By Fred Reif

It was on March 18, 1971 that I first met Bobo Jenkins.
I accepted his invitation to come down to his Big Star Recording Studio on Joy Road in Detroit. I interviewed him that day and we began a friendship that lasted until his death. We did some traveling together and promoted some very unique concerts. I am very proud to have known Bobo and hope I can tell his story the way he told it to me.

M In 1972 Bobo released his first album on his own label, Big Star Records, calling it The Life Of Bobo Jenkins. I was delighted when he asked me to write the notes for the album. He even stated on the front cover to: “Read Back For My all New Life Story.” I never did ask him why he added that. I guess he wanted the real story told.

M John Pickens Jenkins was born on January 7, 1916 in Forkland, Alabama, a town consisting of just two stores. Bobo stated, “You couldn’t buy anything in the day because the stores were closed.” Bobo continues, “The man had to come out of the fields to open the store.”

M His father, a sharecropper, died before Bobo was a year old, leaving his infant son and small farm in the care of his mother and uncle, his father’s brother. His mother was an active church worker, and young Bobo began singing in the family church (Friendship Baptist Church), at the age of five. When he was nine, he formed a quartet, which included Eugene Evans and Wilson Turner, who also later moved to Detroit. They did a lot singing in churches, funerals and at the Friendship Baptist Church, where young Bobo went to Sunday school. “Yea, they had a swell-bellied stove for heat and greased newspapers on the windows in place of glass.” His teacher was his uncle - the same uncle that was raising him.

M Bobo continues the story, “I started plowin’ when I was nine years old...my uncle was just messin’ up all the money.” Bobo was constantly arguing with his uncle. As he grew older the severity of the arguments increased, as did the physical punishment that resulted from them.

M “I was just 11 years old almost 12, when I decided to leave home. I told them that Sunday after goin’ to church that I was leavin’. She said, ‘Your empty stomach will bring you back.’ I told her that I’m hungry when I’m leavin’ here.” He walked eleven miles to a little town called Demopolis, Alabama. “I left that evenin’, walked almost all night and caught a freight goin’ to Frisco.” He got off in Memphis, Tennessee. “When I got to Memphis, it was night again. I went up in town - I was so sleepy and tired that I sat-up on this curb with my feets in the streets. This fella taps me on the shoulder and it was a policeman.” Bobo continues, “He asked me where my peoples was at. I told him that I don’t got none. He put me at this corner and when he got down to the other corner, I turned and ran the other way.”

M He ran up on a lady by the name of Miss Emma Miller, who had a rooming house, and asked her if he could stay. She wanted to know about his folks, but he lied to her saying he didn’t have any. She took him in, and found he knew how to make beds, clean house and cook, which his mother had taught him.

M Everyday, he would walk up the streets a little farther to see more of the town and to find some work. One day he met some prostitutes, not knowing what they were. He asked them if he could help, and as it turns out, they wanted him to watch for the police. “I stayed there two or three nights.”
Soon after, he got a job at a lumber yard, starting the trucks in the morning before the drivers came in. But when they found out his age, they let him go. “I went to gettin’ jobs and as fast as they found out how old I was, I’d be looking for another one.” Bobo continues, “I worked as a mechanic for a year makin’ fifty cents a day. Then, I started goin’ to Arkansas on these trucks, yea - cotton trucks.”
He then drifted down into Mississippi, where he found a job selling peanuts in front of a grocery store. From that job, he developed another job, carrying customer’s groceries out into the country, where they lived. He named this business - “The Rolling Store”. Bobo continues, “Then Mr. Tony, the owner, bought a paneled truck and fixed it to my design, then I had a real ‘Rolling Store.’”

M When he was fourteen, he went back to Memphis and took his first wife, who was thirteen. “I stole the girl. She was thirteen and I went and got her late at night when her daddy was asleep.” This was the first of ten marriages. “Some of ‘em I loved, others I married just to get out of the cold; you’ve got to do it all when you’re hoboin’.

M They left Memphis and went to a small town in Mississippi called Marks. He got a job driving a wholesale truck, delivering groceries to small stores. He spent the next fifteen years traveling and working through the Mississippi Delta. The depression years found Bobo doing hot, dirty, heavy jobs, just to keep body and soul together at near starvation wages. He did everything from cutting cane, working in sawmills to picking cotton.

