Tondeleo: One thing that fascinated me when I first began working around real American rural musicians is that they did not all play bluegrass music. That is the stereotype that we hold of them: blowing on moonshine jugs, playing banjo’s, mandolins, jaw harps, violins and guitars.
When I met Doc and his friends several years ago, they described what they played as “downhome country blues roots.” It is a mix of country, blues and a fair bit of early rock and roll. I was curious as to how this fit in with the stereotype that we have of these people playing nothing but bluegrass.
Following is an interview I had with Doc and Big Dave a couple of years ago.
Doc: Why don’t we play bluegrass? Well, we ain’t got no banjo’s or violins or mandolins first off, Tondy. We got guitars, I got a bass and we got amps. Bluegrass don’t like basses and amps and electric guitars. But we do.
My family was tryin’ to get away from all that when we was comin’ up. People called us hillbillies and my Grand dad said we needed to quit lookin’ and talkin’ like hillbillies or we ain’t never gonna have anything or amount to nothin.’
Big Dave: I don’t like bluegrass. Ain’t nobody told me to. It just reminds me of my old man. He listened to bluegrass all the time. If it wasn’t his friends comin’ by and playin’ it at the house, it was on the radio. It got bad memories for me. It gets on my nerves.
Tondeleo: Bluegrass gets on your nerves? I thought all rural Americans thrived on bluegrass!
Big Dave: Well, you thought wrong, little buddy.
Doc: We don’t play bluegrass. I never learned it. When I was comin’ up I learned from my grand dad and uncles, and their friends. Some was white and some was black. We all learned each other’s songs. But he steered us away from bluegrass.
I been to places where all they play is bluegrass, and I can be playin’ along, and some office boy what took “bluegrass lessons” will watch me a few minutes and then tell me that I am not playin’ “bluegrass chords.” Bluegrass chords? What’s that? I never learnt no bluegrass chords. I ain’t never took lessons.
I learned a lot of what I play from being in the drink houses. That was whites and blacks and mixed people. Just poor people what had problems and still wanted to sing. Mostly they ain’t know what they was playin’ as far as chords go. They just figured out what sounded good.
I ain’t know the names of all the chords. I know more than some people does, as for the names, but not all of them.I just play what I seen other people play an’ I have some what I figured out, and I slide ‘em up and down the neck to make different ones. That’s what mostly I seen comin’ up.
We’d take our guitars and go to the drink house and eat and talk and play music.
Tondeleo: Drink houses. What are drink houses?
Doc: A drink house is what they have a lot of down south, in North Carolina especially. If they ain't a bar in the area where you can go down for a drink or play some music, a person might just open their house up as a drink house.
You can’t just go and hang out in a bar all night if you ain’t drinkin’ and if you’re dirty from work, they ain’t like that too much neither. A drink house is where poor folks go to hang out and talk and drink and relax.
It's just a person’s house, and they might have they livin’ room or back room with a little bar in it, and a few beers in the ‘frigerator, and maybe a few bottles of liquor in the cabinet. You give 'em a couple of bucks and they give you a shot of whiskey or a beer. Maybe even a dollar might get you a sip, if all you got is a dollar. You can just hang out there and talk of play music or whatever you want, as long as you're not causing any trouble.
People in the neighborhood'll come by. Some will pull up in their car and come in just for a drink and leave. Others hang out there all day or evening.It’s a place to hang out, to talk, meet people and swap songs and learn a little by watchin’ what the other guy is doin’ and listenin’ to how he is playin’ and then do it yourself. You can learn a lot that way.
Sometimes they got a radio on, and you can learn some songs that way. That’s where some of the songs we play come from. That and old records we found here and there.
Big Dave: Yeah. I used to go to drink houses when I was in western North Carolina. It was just a cheap place to go and waste some time, and eat a sandwich and play music.
Some of 'ems open just some days or some evenin's and others is open day or night, seven days a week. Some's got a poker game in the back room or out on the picnic table in the back yard in the summer.
Some got a room fixed up where you can play music inside, with a little stage area over in the corner.
Some sell drugs, some don't. Some sell about anything a person could want, if they know you or you is family to a friend of theirs.
I never went for that. I just went for a sandwich, some music and some place to go before going back to my room to sleep.
Doc: You ain’t got to be a drunk or druggie to go to drink houses. I went for the food and music mostly and people what don’t have any money or good clothes got to be able to go someplace, too after work. Where else are we gonna go?
And that’s where we learnt to play and where we learnt the songs we sing. A bit of everything. Hank Williams, Webb Pierce and all them from my grand dad and uncles and they’s friends, and then John Lee Hooker, BB King, Albert King and a bunch of others from the drink houses.
Really, you got to know all of it so you can make a few dollars. We play some places where it is mostly white people and they want that country music what they call roots. So we play it. Some people think we only play country.
Some places we play is like we are the only white folks there. We play blues; John Lee Hooker, Artie White and BB King and all those kinds of songs there. They ain’t never hear us play country.
Sometimes we play where it is mixed and we do mixed music there. A bit of blues, a bit of country. Whatever they want. We play Gospel too, Tondy! We learnt that at church. But also at drink houses and from family. Most poor folks go to church some time in their life, because life is hard and they need help from the Lord. I need help from the Lord.
And me and Marilyn like singin’ and playin’ Gospel music. It reaches down deep inside you.
Tondeleo: I know, I’ve heard you do that, and I quite like it, I do…
Doc: We like that Gospel, Tondy. Not the new stuff. The old stuff. When a man is poor and can’t deal with his problems, he can turn to drinkin’ and drugs, or he can turn to the Lord. I been turnin’ to the Lord when I get down in the mully grubs, and sometimes I can just pick up my guitar and sing a while and I feel all better. We play Gospel around the house a lot. A whole lot.
