Johnny Adams - Only Want To Be With You - Extended Liner Notes
Johnny Adams - Only Want To Be With You
Around his longtime hometown of New Orleans, Johnny Adams was known as the Tan Canary. The distinctive sobriquet suited the rail-thin soul crooner. In a city obsessed with parade beats, second-line rhythms, and all-night partying, Adams was the contrasting picture of subtle, romantic refinement, smooth as silk vocally and sharp as a tack onstage.
In short, he sang just like a lovely bird.
“They got a whole lot of New Orleans music. I try to make mine different, when I can.
Everything I do, I try to make it different,” said the late Adams. “You have to dig for feelings first. If it doesn’t have any feelings, just listening to it, it’s hard for me to sing, put words to try to sing it.”
That singular nickname was bestowed on Adams by a local radio personality during the early ‘70s. “A friend of mine in New Orleans a while back, Groovy Gus Lewis, I used to work for this guy,” said Adams. “He had a club we used to work on Sundays. He just thought to call me ‘the Tan Canary’ on the radio one day, and I’ve been having that handle ever since.”
Adams was homegrown talent all the way, born January 5, 1932 in the Crescent City’s Hollygrove neighborhood. Like so many other melismatically gifted R&B singers of his generation, Johnny was a proud graduate of the gospel highway. He began singing sanctified material in 1953 and performed with a variety of local groups—the Spirits of New Orleans, the Spirits of Kenner, the Soul Revivers, and Sister Bessie Griffin and the Consolators.
Adams was in no great hurry to make the secular leap. He finally succumbed to worldly temptation in 1959, as the Big Easy churned out major rock and roll hits by the bucketful. Imperial, Ace, Specialty, and quite a few more leading independent labels were mining New Orleans’ incredibly deep talent pool and reaping the rewards as the non pareil house band at Cosimo Matassa’s recording studio thundered out romping grooves behind them, the irresistible results appealing to audiences across the U.S.
Devout gospel fans wouldn’t accept a singer playing both sides of the street—Sam Cooke found that out the hard way—but Johnny wasn’t overly worried about the consequences of his crossing over. “At first, it was just mostly curiosity,” said Adams. “If it had been that I was a major gospel singer, it would have been something to worry about, or wonder about. But since I was just local, it really didn't matter. I was just curious to admit I could do rhythm and blues a little better.”
It’s been reported that local songwriter Dorothy LaBostrie, who cleaned up the lyrics on Little Richard’s “Tutti-Frutti” and penned Irma Thomas’ debut single “Don’t Mess With My Man,” overheard Johnny singing in his bathtub one day (they were neighbors) and got the ball rolling on his discovery. Adams strongly refuted that account. “She always knew I could sing, so she just decided to ask,” he said. “I never was a bathtub singer.” In any event, LaBostrie had a delicious R&B ballad she initially called “Oh Why” that she wanted Johnny to try on for size.
By the time Adams waxed the tune as his secular debut for Joe Ruffino’s local Ric label, its title had been switched to “I Won’t Cry.” There was a noticeable Sam Cooke flavor to the number, arranged with plenty of saxophone-enriched goodness by a young Mac “Dr. John” Rebennack with guitarist Edgar Blanchard and his Gondoliers providing backing. Johnny’s fully formed and decidedly sophisticated pipes were singular even then. Issued in March of 1959, “I Won’t Cry” was a hometown sensation without ever quite breaking through nationally.
Ric released eight more singles on Johnny through the end of 1962, and the label’s Ron subsidiary was still releasing his product as late as ‘65. “A Losing Battle,” an emotionally charged blues ballad that Rebennack co-penned, was given a Ray Charles pull by Adams and made a #27 R&B splash on Ric in Billboard during the summer of ‘62. Impressive as his Ric/Ron catalog was, Johnny downplayed his early releases. “I was more or less just a singer then,” he said. “I wasn’t an artist.”
