Bobby Little (Earl Hooker's Drummer) PART 1

[ChicagoB...@aol.com]

Bobby Little
featuring The Counts of Rhythm

The first time I saw Bobby Little play was at a club in Oxford, MS. I
remember the band included Johnny Billington on guitar, Bobby on drums, and Chris
Nesmith on bass. I believe it was the winter of 1989. The club was packed and the
band was really groovin'. I knew immediately that I wanted to play in that
band. The bass player lived in Oxford and would drive to Clarksdale, MS to
practice and gig because both Bobby and Mr. Johnny lived in Clarksdale. To make a
long story short, I talked with Chris and he set up an audition. They liked
what I was doing on the harmonica and hired me. Bobby and I haved played together
on and off for over 5 years. This album is my attempt to capture Bobby's
sound on drums and vocals. For this project I enlisted the help of my current
bandmates Sean Costello (guitar) and Carl Shankle (bass).
Also from Memphis, TN Al Rollog came into the studio to help fill out the
rhythm section. I recorded Bobby's drums, vocals, and piano down in Oxford, MS at
the Zombie Birdhouse Studios (home to many Fat Possum sessions). Bruce Watson
engineered. Then the rest of the band was recorded at Rockingchair Studios in
Memphis, TN. Alan Mullins engineered. This is the blues album I always wanted
to record with Bobby. I'm very pleased with the results and am sure you will
be too.

-Bill Gibson
January 1996

THE DRUMMER IS THE KEY

(Living Blues article from issue No. 96 March/April 1991.
The Beat Behind The Blues)

by Chris Nesmith and Ken Woodmansee

Ronald Bluster, better know as Bobby Little, has followed a path unfamiliar
to the majority of blues performers. Instead of leaving his rural roots behind
for the big city, like so many artists, Little did just the

opposite. He began his musical career in the Bay Area of California, singing
doo wop, then migrated to Chicago's vibrant West Side where his musical
direction took shape, and eventually settled in the cradle of the Delta- Clarksdale,
Mississippi- where he has begun performing once again.

In between his travels, Little developed his drumming craft under the
guidance of Fred Below and Odie Payne and set the beat for bluesmen Earl Hooker,
Jimmy Johnson, A.C. Reed, and a host of others. He also adopted a new name at the
suggestion of Magic Sam.

Besides mastering the drums, Little also learned another facet of the music
business during his years on the road. He began dabbling in radio broadcasting
in the late '60s in Mississippi after his fellow bandmates decided to disband
and head back North. When the F.C.C passed laws requiring radio stations to
hire black employees, Little seized the chance to learn more about the industry.
It wasn't long before he became a well-known pesonality on several stations
throughout the South. More importantly, Little learned the art of promotion
while in radio.

Today, Bobby Little combines all these talents to carry on the musical
tradition that he loves. He is currently drumming in a blues band, the Clarksdale
All-Stars, and is in charge of promotions for Stackhouse Records and the Rooster
Blues label in Clarksdale. He still finds time to spin records three nights a
week at local clubs and even books and promotes local talent throughout the
South. Although he is no longer in the same limelight as his days on the West
Side, Little has carved a new niche for himself in the Delta.

Tell me how you got into music.

Shoot, that's a long, long, long, story. It started back before I was
teenager. Just started with singin' in the streets in junior high, around the
different projects we used to live in, out in the Bay Area of Oakland, and
Berkeley,and the San Francisco area. And we used to have little doo-wop groups, we we
used to call 'em back in the early '50s. Well, four or five guys would get
together and have harmony. Guys like the Clovers was during that time; guys like
the Penguins and the Moonglows. We used to try to copy all of them. And then we
used to have little calypso groups wher I used to mess around with little
bongos and conga drums.

I used to be gettin' licks on the side of my head all the time by my mother
when I used to beat on the side of the dishpan with knives and forks and, you
know, carrying a little rhythm, That's basically how I got off into it. And my
family background, there's a lot of musicians , in gospel. My grandmother was
asinger in church; great-great grandfather was a preacher and a singer in
church. And even my mother, she was a singer in the choir.

