Progressive rock fans (particularly in the United States) probably did not know what to do with the band Frost* when the debut album Milliontown appeared in 2006. Here was a group that was actively embracing the new frontiers of modern recording, still giving the breathtaking performances prog fans expect, mind you, but almost gleefully ignoring the recording limitations that were regularly adopted and calcified in the genre. There’s a practical reason for this: if a prog band can’t go out and replicate a mindbending performance, they tend to be ostracized.

That didn’t stop the band, or its leader Jem Godfrey. Curiously, it had little effect on their ability to play out either, and that ability to blow the doors down live ensured that the small but loyal fanbase that started in the States would stay just as loyal. 

Then the band broke up (sort of).

Then Godfrey appeared in a long series of making-of videos for what would become Experiments In Mass Appeal (2008), Frost*’s second album. Godfrey’s personality perfectly suited the medium, and his amiable demeanor converted more “Frosties*,” but then the band broke up again (sort of).

Fans were tentatively hopeful when, in 2013, news started surfacing. Godfrey was taking some time out of his busy “main gig” as a successful producer/songwriter to make new music for himself. Would it be solo or Frost*? Would it be pop, electronic, or rock? No one really knew for sure except, perhaps, Godfrey himself.  2016’s Falling Satellites surprised many. For those who cling tightly to the traditionalist notions of prog rock, it might have been a huge shock to the system. The club-banging breaks in the midst of the song “Towerblock” induced whiplash in some, but for most (this writer included), it fulfilled the fundamental requirement of progressive rock, in actually being progressive and inclusive, rather than focusing too narrowly on a stoic notion of what the genre must be.

He didn’t do it entirely alone. The first album featured members of the prog institution IQ, and the current band features John Mitchell (guitars, vocals), who has been with Frost* from the start; Nathan King, bass guitar; and Craig Blundell (drums); who both have served on tours with Steven Wilson (Porcupine Tree, Blackfield).

But Godfrey remains the nucleus of the band. He has stated that it has been his outlet for more complicated musical ideas when the pop world takes up too much of his creative time. He was responsible in part (with Bill Padley) for Atomic Kitten’s platinum-selling single, “Whole Again.” He won an Ivor Novello Award (an award for songwriting and composing presented by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors — ED) in 2006 for the best selling single of 2005 in the United Kingdom, “That’s My Goal,” for The X-Factor’s Shayne Ward. He has also gone out on tour as keyboardist for guitar-slinger Joe Satriani. In other words, the day job is far more lucrative and successful, but in turn, funds the passion project which, for eleven years now, has been under the Frost* banner.

Having been a Frostie* from the start, it was a thrill to speak to Jem and to ask questions about the band, the music career in full, his garden shed studio The Cube which has become its own legend at this point, and more. Stemming from a naive request on social media, this interview ended up being a thoughtful discussion, and Popdose thanks Jem Godfrey for taking the time to chat with us.

Could you describe the Ivor Novello Award and its significance, and perhaps what winning such an award means to a songwriting career?

People refer to it as the songwriting Oscars. However I think that’s actually the Grammy. Mine was for the amount of records sold that particular year, so it’s not based on any creative merit, which perhaps slightly clouds my judgment of it. Did the phone ring off the hook afterwards? Not really.

I sound really ungrateful, don’t I? I promise you I’m not, but nor am I going to blow smoke up my own arse.

There has been a significant amount of time between Frost* projects, mainly (to my knowledge) because production work is your primary income generator. With nearly every lull for the band, there had been word that the group was, in fact, ended. I have to start with this question: what is the current status of Frost*?

Frost is alive and well… for the moment. I think any band ebbs and flows in terms of its existence. If a band has something to do, then it’s got a purpose and therefore can justify “being,” so to speak.