M Bobo continues the story, “Down in the Mississippi Delta, we worked from ‘kin’ to ‘cain’t’ - that is, from first light, when you can see, to the last light when you can’t anymore - for thirty cents a day. But weekends, all we’d do was sing and dance. We’d just put up a little shakewall, you know, just a rough concrete floor with a corrugated tin roof and the musicians would set up and play”. Bobo laughs and continues the story, “I’d dance out a pair of shoes on a Saturday night. Shoes was ninty-eight cents a pair!” Bobo continues, “It was a hard life...I’d walk four miles to sell a dozen eggs for a dime, use the dime to buy a sack of sugar and carry it four miles back home”.

M The lack of money was only one persistent problem of life in the Delta - even more crushing was the brutality of Jim Crow. Bobo said there were many times he had to flee from a town in the dead of night to escape the wrath of of local whites who were incensed by his proud, uppity behavior - he insisted on being paid for his work, and he wouldn’t back down in an argument when he knew he was right.
Bobo recalled, “I have had to strangle blood hounds who were chasing me through the woods. When they opened their mouths you could see where they’d had their teeth filled with gold, their masters thought that much of them, because they were so good at tracking down black people.”

M Before coming to Detroit on September 1, 1944, Bobo spent sometime in the Army. After his discharge, he decided he didn’t want to live in the South anymore. It was either Detroit or Chicago, so he picked the Motor City. Shortly after his arrival, he found a job at the Packard Motor Car Company, for eighty-nine cents an hour. He worked there for four years, before they went out of business. He was also managing a garage, as he was an accomplished mechanic. Soon he began working at Briggs Manufacturing Company, which eventually sold out to the Chrysler Corporation, where Bobo worked for the next twenty-six years.

M Life was getting pretty hectic, as Bobo would work on cars; come home to eat and wash up, and go right back to work at the factory. He also got a job taking pictures at the Harlem Inn, where John Lee Hooker was playing. “I was goin’ with a girl named ‘Little’ Miss Thomas, and one night I was developing some pictures and I come out and this guitar player named Percy, stole my girl and left.” Bobo continues, “John Lee told me to get his guitar and go to playin’ it”. He didn’t take it but the next morning he went down to Wellington Street and bought himself a guitar.

M The guy at the pawn shop told him to tune it so he could hear him play. “I told him no, that’s alright.” Bobo continues the story, “I’ll just go home, because you see, I couldn’t even tune it. So, this fella, Albert Witherspoon, tuned it for me and started me off to playin’ it”. Bobo started to laugh and continued the story, “I said I’m goin’ to get this guitar and I’m goin’ pay somebody back. I started playin’ the guitar and have paid many of them back. (laughs) I took many a fella’s girl.”

M Former Detroit bluesman, Eddie Kirkland, related to me once, “Bobo always told me he was gonna start playin’ but I didn’t believe him”. Bobo would have Kirkland come out to his house to give him some pointers on the guitar. Kirkland continues, “He learned how to walk the bass from what I showed him, but Bobo always did have the music in him, he just started playin’ at an older age”. By now, his voice had developed into a strong, powerful instrument, and life had given him much to sing about.

M He wrote his first song - “Democrat Blues”, on election day of 1952, while Eisenhower was being elected. Bobo explained that it was really a song about the Great Depression, and the especially hard economic times that plagued the poor during Republican administrations. “I was workin’ out to Chrysler - it was Briggs then - and I sat down at the end of the line and wrote that song.”

M The Democrats put you on your feets, And you had the nerve to vote ‘em out Bobo said he got his rhythms from the machines on the assembly line. “The whirrin’ of the machines gives me the beat. It’s like listening to a band play all day. Every song I ever wrote that’s any good came to me on the assembly line.”

M In 1954, with the help from John Lee Hooker, Bobo decided to go to Chess Records in Chicago, with his new song. “So I goes to Chicago with my guitar and a little amplifier, and the man says, ‘What you got now? Usually everybody comes from Mississippi and brings a hit with them.’ I said, well, I’m from Mississippi. See, I was lyin’ ‘cause I was livin’ in Detroit, but it sound good to hear it.”

M He gave Bobo $25 to find a place to stay that night. “He figured I didn’t have nowhere to stay, the way I went in there. You see, I went in just like I was really down on the ground - you know what I mean?” He recorded “Democrat Blues” (Chess 1565) and for the flip side he recorded “Bad Luck & Trouble”, which he made up in the studio. Backing Bobo, who did the vocals and guitar, was Robert Richard on harmonica; Albert Witherspoon on guitar; and Harry Fleming on drums.