After I come out of the service, we started messing around with more
instruments. I used to try to play some instruments when I was in high school. They
had me me on instruments I didn't care nothing about. I started out playin',
when they had room for me, with that big upright bass. Or if they had room for me
on what they called a cello. [Laughs.] Things like violin or accordion. It's
been a lot of little instuments in my real young days that we used to have
playin'. Coming through the service I used to tinker around the piano a little
bit. And going through the service we had the same type of little gatherings
like we had coming up, the little doo-wop groups in the N.C.O. clubs. Coming out
of service, I got deeply involved, 'cause I got interested in drums.

When I got interested in drums, I got really involved. When I come out of the
service I stopped around Chicago, wher my grandmother was, and started
messing around with different musicians. I remember putting together my first set of
drums.

How did you do that?

There's a place in Chicago, right at 18th and Halsted, used to be a big music
store there, wher everybody used to go. I had what we would call a marching
drum. One place I found a used tom-tom. Didn't have no head on it so I turned
it upside down, used the bottom of it. A floor tom, didn't have no heads on it,
so I went and had heads put on it and used it. I got a foot pedal, and a
snare, you know, just made it up.

You assembled it together?

Right. Anybody who saw that kind of thing today would think it was a piece of
rag on stage. So, we started out on the West Side, around Roosevelt and
Hoyne. A place called the Washburne Lounge, I had a guitar player, had a run down
guitar, used to play with clamps and things on the guitar. And I only knew one
beat and that was [claps a simple rhythm with his hands]. Everything I played
had a beat to in it. And a harmonica plaker.

See, we slept in this little loft, and every Friday and Saturday night we'd
be up in that little loft, but we had the people packing the place out, and we
had'em dancing to our little beat. So, finally, one day, Shakey Jake and Magic
Sam, they eased off in there, because all of 'em was living on the West Side
and was playing on the West Side. They heard us one day. And they got to
talk'in to us, and I always was the type had a gift for gab. But after meeting them
and talking to them I started following them around. And Magic Sam was the
one that really gave me the name Bobby Little. See, eveybody around Chicago
wanted to be Little this and Little that. So, he said,"Well, man, why don't you be
Bobby Little." It hung with me.

We used to go around to all the musicians, Freddie King-during that time the
West Side of Chicago was wide open with clubs and entertainers. From Mel's
Hideaway Lounge, which was at Loomis and Roosevelt- even Little Walter was living
there- we had guys that was. . . well, we come up under some heavyweights.
Elmore James, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, they was heavy. Jimmy Rogers, oh man, you
could just name'em. It was so heavy until we had to learn what they was
doin'. Every musician I seen playin drums, I always looked at it like he was
learning me somethig. Guys like Fred Below, Odie Payne, Juinor Blackmon, Theodi
Morgan, these was outstanding drummers to me. When I go around them, everything
that was done, I tried to cop. Fred Below's taken more patience, and more time
with me, than any drummer. And so this is why I say, well, Fred Below's really
something off a heavy influence an me.

I was discovered by a great guitar player, which was Earl Hooker. He come
along and needed a drummer to go on the road with him. And I figured, now if I
really want some experience, get me somebody who's out there. So, I travelled
with Earl and recorded with Earl. We did a lot of traveling, all over Chicago,
South Side, West Side, North Side-all over. This was back in the early '60s,
from '61 to about '67 when I went back into broadcasting.

There's a thing called rudiments that a lot of drummers don't know today. You
have to know your rudiments, you have to know your time, you have to know
your different beats. See, a lot of 'em, they'er just beatin', they'er just
following whatever's happening. That's wrong. A drummer is a clock. And this is
what was taught to me years ago. A drummer is a clock, a metronome. Earl would
take his guitar, when he would kick a number off, he would make a little click,
click, click on the guitar that wouldput me in on the clock. And he would love
that shuffle thing, that paper-like sound, along with the backbeat. So, if I
go wrong, he would come out of what he was doing and do that click thing
again. In doing this, I learned that beat. What we used to call the New Orleans
backbeat shuffle. What a lot of people just call straight shuffle now. And a lot
of 'em don't know what the shuffle is all about or what the shuffle is.

Did Fred Below teach you the shuffle?

Well, Fred Below basically taught me drums.

How long was it from the time you put your first drum set together until Earl
Hooker asked you to go on the road with him?

Oh, I'd say about six to seven months.

Is that all? You had already learned enough that Earl Hooker asked you....