Frost will certainly be a thing until 2020 as the timetable for the next three years is fully formed – over the winter, I’m going to finish off an EP called Others, which has the final six tracks from the Falling Satellites sessions that didn’t fit with the theme of the album for various reasons. That will be released sometime in Q2 2018. After that, I shall probably take the summer out and then start properly on album four in the fall of 2018. I expect it’ll take about a year to complete, as I can only work on it part time, and so will probably be released in Q1 or 2 of 2020. After that, I’d quite like to do what (former IQ member) Martin Orford did in 2009. I’ve always wanted to take up beekeeping…

Falling Satellites seemed to have a convoluted childbirth. At first, the project was to be a two-disc, full-on concept album, then became a single album. If I recall correctly, it was also initially to be a solo album, very electronic in nature. Then there were wranglings with how it would appear, either under contract with the label or as an independent release. Could you set the record straight on how the album go to be what it was?

I wouldn’t say it was a convoluted birth; it was more a case of letting it evolve as it needed to. It certainly veered all over the place as it came together, but I think that’s all part of the creative process sometimes. Anything creative that’s nailed to the ground from day one just because somebody says that that is how it’s going to be will never truly flourish as it should do.

Initially, it was indeed intended as a solo release to get around the three album deal Frost* had with InsideOut. However, as the songs progressed, they were so obviously Frost* songs that it seemed very childish on my part to try and wriggle out of a record contract that I’d signed in full understanding of what it would entail. Not only that, but InsideOut were nothing other than hugely supportive and encouraging throughout the whole process, so I was doubly embarrassed. One thing they did suggest however was that it should be 45 minutes long. Personally I agreed, but I knew I’d get a lot of criticism if I did it, so I chickened out and made it 60 minutes. There was enough material to have made a double album, but I felt it was more concise to pick the best of the best from the sessions and made a really good single album rather than a more rambling and long-winded double. It’s like lots of films these days: why do they have to be 2 ½ hours long? It doesn’t make them better. Plus, you get a sore arse.

When I first heard Falling Satellites, it seemed like it was a series of snapshots of endings. In specific, I got this impression from “Towerblock,” “Lights Out,” and at least in title, “Nice Day For It.” Was that the intention or have I misread?

It’s about the human life cycle; more specifically about my dad’s as he died just as I was finishing off the album. Initially, it was more generic than that, but after he died I realized that many of the lyrics could have been about him and his life. Some tracks are absolutely about him and the aftermath of his death – “The Raging Against The Dying Of The Light In 7/8,” for example, is about his final months. The lyric “Seen seldom relations, driving in rain” was about driving to his funeral. It rained heavily and continuously on the day we cremated him.

He was writing a book about his experiences as a child during the Second World War when he died; he talked about being able to read his comics by the light of the fires from the bombed Docklands during the Blitz. That image really struck me, hence the lines about “the lights from the fires in the sky,” and stuff like that.

My life has moved from largely being about beginnings to being more about endings. I’m closer to death than birth now, which has been a sobering revelation. I feel like I’ve hardly got started.

Anyways, the general theme of the album is – we’re here for a very short time, be magnificent while you can.

Have you strung an electrified fence around The Cube to keep Steven Wilson from stealing away any more band members?

No. (Laughs)

It took Craig two days to record his parts for Falling Satellites, the same for John, too. And I didn’t even see Nath as he emailed his parts over. I’m a terrible employer really, Steven’s much better.

One of the most appealing things about Frost* — to me, at least — is that you aren’t indifferent or neglecting of the current sounds of pop music and pop production. That is certainly a part of your larger career as a producer/musician, but prog rock tends to not be so progressive. More often, the form self-replicates or is very beholden to other (older) musical forms. Is there a conscious effort on your part to integrate or is that just a natural response to the types of music you’re involved with, that they’re bound to intermingle?

Partly. I think it’s getting better anyway with bands like Haken, Kepler 10, and the other newer (younger!) prog bands that are emerging. A lot of prog is an exercise in nostalgia both for the bands themselves and also their audiences, and that’s totally okay. But I’m a fine one to talk. “Nice Day For It” couldn’t be more “Duke’s Travels” if it tried!

I’m proud of “Towerblock” though. It’s been very divisive.

How in the world did you wind up involved with prog rock anyway?

