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Bo Diddley His Best
To download this recording via iTunes, click here: The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection: Bo Diddley - His Best - Bo Diddley
To buy this recording from Amazon.com, click here: His Best : The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection
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Bo Diddley
His Best
MCA/Chess Records
CHD - 9373
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1. Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp,. BMI)
Originally Chess single 814
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
2. I'm A Man
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Chess single 814
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
3. You Don't Love Me (You Don't Care)
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally released on Checker LP 1436, Go Bo Diddley
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Willie Dixon or James Bradford (bass)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
4. Diddley Daddy
(Elias McDaniel-Harvey Fuqua, Arc Music Corp./Laison II Publishing, BMI)
Originally Checker single 819
Recorded May 15, 1955
Little Walter (harmonica)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
The Moonglows (background vocals)
5. Pretty Thing
(Willie Dixon, Hoochie Coochie Music (BMI, adm. by Bug)
Originally Checker single 827
Recorded July 14, 1955
Lester Davenport (harmonica)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
6. Bring It To Jerome
(Jerome Green, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 827
Recorded July 14, 1955
Jerome Green (maracas, co-lead vocal)
Lester Davenport (harmonica)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James (drums)
Unknown (woodblock)
7. I'm Lookin' For A Woman
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 832
Recorded November 10, 1955
Jody Williams (guitar)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
8. Who Do You Love?
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 842
Recorded May 24, 1956
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jody Williams (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
9. Hey Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 860
Recorded February 8, 1957
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones with members of The Flamingos (background vocals)
10. Mona (a/k/a I Need You Baby)
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 860
Recorded February 8, 1957
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
11. Before You Accuse Me
(Eugene McDaniels, Longitude Music Co., BMI)
Originally Checker single 878
Recorded August 15, 1957
Willie Dixon (bass)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
2. Say Man
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 931
Recorded January 29, 1958
Jerome Green (maracas, co-lead vocal)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland (drums)
13. Dearest Darling
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 896
Recorded January 29, 1958
Willie Dixon (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland (drums)
14. Crackin' Up
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 924
Recorded December, 1958
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jerome Green, Peggy Jones or The Carnations (background vocals)
15. The Story Of Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel-Eric Burdon, Arc Music Corp., BMI/ Campbell, Connelly Inc., PRS)
Originally Checker single 942
Recorded early September, 1959
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
16. Road Runner
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 942
Recorded late September, 1959
Otis Spann (piano)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Bobby Baskerville, Jerome Green, Peggy Jones (background vocals)
17. Pills
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 985
Recorded May 2, 1961
Jesse James Johnson (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Billy Downing or Edell Robertson (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
18. I Can Tell
(Samuel Smith, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single· 1019
Recorded June 27, 1962
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jesse James Johnson or Chester Lindsey (bass)
Billy Downing or Edell Robertson (drums)
19. You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover
(Willie Dixon, Hoochie Coochie Music (BMI), adm. by Bug)
Same recording date and personnel as "I Can Tell"
Originally Checker single 1019
20. Ooh Baby
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 1158
Recorded September 11, 1966
Bo Diddley (violin)
Edward Drennon (electric violin)
Chester Lindsey (bass)
Ricky Jolivet (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
Cornelia Redmond (tamborine)
Unknown (bongos)
Unknown (maracas)
The Bo-ettes a/k/a Cookies (background vocals)
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Bo Diddley - Vocal and Guitar (all tracks)
All tracks recorded in Chicago
All recordings originally produced by Leonard and Phil Chess and Bo Diddley
Compiled and produced by Andy McKaie
Digitally remastered by Erick Labson, MCA Music Media Studios, No. Hollywood, CA
Art Direction: Vartan
Design: Meire Murakami
Photo Research: Geary Chansley
Photo Credits: Cover: Ray Avery; page 7: Popsie/Frank Driggs Collection; page 11, inlay: MCA/Chess files
Sources: "The Complete Bo Diddley Sessions" by George R. White (George R. White Publications); "The Chess Labels, Vols. 1 & 2" by Michel Ruppli (Greenwood Press); Chess Master tape boxes; and the Chess Files
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Bo Diddley
To paraphrase the titles of two of the 20 Bo Diddley nuggets contained on His Best, The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection, you can't judge a book by its cover, but you sure can tell something about how important a musician is by the artists who do cover versions of his songs.