Someone at Motown must have thought differently. In the late summer of ‘63, singer and promoter Joe “You Talk Too Much” Jones escorted a bunch of Crescent City standouts looking to move up in the world—guitarist Earl King, singer Chris Kenner, flamboyant piano pounder Esquerita, and a rhythm section anchored by drummer Smokey Johnson—to audition for none other than Berry Gordy himself. Things initially looked good as the funky visitors from N’awlins laid down some impressive demos for the perusal of the Motown brass (to this day, only a handful of King’s sides have ever seen light of day from this tantalizing treasure trove).
“I don=t know if it was me or the other guys. At the time, I guess he was digging for artists himself,” mused Adams. “I guess after he found out that he wanted the three of us bad enough, he wanted to negotiate, and it wasn’t there.” Perhaps an alleged phone call from Ruffino to Gordy threatening legal action if Motown dared to sign Adams cooled the deal, or Jones’ reported mammoth monetary demands scuttled negotiations. “We thought we might get a lease going out,” said Johnny. “But after we stayed there two or three days, everything changed. So by this time, I started believing in nobody but me.” Motown took a pass on all of them, and they journeyed back home with no Motown contracts proffered.
Ruffino died later that year, but his widow assigned Johnny’s contract to Joe’s brither-in-law, Joe Assunto, who headed his own Watch imprint. In addition to a couple of Watch 45s in 1963-64, Adams made a 1965 single that somehow ended up on Morris Levy’s New York-based Gone logo (Eddie Bo co-penned both sides). Johnny subsequently ventured down to Pasadena, Texas to wax three 1966-67 45s for Huey P. Meaux’s Pacemaker imprint.
Back on Watch again in 1968, lightning finally struck. “Release Me” was already a genuine country classic, Jimmy Heap having introduced it in 1954 on Capitol. Esther Phillips topped the R&B hit parade with her salty treatment of the weeper near the end of ‘62 on the Lenox logo, and Engelbert Humperdinck established himself on both sides of the Atlantic by pacing the British charts with the ballad as well as enjoying a #4 U.S. pop smash on it in 1967. Yet there was still plenty of chart life in the ballad for additional interpretations.
“We just heard that playing, between Esther Phillips and Engelbert Humperdinck,” remembered Adams. “We just decided to do it. It was a good record.”
When Johnny’s thrilling Wardell Quezergue-arranged revival of “Release Me” started to make regional noise, Assunto and Henry Hildebrand, his partner at All State Distributors, hammered out a deal with Shelby S. Singleton, Jr. up in Nashville to nationally release the platter on Singleton’s SSS International label. Adams’ remake climbed to #34 R&B in early 1969, ensuring he would be with SSS for awhile. There his sound changed, thanks to the Nashvile sessioneers backing him. But the immense power of Adams’ pipes, deftly incorporating a piercing falsetto in precisely the right spots, wouldn’t falter in the slightest.
With Singleton sitting in the producer’s chair, Adams wrapped his elegant pipes around the soaring ballad “Reconsider Me,” the handiwork of two prolific Nashville composers, guitarist Mira Smith and singer Margaret Lewis. Margaret had cut some fine rockabilly platters for Mira’s Shreveport-based Ram label during the late ‘50s as well as vocally backing Dale Hawkins in the studio during the same era for Checker.
“The SSS ladies wrote that one over there,” noted Johnny. “These ladies were doing a lot of writing for Jo Jo Benson and Peggy Scott at the time. You know, changing country songs into blues.” Indeed, those two ladies’ “Soulshake” just missed the R&B Top Ten for Peggy and Jo Jo. Their “Reconsider Me” did a little bit better than that for Johnny; over a 12-week run on Billboard’s soul charts during the summer of 1969, it vaulted up to #8, giving SSS a blockbuster and Adams his ostensible ticket to the bigtime. Perplexingly, its success (it also made it to #28 pop, indicating sizable crossover airplay) didn’t send him too far outside of the Crescent City.