It’s Isaac Newton’s fault – “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” I wanted to make a mad, totally over-the-top prog album to keep myself sane in the midst of all the squeaky clean teen pop I was employed to write at the time. I didn’t realize it would snowball like it did…

The creation process for Experiments In Mass Appeal was heavily documented on social media, in videos, on the Frost* website. There was less of it for “The Dividing Line” from The Philadelphia Experiment, and almost none but the occasional blog post for Falling Satellites. To my knowledge, even the website is gone. Do you feel the process was too exposed for Experiments? In your mind, was there too much promotional involvement in the creation of that album?

We do still have a website – www.frost.life

It was all part of the concept of “Mass Appeal.” It was an experiment for me too, really. The conclusion I drew was that too much information is a bad thing. There were a few people that had imagined a lot more into the album than there was when it finally came out and so were left a bit disappointed with it. Others thought I was a bit of a tosser and so were put off. That said, lots of people enjoyed it and I think it began a bit of a spate of other bands doing something similar, which was nice.

After all that filming, I think old Isaac Newton reared his ugly head again. I’m currently of the opinion that I’ve had my 15 minutes, have some dignity, go and sit back down in my chair, shut up and get on with things rather than waffling on quite so much.

Plus, I don’t think filming us now would be quite so entertaining. We all were quite a lot happier then, I had less children so I wasn’t as tired all the time as I am now. I don’t think the recession had hit either by that point, so the planet was in a good place relatively speaking. Plus, we were much less likely to all die in a giant planet-wide hydrogen fireball than we currently are, there wasn’t a narcissistic psychopath in charge of the free world, and the U.K. hadn’t just committed economic suicide by voting to leave the E.U. It’s doesn’t feel like party time on Planet Earth right now.

For the most part, the band seemingly has stood as an alter ego to you. However, over time John Mitchell seems to have become much more a bandmate than perhaps was his initial role. Where do you see his place in terms of what Frost* was/is?

I think if you’ve got the two of us, then you’ve got “basic” Frost*. I don’t in any way mean that to denigrate what Craig and Nath bring to the party, far from it, but when you have Craig and John in Lonely Robot for example, it’s totally not Frost*, even though there’s 50% of the same people involved.

John has an extraordinary charisma, which is quite beguiling to witness. He can scowl more enigmatically than anybody else I know. He’s got an amazing physical presence. People go a bit funny when they talk to him, whereas they say, “Alright Jem, you walloping old knobber!” when they talk to me.

You’ve also had a small role in Mitchell’s solo/band project Lonely Robot. I guess in a sense, this is a mirror to the Jem Godfrey/Frost* dynamic for him?

Not really. I’m not on the new album at all!

As digital recording and distributing continue to dominate the music world, prog rock remains one of the hold-outs for the album as a structured collection or statement. Even so, artists are finding it difficult to maintain careers based on Spotify stream revenues, and the fragmented singles market is not particularly conducive to the album format, either in physical form or as an intellectual construct. What are your thoughts on this? Is the genie really out of the bottle and artists have to accept they are doing this for the love of it, if not the financial benefit from it?

I think we have to accept that the million dollar days are behind us, and do you know what? I don’t think that’s entirely a bad thing. It’s become much more of a democracy now. Record labels aren’t force feeding us what they think we should be listening to, WE get to choose now, and that’s great. Plus, it broke down all the ivory towers and gave some real pompous arseholes a smack in the mouth with the humility hammer who felt they were owed a living off the backs of musicians’ efforts.

People’s music tastes are much more wide ranging and varied now as a result of platforms like Spotify I think, and there’s less snobbery, too. People can like Taylor Swift, Oscar Peterson, and Frost*, and that’s okay. Are musicians paid fairly enough? No, I don’t think we are, but it’s relative.

Nobody should “expect” to make a living at anything in the arts anyway. That sounds very brutal, but it should be about expression rather than commercial gain. The process is the reward. You might have to be an electrician as well, but if that’s what it takes to buy you time to be creative, then that’s what it takes. I worked in radio stations making promos for six years when I got going. Nobody sets out in life to make radio promos for plain paper fax machines or Rolos, but it got me access to Pro Tools and paid the rent. Frost* has never been profitable, it takes money rather than makes money and always has. I do other stuff to pay for it.