That's not to imply that Bo Diddley's legacy rests solely on the interpretations of his music by others. The rich body of work contained here offers ample testament to the multiple talents - as singer, songwriter, guitarist and creator of one of the archetypal rock rhythms - the man born Elias McDaniels displayed on over 20 Chess albums.
But it's also impossible to overlook the impact of both his songs and the trademark Diddley beat on the '60s British rock explosion, from kingpins like the Stones and Yardbirds down to U.K.-legends-but-us-unknowns like Johnny Kidd & the Pirates and the Pretty Things (who took their name from Bo's song). In the U.S., the Doors, Creedence and Quicksilver were only three of the late '60s luminaries who raided the Diddley songbook and one of the figureheads of an entirely different counter-culture - the New York Dolls - did the same a few years later.
But the indirect influence of Diddley's rhythmic imprint - those thundering tomtoms laying down a variant on the old "shave-and-a-hair-cut-six-bits" hambone rhythm that also cuts close to the clave rhythmic core of Latin music - was even more widespread. Follow the rock 'n' roll timeline from his '50s peers (Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," Johnny Otis' "Willie & The Hand Jive") through '60s and 70s icons (the Who's "Magic Bus,"; Bruce Springsteen's "She's The One") on to the '80s (the decidedly odd couple of George Thorogood's frat-house anthem "Bad To The Bone" and Brit popsters the Smiths) and mid-'90s (lggy Pop's mid-70s "Lust For Life" in the memorable opening sequence of the film "Trainspotting"), and you'll find the Diddley Daddy's been in the house and on your CD player for four decades.
But for a man whose name has become synonymous with a particular rhythm sound, that big, thundering Bo Diddley beat actually turns up pretty infrequently on His Best, The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection. The drummers on "Who Do You Love" and "You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover," probably Bo's two most enduring legacies to the bar bands of the world, both laid down a straight backbeat. But make no mistake, Bo Diddley played body rock - his musical sights were set on the listener's hips from the git-go.
Where the rhythmic emphasis always shines through is in his guitar playing, grounded in right-hand rhythm chops that makes his six-string thing a crucial link in the chain that would later include slews of brilliant soul and funk guitarists. His biggest pop hit, "Say Man," found Diddley talking the talk in the street game of verbal insults known as "signifying" or "the dozens" that looked forward to hip-hop even as he walked the macho bravado walk of Bo's blues peers Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.
Ironically, Bo Diddley - Bo of the heavy-rimmed black glasses that'd probably get him called a nerd today, Bo of the tartan plaid and black leather gunslinger suits, Bo of the self-made square guitar and sonic noises, Bo the unlikeliest of teen idols - was the rocker who brought the deep blues to white America. While Chuck Berry seduced it with rollicking piano, fluid guitar solos and teenage American dream themes, Bo Diddley was the bridge to the guitar/harmonica sound and hoodoo the voodoo chants of Chicago/Mississippi blues their virgin ears weren't ready for in their undiluted form just yet.
"I'm what you call a black Frenchman, a Creole," Diddley related to Pete Welding on the liner notes to his 1973 compilation Got My Own Bag Of Tricks. "All my people are from New Orleans, the bayou country - French, African, Indian, all mixed up. That's where my music comes from, all that mixture."
It makes perfect sense, Bo Diddley and New Orleans - the most Caribbean city of the U.S. and the one place where African drumming survived during and after the slavery era. It was also the home of what Jelly Roll Morton called "the Latin tinge" and a brass band tradition that spawned generations of drummers whose second-line rhythm fueled early rock 'n' roll and isn't exactly far removed from what everyone now knows as the Diddley beat.
But New Orleans couldn't have exerted a strong direct influence, aside from the blood kinfolk ties, since Elias McDaniels was whisked away from his birthplace of McComb, Mississippi (just over the Louisiana border) to the bright lights of the big city, Chicago, with his mother's first cousin when he was 7 or 8. Diddley didn't lack for a varied musical environment growing up in Chicago. He took formal violin lessons for several years but he was also sneaking off to Baptist churches to hear, live and direct, the "shout mode" that Bo himself referred to as the foundation of his music in Bo Diddley: The Chess Box.
