Hokum bands of the 1920s and ’30s created a brand of urban folk tunes called “jug band music” that famously blended the sounds of the plantation and the church with those of the swing, swerve and sway of nascent jazz.
And no one did it better than those Flood heroes The Memphis Jug Band, formed in 1927 by Beale Street guitar/harmonica player Will Shade.
Shade was also known as Son Brimmer, a nickname given to him by his grandmother Annie Brimmer (“son” being short for grandson). The name stuck when other members of the band noticed how the sun bothered him and he used the brim of a hat to shade his eyes.
The Ohio Valley Influence
Incidentally, Will Shade first heard jug band music in our part of the country, on the 1925 recordings by Louisville’s Dixieland Jug Blowers, and he wanted to take that sound south.
“He was excited by what he heard,” Wikipedia notes, “and felt that bringing this style of music to his hometown of Memphis could be promising. He persuaded a few local musicians, though still reluctant, to join him in creating one of the first jug bands in Memphis.”
While Shade was the constant, the rest of his band’s personnel varied from day to day, as he booked gigs and arranging recording sessions.
Some players remained a long time. For instance, Charlie Burse (nicknamed "Laughing Charlie," "Uke Kid Burse" and "The Ukulele Kid”) recorded some 60 sides with the MJB. Others — like Memphis Minnie and Hattie Hart — used the band as a training ground before going on to make careers of their own.
Street Music
The Memphis Jug Band’s venues, as The Corner Jug Store web site noted, included “street corners, juke joints, city nightclubs, political rallies, private parties, hotel ballrooms, medicine shows and riverboats,” and it cut many styles and repertoires to suit its varied audiences.
Most of all, the MJB’s sound was the music of the street, as demonstrated in the open lines of their wonderful “4th Street Mess Around,” recorded in May 1930 for Victor by Ralph Peer:
Go down Fourth until you get to Vance,
Ask anybody about that brand new dance.
The girls all say, “You’re going my way,
It’s right here for you, here’s your only chance.”
And what was that “brand new dance?” Shoot, take your pick! The Eagle Rock, the turkey trot and fox trot, camel walk and Castle Walk, the Charleston and the Lindy Hop were all stirring the feet and wiggling the hips of listeners and players in the ‘20 and ‘30s.
But Mess Around?
But what’s a “mess around?” Well, as we reported here earlier, New Orleans jazzman Wingy Manone in his wonderful autobiography called Trumpet on the Wing, talked about watching people dance the mess-around at the fish fries of his youth in the Crescent City at the beginning of the 20th century.
“The mess-around,” said Wingy, “was a kind of dance where you just messed around with your feet in one place, letting your body do most of the work, while keeping time by snapping fingers with one hand and holding a slab of fish in the other!” Now, that’s an image.
Our Take on the Tune
The Flood first started messing around jug band tunes nearly 50 Springs ago, when the band was still a youngster. Before their juncture with juggery, the guys played mainly old folk songs and some Bob Dylan and John Prine and a smattering of radio tunes from folks like James Taylor and The Eagles.
But then they discovered some fine old recordings by Tampa Red and Georgia Tom, by groups like The Mississippi Sheiks and Gus Cannon’s Jug Stompers, and most especially the great Memphis Jug Band.
Ever since then, The Flood’s musical buffet table has been a lot bigger, with tunes like this one from the warmup at last week’s rehearsal.
More Jugginess?
Of course, The Flood’s jug band music mission has continued.
If today’s song and story have you ready to join the campaign, check out The Hokum channel on the free Radio Floodango music streaming service which has dozens of jug band tunes ready to rock you. Click here to tune it in and you’ll be ready to sing along at the next Flood fest.
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