Is the album dead? I think it is for those for whom it was never that important anyway, but for those who still value it as a thing, it’ll never go away.

Thanks again to Jem Godfrey for taking the time to speak with Popdose. You can learn all about the band at: http://www.frost.life

P.S. About the asterisk: There is, in the United States, a band called Frost featuring guitarist Jack Frost from Seven Witches. There is also a famous black metal band called Celtic Frost. And now you know, in part, why the asterisk is there.

 

(Archive.)

Monday, July 11, 2016

Roscoe’s basement has no gigs scheduled until autumn, but our summer is remarkably productive. We played four originals at the Bug Jar — two of Craig’s and two of Chuck’s — and over the course of the summer’s rehearsals, we will double that number. In mid-June, Craig presents us with a half-dozen demos; we glom onto “Got That Girl,” a mid-tempo jangler with soaring harmonies. It take several rehearsals to nail the complex weave of vocals, but when we do — Craig and Deanna and me in three close parts — it gives me the same tingles I get from the Hollies.

(A couple of the songs in the batch strike me as goofy — which is pretty goddam rich considering that I’m the dum-dum who wrote “Meat Clown” — and that leads me to make some unnecessary and frankly hurtful remarks to Craig, which I later regret and for which I apologize in front of the entire band. Writing about it more than a year later, I still curse myself. I try real hard not to blow this whole deal by being a jerk-ass, but God Almighty, it’s so hard to be a saint when you’re just a boy out on the street.)

My own songwriting is in the mix, too. We’ve started toying with “Purple Jesus” — roughing it up some, futzing with the structure. (I’ve also made it plain that I’m down for collaborative songwriting, and Craig includes among his demos a wordless rave-up tagged “Balada Da,” which I earmark for a possible lyrical fix-up.)

And then comes this Monday morning, and all unexpected, I get an email from Mike…

Hey Jack. I was F’n around with this riff/progression. LMK if it’s something you’d be into putting words to.

My ears prick up and I smile. Mike, you sly dog, I think. You’ve been holding out on me. Could I do something with this? Yeah, I reckon. After mulling it over for a week or so, combing the pages of my notebooks, I chop the progression up a little, fit it with a real sick puppy of a lyric, call it “Sister Saintly,” and knock out a quick vocal proof-of-concept in my living room, barely raising my voice — which for some reason makes me sound sort of like Lou Reed:

Mike digs it well enough, so we present it to the band; turns out everybody digs it. It’s a blast to play live. And every time we do, at Deanna’s insistence, I get right up on the mic and croak, “Intro!”

More than anything, I’m just glad that I didn’t let Mike down or hurt him when he took a chance on me. Creativity demands a certain degree of vulnerability, and I am bowled over (and inexpressibly grateful) that Mike — who so often keeps his own counsel — would place that amount of trust in me. Who would have guessed?

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Monday, August 1, 2016

One night, as rehearsal is winding down, we’re doing a morale check. Given my (ahem) less-than-stellar track record with organizational behavior, I figure it’s a good idea to periodically assess how everybody is feeling about the band and about their individual roles within it — which means asking people how they feel, and listening to them. (Go figure.)

I’ve been casting about for more opportunities for Deanna to sing lead. I love having multiple singers in the line-up, and I’d like to find a way to make the split more equitable. It’s tricky to find songs that suit her delivery, though. There’s a lot of great material for female vocalists in postpunk guitar pop — the Pretenders’ catalog being the most obvious — but Deanna feels (and I agree) that most of it doesn’t really play to her strengths. She’s got good range and expression and power, but not in a traditional tough-rock-chick way. There’s something choir-like — not just in the way she blends so sweetly in harmonies, but in a certain purity of tone. Not a lot of vibrato. Her range and timbre, in fact, are not unlike Bono circa October — which is very cool, but resists the traditional problem-solving technique of blindly shouting, “What about—?” followed by the name of a random woman-fronted rock band. (Not that we don’t try that, much to my displeasure.)