His early musical influences displayed a broad range, too - the suave crooner Nat "King" Cole, the raucous, humorous jump blues of Cab Calloway and Louis Jordan, and the down-to-the-bone Delta sound of John Lee Hooker's "Boogie Chillen'''. And when Bo put together a street band originally called the Hipsters and later the Langley Avenue Jive Cats around 1945, the group that was too young to play in clubs at first couldn't ignore the full throttle sounds of electric Chicago blues filtering out to the sidewalks.
Bo and company, by now including soon-to-be-world's-most-famous maracas player Jerome Green, Billy Boy Arnold on harmonica and Clifton James on drums, had graduated to the club level by 1954. Bo and Billy Boy made a 2-song demo they shopped along Chicago's Record Row with legendary results - run out of Vee Jay, they popped across the street to Chess and straight into a record deal. A week later, Bo Diddley strode into Chess Studios on March 3, 1955 to record his first pair of songs and, as they say, the rest was history.
"There are things-like 'Back In the USA,' 'I'm A Man,' and 'Mojo' - that you know are classics when you cut them," recalled Chess engineer Malcolm Chisholm 10 years ago.
"Bo Diddley/I'm A Man" has to rank as one of the most influential, two-sided debut singles in history. The namesake A-side (technically) began building the Bo myth and introduced the trademark beat as Bo rode Clifton James' tom toms and the maracas to the # 1 R&B chart position within two months. "I'm A Man" was no less explosive, coming straight out of mid-'50s electric Chicago blues with a quintessential coming-of-age boast and archetypal riff flavored by Billy Boy Arnold's harmonica.
And its impact didn't just register on the sales charts - it reverberated around the Chess studios as well. By the end of April, 1955, Little Walter had recorded Diddley's "Roller Coaster" as a scorching instrumental with Bo on guitar. During that summer, Muddy Waters laid down his thinly-veiled homage to "I'm A Man," "Mannish Boy," and upped the macho ante by positioning himself as a 5-minute lovemaker compared to Bo's 50-minute man.
Little Walter also adapted the core riff of Diddley's "You Don't Love Me" for his "Hate To See You Go" in August, and Bo's prototype here shows how deeply connected he was to the electric Chicago blues of the time. Arnold's harmonica again took the lead, Diddley's guitar dug down deep into Muddy-esque rhythm patterns, Otis Spann contributed a rollicking piano solo and Kirkland pushed this no-nonsense, big boogie-like Chess blues sessions' mainstay Fred Below.
But it was Bo's rhythm thing that caught the public ear - witness the #4 R&B chart success of "Pretty Thing" early in 1955, as the harmonica melded into the arrangement to create one solid wall of Diddley beat. "Bring It To Jerome" shifted the focus - Bo's electrifying vocal entrance played off Green's chorus chant before downshifting to a more lightly textured sound featuring Lester Davenport's harmonica. "Diddley Daddy" had already hit # 11 on the R&B charts six months before, reinforcing the Bo myth with the Moonglows' backing vocals and a hypnotic guitar drone.
Surprisingly, Bo's chart success stopped then for three years mysteriously, too, because Diddley cut some of his most memorable tunes between 1957-1959. "I'm Looking For A Woman" returned to classic blues territory with a high-stepping rhythm anchored by straight rockin' drums as Bo plays the country mouse in search of the big-city woman.
With "Who Do You Love?," Bo crafted an enduring lyric archetype on the order of "Johnny B. Goode" and "Hoochie Coochie Man" - except this time Mississippi hoodoo was transplanted to the Southwest with 47 miles of barbed wire, cobra snake neckties, houses made from rattlesnake hide and a chimney made from a human skull. "Hey Bo Diddley" maintains the Western motif with its dude (in every sense of the word) ranch fantasy boast supported by great backing vocals (probably the Moonglows, maybe with a very young Marvin Gaye).
