocals remind me of the Golden Gate Quartet.
Here is the flip side, re-recorded two years later:
1 comment:
When you have a few minutes, and if you are so inclined, check out the many versions of CHEROKEE SHUFFLE, an old fiddle/banjo tune. ( I have a few on my GYMLIST/PLAYLIST.). I wonder if there is ANY background connection.
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