After a brief impasse, Chuck says — jokingly? maybe? — that if we want Deanna to sing more songs, we’ll have to write them ourselves. Which may not have been meant as a challenge, but I take it as one anyway. Yeah, I agree: We should each write one and pitch it. And there we let it rest.

Over the weekend, I listen to my stock of existing demos. And on Monday, I send around my home recording of “Down by the Wayside,” which I had previously not even considered as a potential Roscoe’s Basement song, and I cross my fingers.

And they take it. And they make it magical.

Mike works some benign voodoo on my little guitar riff, crossbreeding it somehow with “Here Comes the Sun,” and Deanna finds shades of wonder and joy in the lyric that I never imagined, and it is the damnedest sensation: I am experiencing my own music, for the first time, through somebody else’s playing, somebody else’s voice — listening to as if I were a fan. Hell, I am a fan. Who knew?

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Friday, August 13, 2016

So I’m kicking around the house doing not much of anything when I get an email from Chuck: his other band, the Mooncats — an acoustic trio that also includes Mike — has a show booked for the following evening, but their singer Amy has been called away for a family emergency:

Nothing is sure yet, but if she can’t make it would you be available and want to play? you, me, and Mike? I’m sure we can come up with some songs to play for a couple hours. I’m just trying to find some backup options in lieu of cancelling with late notice if possible.

I think about it for a full ten seconds before I put on a loud shirt, grab my silly hat, and say yes.

Here’s the hitch: Mike himself is out of town, and won’t be back until Saturday afternoon. In fact, he’s still in the shower when Chuck and I get to his house to try to put together a set list, just hours before the show.

A few Roscoe’s Basement songs are adaptable to the three-piece acoustic format — including a couple of our originals — but not enough for a full evening. The Mooncats set list yields a couple more that I know. I’ve got a pretty deep bench from my days as a solo act, but there’s very little from my old sets that’s familiar to either Chuck or Mike. And so we find ourselves doing what strangers gathered for jam sessions have been doing since time immemorial; going around in a circle, saying Do you know this one? No? How about this one? And all the while the clock is ticking.

Eventually, we amass nearly enough songs to fill our allotted time; I propose to sing a mini-set of solo numbers to pad out the evening, and away we go.

We’re at the Starry Nites Café on University, an Art Deco heap that’s one of my favorite places in the city to hang out. We operate under no band name — although later, on the ride home, it occurs to me that we should have gone by “Roscoe’s Unfinished Basement.” The mood is relaxed. We play “Starry Eyes” and “Peace, Love, and Understanding,” and a slowed-down, countrified take on “I Wanna Be Sedated.”

We chunk our way through tried-and-true jammers like “Sweet Jane” and “All Along the Watchtower” and “Werewolves of London.” We even take a run at “Friction,” for cryeye — just three acoustic guitars. Later, Mike’s wife Debbie comes up to sing a couple, including a lead turn on Elle Goulding’s “Exes and Ohs.”

I discover that “The Passenger” is nowhere near as catchy without a rhythm section. I also discover that I don’t actually know “Dear Prudence” as well as I think I do. But we manage to avoid an out-and-out train wreck. And somewhere along the way, the band version of “Purple Jesus” makes its live debut.

It’s a good night — all fun, no pressure. The crowd (such as it is) is friendly, and Mike and Chuck are such pros that even I can’t go too far astray. The one thing I find dissatisfying is my guitar tone. I’m playing the Ovation CC67 that I inherited from my brother, an early-1980s model with a saddle-mounted piezo pickup, run to a phone-level input on the board. The sound is harsh and trebly and underweight. Maybe I need a direct box, I think; but the truth, I know, is that I need a new guitar — and good luck affording that. My freelancer’s income is as sporadic as ever, and it’s a long ways ’til a birthday or any hope of wifely largesse. I can hope for the windfall of an unexpected magazine assignment, but you know the saying: Wish in one hand, shit in the other, and we’ll see which one fills up first.

