Elvis recorded this one during his late-’60s renaissance:
Here’s Frazier’s version of Ronnie Self’s “Home in My Hand.”
This later became a pub rock standard when Brinsley Schwarz recorded it on Nervous on the Road, and Dave Edmunds did it on Repeat When Necessary as well.
Frazier was also capable of writing more conventional country weepers, like “There Goes My Everything,” which was a big hit for Jack Greene:
This one was also recorded by Elvis. I think Elvis saw in “Mohair Sam” a direction he wanted to explore, and he picked up on a few Frazier songs in that fertile period after “Suspicious Minds.”
I’m going to end with a Dallas Frazier song some of you may be familiar with from Nick Lowe’s Impossible Bird album:
Dallas Frazier retired from the Nashville scene in the late-’80s to become a minister, but he was a master of country soul, and more people should know about him.
I’d never heard of this guy, but I knew a few of these songs. I love that beat he lays into in just about every song you’ve posted. Did “Mohair Sam” or “She’s About a Mover” come first? Surely its an accent from some kind of American folk music I don’t know real well (like an exaggerated version of the accent driving Chuck Berry’s “Memphis”). Anyhow, it’s hard to write a turd based around that heavily accented beat.
Funny I’d never made the connection To She’s About a Mover till I was putting this together today. The beginning of Just a Little Bit of You is a dead ringer for its rhythm, down to the way the ride cymbal sounds. Both were from 1965, and they were recorded in different states so I don’t think there’s any influence one way or the other. And SDQ has the Tex Mex organ, while Rich has the New Orleans style piano — the piano licks that open She’s a Yum Yum and Mohair Sam are totally Professor Longhair/Dr. John — so they take that beat in different directions.
Excellent work Big Steve — my mom was a big Charlie Rich fan\ and those cuts brought back some warm memories. It’s also inspiration for me to dig deep and break out the old Brinsley Schwarz this weekend.
Some of that stuff was pretty cool but that Elvira song is:
a) horrible, and
b) a direct rip of Searchin’ by the Coasters
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92Q0FhNpfUc
Mission accomplished then. Listening to Brinsley Schwarz is never a bad thing.
Hey, BigSteve — this is awesome stuff, and you have my sincere thanks for posting it. The knowledge that there’s a Smash-era Charlie Rich comp out there is enough to make my day. Thanks again!
All this is getting me so pumped up for Ben Vaughn. Ya know what I mean.