Back when I was about 20, I used to hang out at a small record store called Monty Rockers. When I say hang out, I mean all damn day. In the morning I would ride my entry level Honda 90 about ten miles east, park my ass on the floor by the magazine rack, and read fanzines, listen to music, and shoot the bull with the owner, Dan McLain, until the early evening. Every once in a while, in mid-afternoon, the cooler next to the bar-like counter would be be put to use, dispensing cheap beer (still another reason to hang out).
It was easy to eat up a whole day. McLain knew music and loved to talk about music. He wasn't some dorky orator of trivia, he was at his best when he was turning you on to a particular record. He would describe music in less than academic terms, and always reacted to music physically. Let him loose on a personal favorite and he'd really go nuts. He would sing along, holler, raise his fists in the air, and slam the counter like an evangelist (and you walked out a believer). This is how I was turned onto Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps.
Behind the counter in his store, up on a shelf, was a record that wasn't for sale. It was McLain's prized beat-to-shit copy of Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps' (self-titled) second album. It was long out of print, and reissues were rare back then. The first rockabilly revival hadn't even hit yet. The only Gene Vincent cut readily available was "Be-Bop-A-Lula" on a 45 (most likely backed with "Woman Love"). So, with a lack of any real context, my first exposure to Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps second album, arguably one of the best rockabilly LP's ever recorded, was something I wasn't prepared for. Augmented by McLain's animated proselytizing, I was blind-sided.
McLain knew every nook and cranny of that album. Once the needle dropped, he was almost conductor-like, pointing out the screams, yelps, catch-your-breath panting, and the short rapid fire guitar solos. Not only was this my introduction to Gene Vincent and real rockabilly abandonment, but also to the genius guitar playing of Cliff Gallup.
My guitar idol worship years had already passed a couple years earlier, when I got into punk rock (for obvious reasons). Thanks to the guitar idols of the 70s, solos were thought, rightfully so, to be self-indulgent and unneeded. Short, economic solos were nonexistent in mainstream rock; every guitarist seemed to be a prima donna or a "guitar slinger" (rock n' roll's version of a monster truck driver).
The Blue Caps' record from two decades earlier, though, was different. Between the yelping, screaming, panting, and a rhythm section-gone-wild, were compact, perfectly paced solos. Every note in place, fast and frantic, and exceptionally clean. Archetypal rock and roll licks in their purest form, before they were fucked with. Stonehenge, man.
I would soon learn that Gallup wasn't alone. There were a lot of excellent rockabilly guitarists in the early days; Scotty Moore, Paul Burlison, Eddie Cochran, Billy Lee Riley and James Burton, just to name a few. But none as revered over the years as Gallup. The respect for his playing amongst other guitarists is such that for years technical guitar freaks have studied his tablatures and his playing style. In 1993 guitar virtuoso Jeff Beck recorded a whole album of Gene Vincent covers, playing Gallup's solos note-for-note. (Not surprisingly, the album was meant not as a tribute to Vincent, but to Gallup.) Though, despite the adulation of other guitarists, Gallup's name is known little out of the circles of other players and rockabilly fanatics.
A few nights ago, while making the rounds of MP3 blogs, I ran across a posting an MP3 of Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps'
"Who Slapped John?", from their first album, Blue Jean Bop. It's an excellent introduction to Gallup's playing. Though the song is short, clocking in at under two minutes, Gallup manages two solos before the one minute mark, and a third before all is said and done. (I lost count of the screams and yelps of the other band members).
The amazing thing is that "Who Slapped John?" is not unique. The bulk of Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps's first two albums rocks as hard and as efficiently. I don't usually recommend that anyone buy anything, but these albums represent rockabilly, and rock n' roll, at its very best (with sweat you can hear).
Shortly after my introduction to Gene Vincent, his first five albums began to be imported as French reissues. When they got to Monty Rockers, I worked for a day in McLain's shop in exchange for the first three. A whole day for a couple hours of recorded music. But it was, and remains, the highest reward for a day of work I've ever received. And today you can get the first two Vincent albums online, on the same CD, for under twenty dollars. (What the hell are you waiting for?)
