Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown - Rocks (CD)

 

One evening in 1947 T-Bone Walker and his band headlined the then popular and huge Bronze Peacock Club in Houston. Walker had to interrupt his show for health reasons - an opportunity that the 23-year-old did not miss. On the instructions of the club owner he took T-Bone Walker's guitar and went on stage. "It was the first time I played guitar in public. Well, this crowd, man, we had about 800 people in there, and it was an all black audience. And I went up there and immediately invented 'Gatemouth Boogie'. I made about $600 in tips in about 15 minutes. That was a lot of money back then."   

Don Robey, the club owner, became his patron and producer. Dissatisfied with the first recordings produced for Aladdin in Los Angeles in 1947, he founded his first own record company, Peacock Records, for which Gatemouth produced exclusively until the early 1960s.

Chicago music historian and blues expert Bill Dahl has put together this luxuriously crafted CD album for Bear Family Records^®, featuring the most exciting and innovative faster guitar recordings of Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown.  This is the most comprehensive and competent story about a chapter in Texas blues guitar history, which became so important for the future development of modern blues. The fat booklet contains the excitingly told biography, plus many photos, illustrations and a discography of the recordings on this album.