The mix on "Bo Diddley" heavily favored drums over guitar, a sonic scenario reversed on "Mona" with Bo's right hand trills dominating and a new lyrical stance - Bo the pleading lover, laying out naked emotions - that was the flip side of his usual stud fantasies. That plaintive side also pervaded "Before You Accuse Me" - its spare arrangement accentuated Bo's bluesy soloing and a street-level take on "Let he (or she) who is without sin cast the first stone."
But it was entirely different lyrical approach that brought Bo back for his biggest pop chart success. Reaching #20 pop and #3 R&B in mid-'59, "Say Man" was all street-corner goofing between Bo and Jerome over an arrangement that clearly brought the profound Latin music influence at the core of Diddley's rhythm trip to the fore. It showed up particularly strong in Lafayette Leake's piano both here and "Dearest Darling," with Bo back in his pleading mode again on the latter.
The chart stage had been set for "Say Man" earlier that year when the Caribbean-flavored "Crackin' Up," sporting a more complex arrangement with dip-dipping backing vocals and rippling guitar melody, reached #14 R&B and #62 pop. "The Story Of Bo Diddley" found Bo goofin' again, this time on his own self-created mythology ("I'm a killer diller") with a few good-humored "signifying" jabs at his friendly rival Chuck Berry thrown in.
"Road Runner" transferred his usual macho bravado to Berry's home turf as Bo took off down the highway with a motorvating riff augmented by guitar sounds. It reached #20 R&B and #75 pop early in 1960, and it's certainly not inconceivable that its "beep beep" backing vocals inspired the creation of a famed cartoon character who, regularly battled it out with one Wile E. Coyote.
Those who first heard "Pills" via the New York Dolls exuberant cover during the drugs & decadence-crazed glitter rock era will probably be surprised to find that Bo's original sounded more like a complaint than a celebration of the rock 'n' roll nurse's tender ministrations. And the way Diddley's rhythm chops countered the bass melody of "I Can Tell" hit home far harder in England than the U.S.-it was a hit for the pre-Stones bad boys of British rock, Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, and was resurrected by the lean, mean Dr. Feelgood machine just before punk exploded in the U.K.
Custom-tailored for Diddley by Willie Dixon, "You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover" played right into Bo's boaster mode while his right hand chords and the jet-propelled bass guitar lines walking up and down the scales drove the song to #21 R&B and #48 pop in mid-1962. Diddley chalked up his final chart single when "Ooh Baby" peaked at #17 R&B, #88 pop in January, 1967. It was a fitting finale, including some Bo violin, a female chorus testifying to Bo the lover and the spurned Bo-man tossing off some vocal asides that could easily have slipped into Jimi Hendrix's trick bag.
Diddley continued recording with Chess until 1974 - even courting the new rock crowd with his own London Sessions LP - but was largely relegated to the rock 'n' roll oldies or blues festival circuit through the '70s and '80s. Not that you could always keep Bo down on the farm (filled with women or not) - he opened one of the Clash's early U.S. tours in the late '70s and Stones Keith Richards and Ron Wood have rolled around for occasional recordings and gigs since then.
While Diddley never matched the commercial success or recognition of Chuck Berry, he joined his Chess mate as a charter inductee into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame and later added the Rhythm & Blues Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award. His Best: The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection stands as the definitive collection of the creative achievements of the performer, songwriter, and sonic architect who greatly expanded the rhythmic dimension of early rock 'n' roll in fundamental, enduring ways.
- DON SNOWDEN -
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Bo Diddley recordings also available from MCA-Chess include:
Bo Diddley/Go Bo Diddley (CHD-5904)
Rare And Well Done (CHD-9331)
The Chess Box (CHD2-19502)
For a complete listing of available Bo Diddley Chess recordings and more information regarding MCA-Chess releases, please write: Chess Club, c/o MCA Records, 70 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA 91608.