M Bobo said he never received a penny in royalties. Although he did record two songs for the Boxer label in Chicago and a few for Fortune Records in Detroit; he vowed that one day he would have his own recording studio, and in time, he did. “Democrat Blues” did establish him as a member of the Detroit blues scene, and he formed a band which worked regularly at the Apex Bar on Oakland, the Club Caribbe on East Jefferson and the Black Velvet in Mt. Clemens, to name a few. In addition, he played in shows along with such great national artists as Illinois Jacquet, Jimmy Reed, Mahalia Jackson, Lionel Hampton, and Louis Jordan.

M Bobo was now living at 449 Hendrick, in the area then known as Black Bottom. He declared the house open, and on weekend nights the house was filled with musicians playing the blues all night long, and sometimes well into the next day. Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller), the great harp player, who was now staying in Detroit, and playing with Baby Boy Warren’s band, would show up at his house after a gig.

M In 1959, Bobo began working on his long-time dream - a recording studio. His first studio was built in a basement under his record shop at 5901 Antoinette. He called it his “paste board studio”. It was located near a supermarket and everyday when the stockboy would throw the empty cartons out, Bobo was there. “I had to go out and hustle card-board boxes to make this studio.” Bobo continues, “People used to think I was a junk man carrying all those boxes under my arm”. He had a little Webco tape recorder with one track. He was determined to fulfill his dream. “I’m not goin’ to give up. There’s only one thing that is gonna stop me and that is sickness or death.” He looks me straight in the eye and continues, “If I have to go and eat me a can of soup today, tomorrow I might be able to eat steak”. He laughed and said, “Yea, that’s right”.

M Bobo knew what he wanted, “I just need a four-track cause that’s all I need for blues - too many pieces don’t make it sound like the blues - just drums, couple of guitars and organ. See, I know the blues artists here, white and black. If I could just get enough for pressing and distribution, I can make it.”

M Bobo continues the story, “These guys are in need for someone to record them who is going to give them what they got comin’, but the way some record companies do, they discourage artists by stealing their money that comes in and swear they didn’t make nothin’. The artist is left with nothin’. They never calls ‘em in and gives them a count.”

M Bobo blames Motown Records for the decline of recording blues artists in Detroit. “There are a lot of little record companies here in Detroit, but there is only one big one that is controlling Detroit, and if you don’t sound the way they want it, then no go. They don’t want any blues.”

M He called his studio and record label, Big Star Records. The first group he recorded was the Walton Brothers, featuring ten year old, Clarence Walton on the song, The Cat” and on side 2, “Midnight” (BS002). He then recorded their father, harmonica player, ‘Little Daddy’ James Walton, who came to Detroit in 1945. Backed by his sons, the record was called “Come On Tell Me What You Got” and the flip side called “Shady Grove” (BS-001).

M He finally developed a real studio with eight tracks, at 4228 Joy Road. He recorded and promoted such artists as Little Junior Cannady, Chubby Martin, Chuck Cole, Big Roger Jenkins, and even put out a 45 by the legendary Robert Junior Lockwood.

M In 1970, Bobo took Sheldon Annis, a writer for the Detroit Free Press, on a tour of the clubs that featured many of the real bluesmen, including Washboard Willie, Little Junior Cannady, Little Sonny Willis, and Little Daddy Walton. “See, I ain’t been out of work in twenty years, because my peoples always want to hear the blues. You see, it’s in our blood - sometimes jazz-blues, sometimes soul music blues or sometimes what I play - just plain old dirty blues.”

M Bobo continues the story, “When times are good, we play ‘em fast, uptempo, you know. But when times are bad, we play ‘em slow and funky, and it sounds like the blues. That’s why you can hear more blues in Detroit today than anytime in the last five, six, seven years.

M It was on August 30, 1970 that I first heard Bobo perform; at the first Detroit Blues Festival, which took place on the steps of the Rackham Building stretching onto the lawn of the Detroit Art Institute. Appearing on the show were Eddie Burns, Big Jack Reynolds, Little Junior Cannady, Little Sonny, Little Daddy Walton & Sons, Mr. Bo, Washboard Willie, Little Sonny Willis, and Johnnie Mae Mathews - all local Detroit blues artists. The festival brought in Jim & Amy O’Neal and Bruce Iglauer, who had just started the magazine, Living Blues. They helped spread the word of these Detroit Blues artists through an article and review of the festival in issue 3 of this long-standing American Blues magazine. Both issues 3 and 4 also included an interview with Bobo.

