Listen: Wham / Lonnie Mack LonnieMackWham.mp3

Listen: Suzie Q / Lonnie Mack LonnieMackSuzie.mp3

Often lumped with Duane Eddy and Link Wray, contemporaries of the day, Lonnie Mack’s musical distinction is the blues as opposed to a rockabilly instrumental slant. Not surprisingly, he’s widely regarded as a ground-breaking rock guitarist, whose artistic impact far outreaches his commercial accomplishments, although he had a few massive records. His first, ‘Memphis’ hit Top 5 in early ’63 on both Billboard’s Pop and RnB charts.

Things were clearly different in those days. It’s not the first time that a record, recorded quickly during some down time, post a proper session, somehow got released without the artist knowing, and ended up a hit – again to said artist’s surprise. Such was apparently the case with ‘Memphis’

‘Wham’, a followup, has significance for (a) being another unlikely instrumental success and (b) for actually describing a sound both unique and original at the time in it’s title. The culprit, a whammy bar, in reality a Bigsby tremelo arm. To further enhance the vibrato on his tunes, Lonnie Mack employed a variant of Robert Ward’s distortion technique, using a 1950s-era tube-fired Magnatone amplifier to produce a ‘rotating, fluttery sound’. Hence, the blues guitar revolution began, at least according to some.

Either way, this is a great double sider. Adults and children alike should own a handful of his 7′s for when the appropriate party moment occurs at one’s home.

I was quite excited back in September ’69 when Lonnie Mack was on the bill at The Fillmore East as main support to headliners Crosby, Stills & Nash. Opening that weekend: The Move. I just sent away for two tickets and announced to my Dad that he was either taking me or I was hitch hiking. Mind you, we lived in Syracuse and NYC was a good 300 miles away. To be honest, this was all about seeing The Move, but planning to stay long enough to gawk at Lonnie Mack and his wire-fire fingers.

Sadly, The Move never did play New York, so I exchanged my seats for another weekend’s triple header: Spirit / The Kinks / The Bonzo Dog Band. A life changing tradeoff, I can assure you.

Listen: A Public Execution / Mouse A Public Execution.mp3

I think it was Lenny Kaye who said something about Mouse doing Bob Dylan better than Bob Dylan. But in local towns across American during ’65 – ’66, all the garage bands mimicked some favorite. Occasionally it would be so good, you didn’t care. Such was the case with this first Mouse single, which became a real cult record even then. The three singles that followed came out as Mouse & The Traps and were all over the place musically. But the biggest success, reaching #122 in Feb ’66, was indeed the debut, ‘A Public Execution’. Actually the local Ohio label that issued it, Fraternity, was always of interest. Pressed on shiny, thick vinyl with a standard orange or more common, maroon label; their releases had a collector’s feel from the get go. A favorite from them that almost took off nationally, 2 Of Club’s ‘Walk Tall’, was a super girl group track that I’ll post soon. Meanwhile their biggest seller was Lonnie Mack, and who can hate that idea.