Not for the first time, my lack of access to decent equipment gnaws at me. What kind of asset am I if my playing sounds like baling wire strung across a shoebox? Good gear can’t make up for lack of talent, of course, but bad gear will make a good player sound worse. Goddammit, this is supposed to be the music of the working classes. That there should be such a high economic barrier to doing it well — it just seems unfair. Look, I know that being a street fighting man was never an option; but what can a poor boy do when even playing in a rock ‘n’ roll band seems beyond his reach?

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Monday, August 29, 2016

As I mentioned a few months ago, I sometimes enter online contests to cheer myself up when I feel blue. I never win anything, never expect to — it’s more like a ritual to help me stay positive, to invite good fortune into my life: to assert that, dammit, I am worthwhile and I deserve nice things. Half the time, I forget what contests I’ve even entered. The point is not to win; the point is to feel like a winner.

And then I get this email:I have to read it three times before it sinks in.

I desperately need a new acoustic-electric guitar, and I just won one. Out of the blue.

I just won a motherfucking Martin. Only the greatest name in guitars.

I can scarcely believe it. I think, until the last minute, that it might be some scam; but a mere two days later, on a Wednesday afternoon, the UPS man comes by my house with a big cardboard box:

The guitar is packed inside a gig bag inside a plastic bag inside the box, and when I take it out the action the action is already perfect and it’s in near-perfect tune. All I can think is: Oh my God, it’s so cute. It’s smaller that I thought it would be — a scaled-down dreadnought, 15/16 size, with a 24″ scale. The Ovation, for comparison, has a 25¼” scale, and you wouldn’t think the difference would be noticeable — but it is. (Of course, I have big hands to begin with, and I play bass as much as I play guitar, so.)

The tone and feel are beautiful. It’s incredibly easy and slick to play, and it sounds great plugged in or otherwise. And it is suddenly the second-most valuable object of which I can claim sole ownership — come to think of it, it may actually be worth more than my car.

I will not remember what song I play first on this new machine; something fingerstyle, most likely, probably a jazz tune. But as I play, a feeling comes over me that I will remember. Not contentment: not even happiness, exactly. Say rather the opposite of nostalgia, whatever you might call it. An aching look forward into golden-hued future, with a mixture of hope and yearning and an absolute conviction — despite the inevitability of pain and disappointment — that everything is proceeding according to plan; that life is ultimately good, and full of unexpected wonders.

Next month: Community

Grant Hart, the legendary singer/songwriter/drummer for Husker Du has died at the age of 56, according to reports, after a long battle with cancer. At around 2 a.m. Eastern time, the official Husker Du Facebook page posted a photo of Mr. Hart with no caption.

After the break-up of Husker Du in 1988, Mr. Grant went on to form and front Nova Mob and released a string of solo albums.  He was also a full-time artist.

Tributes have been pouring in from countless individuals, most poignantly, a very touching remembrance from Mr. Hart’s former Husker Du bandmate, Bob Mould, which can be read on Mr. Mould’s official Facebook page.

What was the first rock and roll song? It depends on who you talk to and to some extent how you define rock and roll. Some would say it was recorded Jackie Brenston who sang in Ike Turner’s band and hit pay dirt with “Rocket 88” in 1951. Others bestow the title on Billy Ward’s Dominoes who made it big with “Sixty-Minute Man” that same year. But go back three years earlier, to 1948, and there you will find the Wynonie Harris smash “Good Rockin’ Tonight.”

Harris was born in Omaha in 1915 to an unwed 15-year-old mother and an unknown father. At the age of 16, Harris had dropped out of high school. He didn’t start his show business career as a singer though, he began as a dancer. In the early 1930s Harris teamed up with Velda Shannon and by 1934 they were appearing regularly at Omaha’s Ritz Theater. The success of the dance team allowed Harris to earn a living as a performer, no small feat during the Great Depression.