M I really wasn’t impressed with Bobo’s guitar playing as I was with his singing and the lyrics of his original songs. A few months later, I sent him a letter introducing myself as Lightnin’ Slim’s manager and was interested in helping him and the other Detroit blues artists find some gigs and whatever else I could do to help promote the Detroit Blues. I finally received a letter from him in March of 1971. He said he had written me earlier and couldn’t understand why I didn’t get it.

M I called him to set-up a time to come down to Detroit to meet with him and to do an interview. For the next number of years, I was a frequent visitor to his Big Star Recording Studio, On that first trip, I got the interview, and was fortunate to meet Baby Boy Warren, Little Daddy Walton, ‘Rabbit’ Johnson, and many other friends and hanger-ons. What a drunken day that was! Just let me say, the place was jumpin’.

M This was ‘blues central’ in Detroit. Let me see if I could describe the place: To the left, as you walk in, was the control room, where Bobo held court as the engineer, producer, and host. There were wires everywhere, connected to God knows what; chairs with no backs; shelves of master tapes that Bobo had recorded; ashtrays overflowing; Stroh’s beer cans everywhere. Down the hall was the studio with scraps of dirty carpet tacked to the walls to deaden the sound. Paint peelings hung suspended from the ceiling; cigarette butts everywhere; whiskey bottles and beer cans scattered all over the floor; but the place was always happenin’.

M Bobo began taking me out to some of the clubs in Detroit that had blues. I would usually spend the night at his house, sleeping on his plastic-covered couch, and eating one of his favorite meals - Spam! We each had our own can. Ych! I hated it, but tried to eat at least part of it. Although, I remember one time he took a friend and I out to White Castle, when they had twelve hamburgers for a dollar! I have to admit, looking back at those times, was really a lot of fun.

M In the Winter of 1971, Bobo and I were partners in the First Saginaw Blues Festival. What a line-up that was going to be: the legendary Louisiana swamp bluesman, Lightnin’ Slim; Baby Boy Warren, (who ended up bringing his old piano partner, Boogie Woogie Red); Arthur Gunter (who wrote “Baby, Let’s Play House”, one of Elvis Presley’s first big hits); and the great one-man band, Dr. Ross the harmonica boss. Backing everyone was going to be Bobo Jenkins and the Big Star Band.

M Unfortunately, midnight was approaching, and still no Bobo. Finally, he and his entourage arrived at around twelve-ten. It took them about 45 minutes to set up before Lightnin’ Slim could take the stage. It was pretty-much a disaster! Bobo and his up-town band just could not back up Lightnin’ and his laid-back Louisiana swamp blues. After two songs, Baby Boy Warren and Boogie Woogie Red took the stage, which was a little better, because the band knew the songs of the Detroit duo. It was getting closer to the 2am deadline, so Bobo and band could only do about three songs.

M The following year I came down to Detroit and met with the Mayor and his people, along with Bobo, to put together another blues festival - this time out on Belle Isle. The all-day event included Little Junior Cannady, Willie D. Warren, Washboard Willie, Baby Boy Warren, Dave and Roselyn, among others. The year 1972, was also the year Bobo put out his first album on Big Star, called “The Life of Bobo Jenkins.” The main cut on the album was “24 Years (On the Wrong Road)”. It was a song he wrote about working in the factories. “I was sittin’ ‘round one day thinkin’ how if I’da knowed then what I know now, I never would’ve walked in the door of a factory. I can’t stand workin’ in those places. They hire bosses who can’t see past their noses.“ Bobo was going to retire on his birthday on January 7, 1975.

M I was down in the studio for most of the sessions. I also wrote the liner notes, which stated on the front cover - Read Back For My “ll New Life Story. Bobo had his ways about recording, and said he was taught by a guy at RCA. Musicians would come and go, saying they would be right back and then never show up. I really don’t know how the project ever got finished.

M Bobo thought he was inventing something new in recording and the final outcome was; the band coming out on one side of the speaker and Bobo and his guitar on the other. To this day, I still can’t believe the way he mixed the final songs, but Bobo was the boss, engineer (yes, engineer!), and producer. He would set the dials on his Teak tape machine, and then run back into the studio and record with the band. Bobo didn’t want anyone to touch his equipment, so he did everything himself. One of the cuts on the record has a phone ringing in the background.