®© 1997 MCA Records, Inc. CHO-9373
To buy this recording from Amazon.com, click here: His Best : The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection
____________________________________________________________Bo Diddley
His Best
MCA/Chess Records
CHD - 9373
____________________________________________________________
1. Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp,. BMI)
Originally Chess single 814
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
2. I'm A Man
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Chess single 814
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
3. You Don't Love Me (You Don't Care)
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally released on Checker LP 1436, Go Bo Diddley
Recorded March 2, 1955
Billy Boy Arnold (harmonica)
Otis Spann (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Willie Dixon or James Bradford (bass)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
4. Diddley Daddy
(Elias McDaniel-Harvey Fuqua, Arc Music Corp./Laison II Publishing, BMI)
Originally Checker single 819
Recorded May 15, 1955
Little Walter (harmonica)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
The Moonglows (background vocals)
5. Pretty Thing
(Willie Dixon, Hoochie Coochie Music (BMI, adm. by Bug)
Originally Checker single 827
Recorded July 14, 1955
Lester Davenport (harmonica)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
6. Bring It To Jerome
(Jerome Green, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 827
Recorded July 14, 1955
Jerome Green (maracas, co-lead vocal)
Lester Davenport (harmonica)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James (drums)
Unknown (woodblock)
7. I'm Lookin' For A Woman
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 832
Recorded November 10, 1955
Jody Williams (guitar)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Clifton James (drums)
8. Who Do You Love?
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 842
Recorded May 24, 1956
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jody Williams (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
9. Hey Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 860
Recorded February 8, 1957
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones with members of The Flamingos (background vocals)
10. Mona (a/k/a I Need You Baby)
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 860
Recorded February 8, 1957
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
11. Before You Accuse Me
(Eugene McDaniels, Longitude Music Co., BMI)
Originally Checker single 878
Recorded August 15, 1957
Willie Dixon (bass)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland or Clifton James (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
2. Say Man
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 931
Recorded January 29, 1958
Jerome Green (maracas, co-lead vocal)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland (drums)
13. Dearest Darling
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 896
Recorded January 29, 1958
Willie Dixon (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Frank Kirkland (drums)
14. Crackin' Up
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 924
Recorded December, 1958
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jerome Green, Peggy Jones or The Carnations (background vocals)
15. The Story Of Bo Diddley
(Elias McDaniel-Eric Burdon, Arc Music Corp., BMI/ Campbell, Connelly Inc., PRS)
Originally Checker single 942
Recorded early September, 1959
Lafayette Leake (piano)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Willie Dixon (bass)
Clifton James or Frank Kirkland (drums)
16. Road Runner
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 942
Recorded late September, 1959
Otis Spann (piano)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
Bobby Baskerville, Jerome Green, Peggy Jones (background vocals)
17. Pills
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 985
Recorded May 2, 1961
Jesse James Johnson (bass)
Peggy Jones (guitar)
Billy Downing or Edell Robertson (drums)
Jerome Green (maracas)
18. I Can Tell
(Samuel Smith, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single· 1019
Recorded June 27, 1962
Jerome Green (maracas)
Jesse James Johnson or Chester Lindsey (bass)
Billy Downing or Edell Robertson (drums)
19. You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover
(Willie Dixon, Hoochie Coochie Music (BMI), adm. by Bug)
Same recording date and personnel as "I Can Tell"
Originally Checker single 1019
20. Ooh Baby
(Elias McDaniel, Arc Music Corp., BMI)
Originally Checker single 1158
Recorded September 11, 1966
Bo Diddley (violin)
Edward Drennon (electric violin)
Chester Lindsey (bass)
Ricky Jolivet (guitar)
Clifton James (drums)
Cornelia Redmond (tamborine)
Unknown (bongos)
Unknown (maracas)
The Bo-ettes a/k/a Cookies (background vocals)
____________________________________________________________
Bo Diddley - Vocal and Guitar (all tracks)
All tracks recorded in Chicago
All recordings originally produced by Leonard and Phil Chess and Bo Diddley
Compiled and produced by Andy McKaie
Digitally remastered by Erick Labson, MCA Music Media Studios, No. Hollywood, CA
Art Direction: Vartan
Design: Meire Murakami
Photo Research: Geary Chansley
Photo Credits: Cover: Ray Avery; page 7: Popsie/Frank Driggs Collection; page 11, inlay: MCA/Chess files
Sources: "The Complete Bo Diddley Sessions" by George R. White (George R. White Publications); "The Chess Labels, Vols. 1 & 2" by Michel Ruppli (Greenwood Press); Chess Master tape boxes; and the Chess Files
____________________________________________________________
Bo Diddley
To paraphrase the titles of two of the 20 Bo Diddley nuggets contained on His Best, The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection, you can't judge a book by its cover, but you sure can tell something about how important a musician is by the artists who do cover versions of his songs.