Right. See, Earl pulled me out of the loft. And in getting with Earl, this
made me start getting more exposure-exposure around Chicago, exposure around
more musicians. So, when we brought it on the road, I would be with guys like
Jimmy Johnson.
I walked from the West side to the South Side one time , putting together a
band . I found Jimmy over there by the White Sox park, by the Dugout. Jimmy was
playing guitar and a guy by the name of Bob Walton was playing bass. And
another guy around Chicago named Johnny Hi-Fi, I found him a little bit farther on
up, going on down South.

He was a Chuck Berry-type guitar player. In this one day, I walked through
and found musicians that that we called in to rehearsal. And we all got
together. Ended up with Jimmy Johnson, Bobby Fields, Johnny Hi-Fi, and Bob Walton. We
played on the South Side at a place called Rock and Roll's, back in the Billy
Boy [Arnold] era. That's when we started our group called the Lucky Hearts.
And this was the group I would play with when I wasn't on the road with Earl.
And we had little things like the Blue Monday party that was going on at the
Trocardero. We would always be around those jam sessions, and get recognition.
For a whole year,there was a guy that carried our name on the top of his car in
Chicago. And we had some pretty good promotional deals. We had guys like Bobby
Fields, saxophine, and A.C. Reed, saxophone. Monk Higgins was one of our
arrangers. And Jimmy had a brother used to play bass with us named Mac Johnson. We
had Ricky Allen-that was one of my first sessions. Bobby Saxton, that was one
of the first sessions I ever went into the studio with.

Did the Lucky Hearts ever do any recording?

No, Jimmy did, I didn't do any recording until after the Lucky Hearts broke
up. But the Lucky Hearts was responsible for being the first of all the bands
around Chicago of having horn sections. We had something like four and five
horns back in '60 and '60. I can say we was the first, or one of the first,
'cause the other one was Red Saunders and his group. Red Saunders was one of
Chicago's biggest bands. He used to be [at the] Club Delisa. And in the changeover,
coming into the rhythm and blues, into the blues field , we was one of the
first bands to have horns. We had four and five-piece horn section, and our horn
arranger was Monk Higgins, and we had Johnny Miggs on saxophone, we had
Erskine Oglesby. He used to be one of Ike Turner's horn players. We had Julius
Beasley, baritone. Well, we had a horn section when other people was just going
with a rhythm section.

You were playing the blues, right?

Blues, rhythm and blues. Which is the same thing. We did blues, we did some
of everything. Anything that came out.

What kind of stuff were you doing?

During that time? Jimmy was singing more B.B. King things. I was doing a lot
of Bobby "Blue" Bland's stuff and Brook Benton. We was doing a lot of James
Brown's stuff and Little Richard's stuff. We was doing a lot of different
groups, because we had a lot of different groups that used to come around us a
lot-guys like the Daylighters, the Dutones.

Soul Groups.

Right, right. Soul, rhythm and blues. Well, people termmed it as soul, but it
was basically in between blues and rhythm. Well, Ricky Allen was our singer,
with Jimmy Johnson. And Ricky Allen recorded with Earl. His first record was
recorded with Earl Hooker. Bobby Saxton, he was one of the first material that
I recorded with B & Baby label. THis was one of the first studios that I went
in, with Bbby Saxton. Little Faith Taylor-She was about ten years old, during
that time. We was recording her for B & Baby. And those was some of the first
recording sessions I had made in the studio.

B & Baby was owned by Cadillac Baby. He used to have a club. And he had a
record Label and a record company, too. He had a club that had a revolving stage.
This was on Dearborn and about 42nd and 43rd. It's not ther now, but that was
one of the show spots in Chicago at the time.

Where did you tour with Earl Hooker? Did you stick to the Midwest or did you
come down South?

We played all over the South. We was all up in Missouri, all into St. Louis,
all into Kansas City. We played Chuck Berry's club , the club he has got north
of St. Louis. I forget the name of the town now, but it's in between St.
Louis and Kansas City. The club where he's got a swimming pool in the shape of his
guitar. This was years ago. We played Kansas City . We played on 12th and
Vine. We played a place called the Black Orchid, one of the show spots in Kansas
City at that time. Earl had a lot a people in Kansas City at the time; he had
a lot of people every where we went. See, Earl was out there before I come out
of the service. Earl had been out there, in the limelights. He was recognized
with peole like T-Bone Walker, and B. B. King in his young days. And when I
got out there, he was right at his peak. He was one of the guitar players
that's really not recognized as much as he need to be recognized. And it's bad that
he's not living now to see what's happening. But, I guess that the way it
goes.

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