M The album became known as the ‘Red’ album, with an old photo of a much younger Bobo, inside a big star. I helped him promote and sell the album, although we didn’t have any distribution. I sent a copy to Blues Unlimited in England, the leading blues magazine at the time.They gave it a good review and because of that, we sold them all over the world.

M We went to the NAIRD (National Association of Independent Record Distributors) convention in Charlotte, NC, and did an impromtu duet at the cocktail party, with Bobo on guitar and vocals, and myself on the washboard. We picked up one distributor.

M The following year, we went to the convention in Denver, Colorado. We once again drove in his big Cadillac, with his right-hand man L.B., as the driver. I also took a female friend with me. As we were driving out there from Detroit, I remember in southern Indiana, we stopped at a truck stop to get gas and to use the bathroom. My friend and I got out and found the bathrooms, while Bobo and L.B. were taking care of the gas. When we were coming back, Bobo said he had asked the gas station attendant where the bathroom was, and he said they didn’t have one. I couldn’t believe it. I just came from there. The guy was a damn bigot, a racist. I was so pissed, I told Bobo we have to do something, but he just said to get back into the car and leave. I was fuming - I wanted to bomb the place. I had never witnessed such racial behavior.

M We once again played at the cocktail party, but this time, didn’t pick up any new distributors. We continued to make the sales through Blues Unlimited, with an ad I had put in one issue. In the winter of 1972, there was a break-in at the Big Star studio and all of his equipment was stolen, and no insurance. But, with the success of the ‘red’ album, Bobo was able to purchase all new equipment.
In 1973 I was asked by John Sinclair, who was the creative director for the Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival, to put together a special Detroit Blues Revue, that was based on the great rhythm & blues revues of the 1950s, where the name artists would come out in front of a backing band to perform their two, three or four best-known songs, in a tight, fast-moving revue format.

M Bobo was excited about this gig and was supposed to come on early in the show, but no, that was not to be; he didn’t even show up until late in the revue, and then decided he didn’t want to be backed up by the house band, which was Little Mack Collins and the Partymakers. He ended up using the Ann Arbor based blues group consisting of Steve Nardella on harp, John Nicholas on guitar, bassist Sarah Brown and drummer Fran Christina. Schoolkids’ Records in Ann Arbor (also P-Vine in Japan) released this Detroit Blues Revue in 1995, as part of an on-going series of this legendary grand-daddy of all blues festivals.

M This Ann Arbor blues group was also asked to be the back-up musicians on his next album - the ‘green’ one, which had the same cover as the previous ‘red’, and was called “Here I Am A Fool In Love Again”. He says the name for this song came from being mistreated by one of those young girls. Another song on the album was “Sharecropper Blues”, comparing the old sharecropping days back in Alabama and Mississippi, with the new sharecropping days in the auto plants, where after all the deductions you only get one-half of your money to take home. Also included was his 1974 Big Star 45 political song “Watergate Blues.” He also included two songs “Baby Don’t You Want To Go” and “Ten Below Zero”, which were recorded in 1956, and included Bobo on vocals and guitar; ‘Rabbit’ Johnson on 2nd guitar; Robert Richard, harmonica; and Ted Walker, drums.

M Steve Nardella, harmonica player on the session for the ‘green’ album remembers; “We arrived early at the studio and Bobo was not insight. There were all these street people hanging out in front of the studio, and soon we saw this Cadillac pull up to the curve about half-a-block down the street. Getting out of the car was a big man with greasy slick-back hair and his toes curdled upward at the end of his shoes which were cut off at the front. After putting some money into the meter, he walked over to us and made a comment about us being early.”

M Bobo’s trusty watch dog ‘Pimp’ was barking on the inside of the studio and after unlocking the many locks to the entrance, the band entered Bobo’s lifelong dream, which he was so proud of. Nardella said, “Bobo would turn on the tape recorder and then run back to the studio, strap on his guitar and started the song off.” At the end of the day, each musician received a check for fifty dollars.

M Bobo still had no real distribution and the ‘green’ album didn’t sell very well. He was now using the slogan, “Thank you for helping me keep the blues alive,” and got a show on Detroit’s WDET radio station, at the 2am to 4am slot on Saturday night (or actually, Sunday morning). Thus, the Blues After Hours show was born.