That's not to imply that Bo Diddley's legacy rests solely on the interpretations of his music by others. The rich body of work contained here offers ample testament to the multiple talents - as singer, songwriter, guitarist and creator of one of the archetypal rock rhythms - the man born Elias McDaniels displayed on over 20 Chess albums.
But it's also impossible to overlook the impact of both his songs and the trademark Diddley beat on the '60s British rock explosion, from kingpins like the Stones and Yardbirds down to U.K.-legends-but-us-unknowns like Johnny Kidd & the Pirates and the Pretty Things (who took their name from Bo's song). In the U.S., the Doors, Creedence and Quicksilver were only three of the late '60s luminaries who raided the Diddley songbook and one of the figureheads of an entirely different counter-culture - the New York Dolls - did the same a few years later.
But the indirect influence of Diddley's rhythmic imprint - those thundering tomtoms laying down a variant on the old "shave-and-a-hair-cut-six-bits" hambone rhythm that also cuts close to the clave rhythmic core of Latin music - was even more widespread. Follow the rock 'n' roll timeline from his '50s peers (Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," Johnny Otis' "Willie & The Hand Jive") through '60s and 70s icons (the Who's "Magic Bus,"; Bruce Springsteen's "She's The One") on to the '80s (the decidedly odd couple of George Thorogood's frat-house anthem "Bad To The Bone" and Brit popsters the Smiths) and mid-'90s (lggy Pop's mid-70s "Lust For Life" in the memorable opening sequence of the film "Trainspotting"), and you'll find the Diddley Daddy's been in the house and on your CD player for four decades.
But for a man whose name has become synonymous with a particular rhythm sound, that big, thundering Bo Diddley beat actually turns up pretty infrequently on His Best, The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection. The drummers on "Who Do You Love" and "You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover," probably Bo's two most enduring legacies to the bar bands of the world, both laid down a straight backbeat. But make no mistake, Bo Diddley played body rock - his musical sights were set on the listener's hips from the git-go.
Where the rhythmic emphasis always shines through is in his guitar playing, grounded in right-hand rhythm chops that makes his six-string thing a crucial link in the chain that would later include slews of brilliant soul and funk guitarists. His biggest pop hit, "Say Man," found Diddley talking the talk in the street game of verbal insults known as "signifying" or "the dozens" that looked forward to hip-hop even as he walked the macho bravado walk of Bo's blues peers Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.
Ironically, Bo Diddley - Bo of the heavy-rimmed black glasses that'd probably get him called a nerd today, Bo of the tartan plaid and black leather gunslinger suits, Bo of the self-made square guitar and sonic noises, Bo the unlikeliest of teen idols - was the rocker who brought the deep blues to white America. While Chuck Berry seduced it with rollicking piano, fluid guitar solos and teenage American dream themes, Bo Diddley was the bridge to the guitar/harmonica sound and hoodoo the voodoo chants of Chicago/Mississippi blues their virgin ears weren't ready for in their undiluted form just yet.
"I'm what you call a black Frenchman, a Creole," Diddley related to Pete Welding on the liner notes to his 1973 compilation Got My Own Bag Of Tricks. "All my people are from New Orleans, the bayou country - French, African, Indian, all mixed up. That's where my music comes from, all that mixture."
It makes perfect sense, Bo Diddley and New Orleans - the most Caribbean city of the U.S. and the one place where African drumming survived during and after the slavery era. It was also the home of what Jelly Roll Morton called "the Latin tinge" and a brass band tradition that spawned generations of drummers whose second-line rhythm fueled early rock 'n' roll and isn't exactly far removed from what everyone now knows as the Diddley beat.
