Who was/is Matt Lucas ? - CDs, Vinyl LPs, DVD and more
Matt Lucas
Singing drummer Matt Lucas, born in Memphis in 1935, was adopted by a family in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, where his teenaged years were signposted by early alcoholism and a spell in the reformatory. Liner notes to Lucas's blues albums on KANATA (1972) and BLUE JAM (1983) describe a kid who hung out at back-of-town clubs, soaking up jazz and blues and drawing the scorn of fellow whites, who branded him with a racist slur for it. At 17 he moved to St. Louis to play drums in strip clubs. "I learned a lot there," he said. "You had to keep time to the strippers' asses."
At some point, Lucas joined Narvel Felts, and in 1959 he recorded R&B for the GOOD label. Felts had a deal with ex-SUN sessioneer Roland Janes in Memphis, and Janes heard something he liked in Lucas's proto-soul version of Hank Snow's I'm Moving On, which he leased to SMASH. It became a minor hit, and in November 1963, Janes pitched Lucas's version of his own Put Me Down to DOT. Lucas sings as black as ever while the pumping piano of Jamie Isinhood owes a considerable debt to the original Jerry Lee Lewis version.
The rest of the '60s were a downer for Lucas. "I was drinking so much and popping so many pills that people were coming to the clubs just to see if I'd finish the night on my feet." Today, Lucas is clean and well and living in Florida. He's still a one-hit wonder, though anyone brave enough to merge rockabilly and blue-eyed soul deserved better.
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