One of the circuit stops for Harris and Shannon was Club Harlem and it was there that Harris began to sing the blues. In order to study the form more closely, he started to travel to Kansas City where he could see masters of the form like Jimmy Rushing and Big Joe Turner up close. Harris’ big break as a singer came at a club in Los Angeles where he earned the title “Mr. Blues.”

Harris toured continually and when the musician’s strike took place in the early 1940s, and no recording was allowed, all that was left was live performance. It was during one of these appearances, at the Rhumboogie Club in Chicago, that Harris caught the eye and ear of bandleader Lucky Millender. Harris was invited to join the band and soon thereafter he found himself performing at Harlem’s famed Apollo Theater for the first time.

The strike ended in 1944 and Harris went into the studio with Millender for his debut recording session. The band recorded five songs that day and Harris sang on two of them, “Who Threw the Whiskey in the Well,” and “Hurry, Hurry.” The session was for Decca Records but there was a war on and there was an embargo on the shellac needed to actually make the records.

The record was delayed but Harris kept gaining popularity as he toured the country with Millender. Eventually, a disagreement about money led Harris to quit the band in September 1945. When a promoter threatened to cancel a Millender gig in Houston because Harris was no longer with the band, Harris relented and returned to the band for the then handsome price of $100 a night, but that would be the last time Harris played with the band.

Decca finally released “Who Threw the Water in the Well” in April 1945. By July, the record was #1 on the R&B chart and remained in that spot for eight weeks, even attracting interest from a white audience, something unusual for that era. The Decca contract was with Millender so that meant that Harris could field offers from any record company for his solo career. He eventually landed with a label called Philo and employed Johnny Otis as his bandleader.

Harris, along with the band that Otis assembled for him, recorded a song called “Around the Clock” for Philo in 1945 and while it wasn’t a huge hit, it was a popular record spawning several high-profile cover versions. But Philo was just the beginning. Harris did sessions for labels like Apollo, Bullet, and Aladdin.

It was at Syd Nathan’s King Records that Harris broke through. In the late ’40s and early ’50s, Harris had a series of hits for the label including his 1948 cover of the Roy Brown tune “Good Rockin’ Tonight.” The record turned out to be Harris’ second #1 R&B hit, but the first under his own name. Three years later, Elvis Presley scored big with his version of the song. Other Harris hits of the era included “All She Wants to do is Rock,” “Sittin’ on it All the Time,” and “Bloodshot Eyes.” He even reconnected with Millender for “Oh Babe,” a #7 hit in 1950.

By 1954, Harris’ time at King Records was over and he recorded for various labels with no major success. He recorded six songs for Roulette in 1960 including a remake of his own “Bloodshot Eyes.” But Harris was known to be a carouser and he fell deeper and deeper into debt. In 1964 he settled in Los Angeles. There he would make his final recordings, for Chess Records, “The Comeback,” “Buzzard Luck,” and “Conjured.” Harris played his last big show at the Apollo in November 1967 on a bill that included legends Big Joe Turner, Big Mama Thornton, Jimmy Witherspoon, and T-Bone Walker.

By 1969, Harris was gone, a victim of cancer at the age of 53. As I said at the outset, it all depends on how you define it, but any discussion of the records that gave birth to rock and roll has to include Wynonie Harris’ “Good Rockin’ Tonight.”

I’ve got a soft spot for anyone who, like me, moves to LA from the midwest. Austin David, originally from Michigan, relocated to the City of Angels and is cranking out a new brand of California pop/rock worthy of hearkening a new era of SoCal sound. His track “Find Me a New Way” recalls bands like Red Hot Chili Peppers (and if there’s one band LA radio loves, it’s Flea and the Gang) but merges that ’90s beat with today’s Top 40.

His new video for “Find Me a New Way” celebrates three distinct aspects of California life: the stereotypical cowboy style complete with line dances, the swanky club kid, and the forever-vacationer in a Hawaiian shirt hanging out by a pool. Accompanied by a trio of female dancers, David wanders through different landscapes, proverbially finding a new way for himself. It’s obvious that, in this case, art is imitating life, and as Austin David makes his mark in LA, his music will make his mark on listeners everywhere.