But New Orleans couldn't have exerted a strong direct influence, aside from the blood kinfolk ties, since Elias McDaniels was whisked away from his birthplace of McComb, Mississippi (just over the Louisiana border) to the bright lights of the big city, Chicago, with his mother's first cousin when he was 7 or 8. Diddley didn't lack for a varied musical environment growing up in Chicago. He took formal violin lessons for several years but he was also sneaking off to Baptist churches to hear, live and direct, the "shout mode" that Bo himself referred to as the foundation of his music in Bo Diddley: The Chess Box.
His early musical influences displayed a broad range, too - the suave crooner Nat "King" Cole, the raucous, humorous jump blues of Cab Calloway and Louis Jordan, and the down-to-the-bone Delta sound of John Lee Hooker's "Boogie Chillen'''. And when Bo put together a street band originally called the Hipsters and later the Langley Avenue Jive Cats around 1945, the group that was too young to play in clubs at first couldn't ignore the full throttle sounds of electric Chicago blues filtering out to the sidewalks.
Bo and company, by now including soon-to-be-world's-most-famous maracas player Jerome Green, Billy Boy Arnold on harmonica and Clifton James on drums, had graduated to the club level by 1954. Bo and Billy Boy made a 2-song demo they shopped along Chicago's Record Row with legendary results - run out of Vee Jay, they popped across the street to Chess and straight into a record deal. A week later, Bo Diddley strode into Chess Studios on March 3, 1955 to record his first pair of songs and, as they say, the rest was history.
"There are things-like 'Back In the USA,' 'I'm A Man,' and 'Mojo' - that you know are classics when you cut them," recalled Chess engineer Malcolm Chisholm 10 years ago.
"Bo Diddley/I'm A Man" has to rank as one of the most influential, two-sided debut singles in history. The namesake A-side (technically) began building the Bo myth and introduced the trademark beat as Bo rode Clifton James' tom toms and the maracas to the # 1 R&B chart position within two months. "I'm A Man" was no less explosive, coming straight out of mid-'50s electric Chicago blues with a quintessential coming-of-age boast and archetypal riff flavored by Billy Boy Arnold's harmonica.
And its impact didn't just register on the sales charts - it reverberated around the Chess studios as well. By the end of April, 1955, Little Walter had recorded Diddley's "Roller Coaster" as a scorching instrumental with Bo on guitar. During that summer, Muddy Waters laid down his thinly-veiled homage to "I'm A Man," "Mannish Boy," and upped the macho ante by positioning himself as a 5-minute lovemaker compared to Bo's 50-minute man.
Little Walter also adapted the core riff of Diddley's "You Don't Love Me" for his "Hate To See You Go" in August, and Bo's prototype here shows how deeply connected he was to the electric Chicago blues of the time. Arnold's harmonica again took the lead, Diddley's guitar dug down deep into Muddy-esque rhythm patterns, Otis Spann contributed a rollicking piano solo and Kirkland pushed this no-nonsense, big boogie-like Chess blues sessions' mainstay Fred Below.
But it was Bo's rhythm thing that caught the public ear - witness the #4 R&B chart success of "Pretty Thing" early in 1955, as the harmonica melded into the arrangement to create one solid wall of Diddley beat. "Bring It To Jerome" shifted the focus - Bo's electrifying vocal entrance played off Green's chorus chant before downshifting to a more lightly textured sound featuring Lester Davenport's harmonica. "Diddley Daddy" had already hit # 11 on the R&B charts six months before, reinforcing the Bo myth with the Moonglows' backing vocals and a hypnotic guitar drone.
Surprisingly, Bo's chart success stopped then for three years mysteriously, too, because Diddley cut some of his most memorable tunes between 1957-1959. "I'm Looking For A Woman" returned to classic blues territory with a high-stepping rhythm anchored by straight rockin' drums as Bo plays the country mouse in search of the big-city woman.
With "Who Do You Love?," Bo crafted an enduring lyric archetype on the order of "Johnny B. Goode" and "Hoochie Coochie Man" - except this time Mississippi hoodoo was transplanted to the Southwest with 47 miles of barbed wire, cobra snake neckties, houses made from rattlesnake hide and a chimney made from a human skull. "Hey Bo Diddley" maintains the Western motif with its dude (in every sense of the word) ranch fantasy boast supported by great backing vocals (probably the Moonglows, maybe with a very young Marvin Gaye).