“I did a lot of work off of that, but not a lot of touring,” he said. “I didn’t start touring until I signed with Rounder in ‘83.”
Margaret and Mira also supplied Adams’ next SSS International offering, “I Can’t Be All Bad,” another country-soul standout decorated with rock-tinged slide guitar that made a #45 R&B showing in late 1969. An updated “I Won’t Cry” charted R&B for Johnny the following year on SSS, peaking at #41.
Atlantic Records, the New York-based powerhouse that made stars of everyone from Ruth Brown and the Drifters to Solomon Burke and Wilson Pickett, recruited Johnny in 1971 through the efforts of Assunto and Hildebrand. But something didn’t click from a commercial standpoint, despite Adams working first with Wardell Quezergue at Malaco Studios in Jackson, Mississippi and then with Brad Shapiro and Dave Crawford in Miami, where he sang over pre-recorded backing tracks (in retrospect, perhaps asking Adams to cover “Salt Of The Earth” off the Rolling Stones’ Beggars Banquet album wasn’t the greatest strategy).
Four non-charting Atlantic singles and Johnny was back with SSS International, recording this time at Finley Duncan’s Playground Studios in Valparaiso, Florida. That setup didn’t endure for long either. Adams’ next recording stop was back home in New Orleans, this time persisting for a considerable length of time as he hooked up with producer Senator Jones to make the recordings that comprise the two-disc overview. Not only did Jones, who wasn’t a senator in the political sense, cut Adams prolifically for his JB’s and Hep’ Me labels, he licensed the singer’s product to more powerful national concerns (Chelsea and Ariola each released an album’s worth of Jones-produced masters by Johnny).
Born November 9, 1934 in Jackson, Mississippi, Senator Nolan Jones was a major blues fan growing up. At 17, his family moved to New Orleans. While in the Army at Fort Benning, Georgia, he sang with a vocal group called the Desperadoes, whose members also included future R&B stars Jo Jo Benson and Oscar Toney, Jr. Back in New Orleans after his military discharge, Jones attempted to gain a foothold in the music business, working at Assunto’s One Stop Record Shop on South Rampart Street and promoting his own recording career in 1964 with a self-penned “I Think Of You” for Watch. There were more one-off 45s for the local Hot Line, Sapphire, and Whurley Burley logos; New York’s Bell Records picked up his funk-soaked Bob Robin-produced adaptation of country star Nat Stuckey’s hit “Sweet Thing” in ‘67.
Jones launched his own Black Patch label in 1968 (he wore one over his left eye), soon adding Shagg (his nickname) and other imprints to his stable. His JB’s and Hep’ Me logos both issued plenty of singles by Adams that were produced by Senator, who didn’t skimp on the musical backdrops behind his star performer when they entered one local studio or another (Allen Toussaint and Marshall Sehorn’s Sea-Saint Studios was often utilized). “On the Hep= Me label, we did a lot of sessions with as many as five violin players on the set,” noted Johnny.
Jones usually asked Adams to tackle fairly well-known material rather than soliciting fresh compositions. One 1976 single on JB’s, tightly arranged by Raymond Jones, twinned Adams’ remakes of Aretha’s “Baby I Love You” (it’s included on this compilation) and the O’Jays’ “Stairway To Heaven.”
Soul standards dating from the previous decade were reinvigorated with brassy, propulsive arrangements. Chuck Jackson’s “I Don’t Want To Cry,” Ben E. King’s “Stand By Me” (Johnny’s may be the briskest rendition ever committed to tape, in New Orleans or anywhere else, and it was lengthy enough to allude to Sam Cooke’s “Chain Gang” and the Temptations’ “My Girl”), Toussaint McCall’s “Nothing Takes The Place Of You,” Ketty Lester’s majestic “Love Letters,” Bobby Bland’s “Share Your Love With Me,” and Earl Gaines’ “The Best Of Luck To You” were all given passionate Adams revivals, often utilizing arrangements by the brilliant Quezergue. Charlie Rich’s impossible-to-categorize “Who Will The Next Fool Be” elicited a deeply moving treatment as well.
