GREAT FATS DOMINO 78 THE BIG BEAT / I WANT YOU TO KNOW UK LONDON HLP 8575 V+
£
18
$
24
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Description
TWO GREAT SIDES ON THIS HARDER TO FIND FATS DOMINO LONDON LABEL 78
THE BIG BEAT
b/w I WANT YOU TO KNOW
Fats was the top-selling male R&B artist of the 50s, during which Chuck Berry placed 16 songs on the R&B charts and Little Richard placed 18. Fats' total was 46 (27 of which also made the Pop charts. Add to that 6 Pop hits that didn't make the R&B charts! (Even Elvis “only” had 38 tunes on the Pop charts in the 50s.) In a way, Fats was the Nat “King” Cole of 50s R&B; he just sang, without gimmicks, and made it sound easy. There was nothing threatening about his appearance or his music; adults accepted him almost as easily as their kids.
Antoine Domino was born February 28, 1928 in (of course) New Orleans. When he was six, the family (there were eight other children) inherited an old upright piano, and he took to it eagerly, influenced by his brother-in-law Harrison Verret (a banjo and guitar player). It took only two years before he was performing for pennies in some of the wilder local clubs. He must have gathered a lot of pennies, because by the time he was 17 or so, Billy Diamond, in whose band he was playing, had already started calling him “Fats.” (A photo from around 1945, however, shows “Slim” Domino.)
Fats' early influences were Louis Jordan, Roy Milton, Amos Milburn, Joe Turner, Camille Howard, Count Basie, Little Willie Littlefield, and Charles Brown (not a bad bunch to have influence you). Of course, there were also the boogie-woogie and stride giants: Albert Ammons, Pete Johnson, Meade Lux Lewis, Champion Jack Dupree, and Roy “Professor Longhair” Byrd.
However, Fats' career almost ended before it started. Working for pennies was all well and good, but he also had a “real” job, working in a bedspring factory. One day a pile of springs fell on his hands and doctors told him he'd never play the piano again. But Fats fooled them all: within two years he was back playing with a small combo in a local roadhouse called the Hideaway Club. In 1948, he married Rose Mary Hall, his childhood sweetheart
Enter trumpeter Dave Bartholomew, who was the leader of a popular local dance band that had already recorded on the DeLuxe label. One day in 1949, Lew Chudd, owner of Imperial Records came to New Orleans. He'd made a prior appointment to look up Bartholomew and scout out talent for his California-based label. Bartholomew had heard of Fats Domino, and the two of them went to the Hideaway Club to see his act. It only took a few songs for Chudd to decide to sign Fats. Dave was also hired by Chudd, as a New Orleans talent scout.
It was Bartholomew who would do the arrangements for Fats' songs over the years (and author or co-author most of them), and his band was always there to do backup. Others in the band were Herb Hardesty (the tenor saxman heard on most of Fats' recordings), Clarence Hall (tenor sax), Alvin “Red” Tyler (tenor sax), Earl Palmer (drums), Ernest McLean (guitar), Salvador Doucette (piano), and Joe Harris (alto sax).
Fats held his first recording session a few days later on December 10, 1949, in the legendary J&M Studios of Cosimo Matassa. The first two tunes he recorded (DETROIT CITY BLUES and THE FAT MAN) became his first Imperial release, issued in January 1950. It didn't take the record-buying public long to find out what the roadhouse crowd knew: THE FAT MAN entered the R&B charts in February, climbing to #2 before it finished its 9-week run. With his New Orleans-based musical background and vocalizations, Fats captivated R&B audiences. Fats was on his way.
DISC DETAILS:
UK LONDON HLP 8575 10" 78rpm SHELLAC
SIDE 1: - THE BIG BEAT
SIDE 2:- I WANT YOU TO KNOW
CONDITION - V+
STILL PLAYS GREAT
DON'T MISS OUT - BUY NOW!
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