The mix on "Bo Diddley" heavily favored drums over guitar, a sonic scenario reversed on "Mona" with Bo's right hand trills dominating and a new lyrical stance - Bo the pleading lover, laying out naked emotions - that was the flip side of his usual stud fantasies. That plaintive side also pervaded "Before You Accuse Me" - its spare arrangement accentuated Bo's bluesy soloing and a street-level take on "Let he (or she) who is without sin cast the first stone."
But it was entirely different lyrical approach that brought Bo back for his biggest pop chart success. Reaching #20 pop and #3 R&B in mid-'59, "Say Man" was all street-corner goofing between Bo and Jerome over an arrangement that clearly brought the profound Latin music influence at the core of Diddley's rhythm trip to the fore. It showed up particularly strong in Lafayette Leake's piano both here and "Dearest Darling," with Bo back in his pleading mode again on the latter.
The chart stage had been set for "Say Man" earlier that year when the Caribbean-flavored "Crackin' Up," sporting a more complex arrangement with dip-dipping backing vocals and rippling guitar melody, reached #14 R&B and #62 pop. "The Story Of Bo Diddley" found Bo goofin' again, this time on his own self-created mythology ("I'm a killer diller") with a few good-humored "signifying" jabs at his friendly rival Chuck Berry thrown in.
"Road Runner" transferred his usual macho bravado to Berry's home turf as Bo took off down the highway with a motorvating riff augmented by guitar sounds. It reached #20 R&B and #75 pop early in 1960, and it's certainly not inconceivable that its "beep beep" backing vocals inspired the creation of a famed cartoon character who, regularly battled it out with one Wile E. Coyote.
Those who first heard "Pills" via the New York Dolls exuberant cover during the drugs & decadence-crazed glitter rock era will probably be surprised to find that Bo's original sounded more like a complaint than a celebration of the rock 'n' roll nurse's tender ministrations. And the way Diddley's rhythm chops countered the bass melody of "I Can Tell" hit home far harder in England than the U.S.-it was a hit for the pre-Stones bad boys of British rock, Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, and was resurrected by the lean, mean Dr. Feelgood machine just before punk exploded in the U.K.
Custom-tailored for Diddley by Willie Dixon, "You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover" played right into Bo's boaster mode while his right hand chords and the jet-propelled bass guitar lines walking up and down the scales drove the song to #21 R&B and #48 pop in mid-1962. Diddley chalked up his final chart single when "Ooh Baby" peaked at #17 R&B, #88 pop in January, 1967. It was a fitting finale, including some Bo violin, a female chorus testifying to Bo the lover and the spurned Bo-man tossing off some vocal asides that could easily have slipped into Jimi Hendrix's trick bag.
Diddley continued recording with Chess until 1974 - even courting the new rock crowd with his own London Sessions LP - but was largely relegated to the rock 'n' roll oldies or blues festival circuit through the '70s and '80s. Not that you could always keep Bo down on the farm (filled with women or not) - he opened one of the Clash's early U.S. tours in the late '70s and Stones Keith Richards and Ron Wood have rolled around for occasional recordings and gigs since then.
While Diddley never matched the commercial success or recognition of Chuck Berry, he joined his Chess mate as a charter inductee into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame and later added the Rhythm & Blues Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award. His Best: The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection stands as the definitive collection of the creative achievements of the performer, songwriter, and sonic architect who greatly expanded the rhythmic dimension of early rock 'n' roll in fundamental, enduring ways.
- DON SNOWDEN -
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Bo Diddley recordings also available from MCA-Chess include:
Bo Diddley/Go Bo Diddley (CHD-5904)
Rare And Well Done (CHD-9331)
The Chess Box (CHD2-19502)
For a complete listing of available Bo Diddley Chess recordings and more information regarding MCA-Chess releases, please write: Chess Club, c/o MCA Records, 70 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA 91608.
®© 1997 MCA Records, Inc. CHO-9373