Just as common within Johnny’s studio repertoire under Senator’s reign were thoughtfully chosen country covers. Jones seems to have been particularly fond of raiding the then-current repertoires of Conway Twitty (“I Can’t Believe She Gives It All To Me”) and Don Williams (“I Believe In You”). Adams’ Quezergue-arranged rendition of Conway’s “After All The Good Is Gone” made a #75 showing on Billboard’s R&B charts in the spring of 1978 after Senator licensed it to Ariola Records for nationwide consumption. That wasn’t an isolated occurrence--Jones leased full-length Adams albums to Chelsea (1976’s Stand By Me) as well as Ariola (After All the Good Is Gone).
Disco was raging like an inferno during the years Adams and Jones were clicking on all cylinders together, and Johnny’s output wasn’t immune from the trend. “Feel The Beat, Feel The Heat” took an unusually tasteful approach to the usual dance floor gymnastics, while Adams’ version of “Spanish Harlem” veritably swirled with abandon. Some of the most powerful entries in Johnny’s sizable Hep’ Me catalog came on the less familiar stuff. Particularly memorable was the powerful “Selfish,” while session guitarist Teddy Royal’s “Chasing Rainbows” showcased Adams in a deliciously funky groove.
This collection also encompasses a handful of live performances that caught Johnny in a relaxed, jazzy frame of mind; his reading of Percy Mayfield’s mellow blues “Lost Mind” and a steady-swinging “Roadblock” caught the sumptuous singer in his own late-night element, an environment where he could turn around and give Frank Sinatra a run for his money on the smoky standard “I Cover The Waterfront.”
Signing with Rounder Records in 1983 propelled Adams into a different orbit entirely. Instead of making 45s aimed at the African American market as Senator had, Rounder was a wide-ranging roots music label headquartered in Massachusetts that focused on albums. Producer Scott Billington helmed nine extremely classy and well-received Adams albums for Rounder, beginning with From the Heart in 1984 and including immaculate tribute sets to Percy Mayfield and Doc Pomus.
“Those two guys were experts in writing what they feel and what they know about: feelings,” said Adams. “The best record I had with Rounder was (1989’s) Walking on a Tightrope. It was a well-recorded and a well-performed album.” Adams also crooned jazz on 1993’s Good Morning Heartache and dug deep into his soul for One Foot in the Blues in ‘96. His vocal command never deserted him no matter what genre he explored.
“You’ve got a lot of people singing their hearts out, but without a melodic sound, and they're selling millions,” lamented Adams during a mid-‘90s interview. “So you can’t always say just because you sound good, it’s going to sell. You just have to hope here and there. And I don’t do much of that. I’m at that place now where I do it because I'm still able a little bit, and whatever becomes of it becomes of it. I reap whatever there is. So I’m not going to scratch my head about it.”
Prostate cancer killed Adams on September 14, 1998 in his adopted hometown of Baton Rouge, Louisiana at age 66, the same year Rounder released his final CD, Man of My Word. It’s hard to imagine that a better voice could be located around New Orleans during the city’s R&B heyday. Sunset Boulevard’s expansive two-CD overview of Johnny’s days with Senator Jones as his producer certainly underscores that.
--Bill Dahl
SOURCES
Discogs website: www.discogs.com
45cat website: www45cat.com
I Hear You Knockin’: The Sound of New Orleans Rhythm and Blues, by Jeff Hannusch (Ville Platte, LA: Swallow Pubs., Inc., 1989)
Joel Whitburn’s Top Country Singles 1944-1988, by Joel Whitburn (Menomonee Falls, WI: Record Research, Inc., 1989)
Joel Whitburn’s Top R&B Singles 1942-1988, by Joel Whitburn (Menomonee Falls, WI: Record Research, Inc., 1988)
Wikipedia website: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Adams
YouTube website: www.youtube.com