Swamp Soul Man.
His music has been labelled 'swamp soul,' does he feel that this is an apt description? "Well, if it's gotta have a tag, I guess that'll take care of it," he said in those rich, deep tones. "Really it's my interpretation of the music back home, music and surroundings I grew up with. The subjects and the people I knew, they're all reflected in my songs somewhere and the sound just kinda evolved.
"My early influences have been put down as Lightnin' Hopkins and Elvis Presley and, sure, I listened to them both a lot. I never got to see Hopkins until last year though, quite by accident, and I ended up doing some liner notes for one of his albums afterwards. The Presley bit was quite hard to get rid of. It came about because I was doing a lot of his material then and I had a band behind me.
Freedom
"Anyway, I found I had a greater amount of freedom Working alone and so I got rid of the band about three years ago. I'd been writing some of my songs but I just had to find an identify of my own, do my own thing entirely, " 'Polk Salad Annie', 'Old Man Willis', 'Willie And Laura Mae Jones', the characters in those, songs were all cast in the image of people I'd known. 'Roosevelt And Ira Lee' were real too, a couple of guys called Roosevelt Monk and Ira James, and that title caused a fair bit of trouble with the record in the States. One week it was on the chart, having sold around 300,000 copies and the next week it wasn't showing at all. It seems that people were saying I'd written a song about two negro characters and given them the names of a U.S. President and a war hero President Roosevelt and Ira Lee Hayes). In fact, Monk and James were white guys!
"it was just a racial thing and it really brought me down. It's a cryin' shame that people have to be judged by colour, let alone music!"
What kind of music does Tony Joe listen to... blues, cajun maybe?
"I listen to most things as long as they've got guts and soul. I just can't stand cajun music at any price, same goes for country. Blues I like, Muddy Waters especially, but you've got to be an addict to really get inside it and I'm not. For my money, the best acts around at the moment are Isaac Hayes, Chicago, Taj Mahal... and Mavis Staples. Wow, everybody's just gotta have a Mavis Staples album!
Europe is acknowledged as a separate record market generally speaking, thus this his second promo visit to stir up some action here. Does reaction to his music vary in different States on the mammoth American circuit?
Canada
"No, I guess not really. If anything, I can go down better up north than down south. And I get a lot of satisfaction playing in Canada ... the Toronto Festival last year was great. Mostly I play the club and college circuit but I've been getting into festivals too. I'll be doing the Hollywood Festival in Britain this trip and I may do the Isle Of Wight later in the summer. An offer has been made if things can be worked out I'd like to play there.
"A lot of unscrupulous people have become involved with festivals since they started on a large scale, but they can be good. Those organising the better ones realise that things can take anything up to a year to set up properly. The one at Dallas was about the best ever."
Tony Joe recently bought a 1,200 acre ranch in Arkansas. Does he intend to cut down on appearances and get back to the land?
His songs have been much sought after by a host of performers and Brook Benton sold about two million copies of "Rainy Night In Georgia." Would be like to write more for other people'?
"I just write my songs as they're needed. I might write a couple in a week if there's a record session coming up... or none at all for about a month if they're not needed. I just write songs for myself. If they suit other people, then fine."
September
"Groupy Girl" has been moving on the Continent and looks like it could take off here. What's next for Tony Joe in Britain?
"Well, I'll be back here in September for sure to do a solo concert at London's Albert Hall and guest on a Bobby Gentry TV special.. Like this trip, I'll just have a drummer backing my own guitar and harmonica. Then I'll also do my own TV show in the series Stanley Dorfman is setting up on singer/composers. I was to do it this time over but I'm out of time.
"On The record front, I've just got a new single out in the States called 'Save Your Sugar For Me' ... which I hope the radio stations there don't ban like they did 'Groupy Girl.' You could only pick that up on the underground wavelengths back home.
"Then, in June, I've got a new album for Stateside release titled 'Chapter Three,' I wrote all the stuff on one side and the other has songs that I dig, like Otis' 'Hard To Handle,' Junior Walker's 'What Does It Take' and John Lee Hooker's 'Boom Boom.' On my first album, I did a few things like 'Look Of Love' which others wanted me to do. On this, my third, the selections are all down to one personn... me!"
unknown writer
June 5 1970
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