M The show was hosted by the Famous Coachman, a friend of Bobo’s, and the late night show attracted a diverse audience of blues lovers. The Coachman was on the air until 1997. Bobo’s dream was to have a 24-hour blues station. While he never realized this dream, the popularity of the Blues After Hours show did encourage several local radio stations to begin programing a blues show.
In 1976 he was invited to perform at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC, for the Bicentennial Celebration. By 1977, Bobo released the ‘yellow’ album called Detroit All Purpose Blues by Bobo Jenkins, which featured Bobo, Willie D. Warren, who earlier had played with Freddy King and Otis Rush, in Chicago in the 1950’s; Buddy Folks, a guitar and harmonica player; Canadian, ‘Blind Child’ Gerry Gaughan; and featuring the Big Star Band. This album still didn’t have any distribution, died, and went to record heaven.

M In 1982 Bobo went to Europe for the American Living Blues Festival tour, but due to poor health he returned home after the first concert. A long illness ultimately led to his death on August 14, 1984, at the age of 69.

M Bobo was quite a character, but more than anyone else at the time, singlehandedly breathed life into Detroit’s often-overlooked blues scene.
Fred Reif © June, 2001

Bobo Jenkins’ Discography

Bobo Jenkins Detroit, 1954
vcl/gtr with Robert Richard, hca; Albert Witherspoon, gtr; Harry Flemming, dms.

Democrat Blues Chess 1565, Blues Classics LP BC-6
Bad Luck And Trouble - - Chicago, 1955
Vcl/gtr with Willie Johnson, Eddie Taylor, gtrs; unk. dms

Nothing But Love Boxer 202, Duchess 101, Blues Rarities, Vol. 1 LP (UK)

Tell Me Who - - - Detroit, 1956
Vcl/gtr with Robert Richard, hca; unk. piano; James ‘Rabbit’ Johnson, gtr; Ted Walker. dms

Baby Don’t You Want To Go Fortune 838, Blues Classics 12, Big Star LP 11-33, P-Vine PCD5640 (Japan)

Ten Below Zero - - - - PCD5640 (Japan)
(Note: 45rpm version of above features alternate takes of both sides.) Detroit, c. mid.’50s

Sea Sick And Water Bound Fortune LP 3012
Detroit, c. 1964
Vcl/gtr with Walter Cox, pno; unk. gtr; unk. dms.

You Will Never Understand Big Star 001

Tell Me Where You Stayed Last Night - Detroit, 1972
Vcl/gtr with unk musicians

When I First Left Home Big Star LP 008-19, P-Vine PCD 5640 (Japan)

Realing And Rocking - - - -
Cold Hearted Blues -
I Love That Woman - - - -
Solid Gold - - - -
You Will Never Understand - - - -
Trying to Get You Off My Mind - - - -
24 Years - - - -
I Sure Got To Leave Your Town - - - -
Have You Heard the News - - - -
Tell Me Who - - - -
I’m So Glad Trouble Don’t Last Always - - - -
Ann Arbor, MI 1973
Bobo, vcl/gtr; Steve Nardella, hca; John Nicholas, rhythm gtr; Sarah Brown, bs; Fran Christina, dms; unidentified female vocalist.

24 Years Schoolkids Records CD 2101 - Total Energy 3019
Reelin’ And Rockin’ - -
She Wanna Sell My Monkey - -
Detroit, 1974
Vcl/gtr with Sarah Brown, bas; Steve Nardella, hca; Fran Christina, dms; James ‘Rabbit’ Johnson, 2nd gtr; and on some King (?) came on first half(?)

Playboy Blues Big Star 11-33, P-Vine PCD 5640 (Japan)
If You Were The Only Woman - - - -
Shake ‘Em On Down - - - -
Scared To Call Her Name - - - -
Monkey Not For Sale - - - -
Here I Am A Fool In Love Again - - - -
Somebody Been Talkin’ - - - -
Share Cropper Blues (Michael Bell, 2 gtr;
Melvin Allen, bs - - - -
Nothing But Love - - - -
Watergate Blues
(Bobo, gtr; King(?), bs;
‘Rabbit’, 2nd gtr; L.B. Pryor, organ;
Kenny Mathews, dms - - - -
Detroit, 1977
Vcl/gtr with Don Copeland, gtr; George Freeman, bs; Eileen Orr, organ; Henry Knott or Harry Douglas, dms.

I Love That Woman Big Star LP 15-50, P-Vine PCD 5641 (Japan)
Heard The News - - - -
New 44 Blues - - - -
First Left Home - - - -
Nothing But Love - - - -