Step It Up and Go : The Story of North Carolina Popular Music, From Blind Boy Fuller and Doc Watson to Nina Simone and Superchunk

This book is a love letter to the artists, scenes, and sounds defining North Carolina's extraordinary contributions to American popular music. David Menconi spent three decades immersed in the state's music, where traditions run deep but the energy expands in countless directions. Menconi shows how working-class roots and rebellion tie North Carolina's Piedmont blues, jazz, and bluegrass to beach music, rock, hip-hop, and more. From mill towns and mountain coves to college-town clubs and the stage of American Idol , Blind Boy Fuller and Doc Watson to Nina Simone and Superchunk, Step It Up and Go celebrates homegrown music just as essential to the state as barbecue and basketball. Spanning a century of history from the dawn of recorded music to the present, and with sidebars and photos that help reveal the many-splendored glory of North Carolina's sonic landscape, this is a must-read for every music lover. MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict MuPDF error: syntax error: invalid key in dict Cover 1 Half Title 2 Title 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 Prologue: March 1991 16 Minstrel of the Appalachians: Bascom Lamar Lunsford 19 1. Linthead Pop: Charlie Poole, the Father of Mill-Town Rock (and the First Rock Star) 25 “Orange Blossom Special”: Ervin T. Rouse 34 2. Step It Up and Go: Blind Boy Fuller, Durham, and the Piedmont Blues 41 Keeping the Blues Alive: Music Maker Relief Foundation 44 The First Ladies of Piedmont Blues: Elizabeth Cotten and Etta Baker 49 The Gospel Truth: Mitchell’s Christian Singers 57 3. Through the Airwaves: Arthur Smith in Charlotte 60 Mountain Man: Wade Mainer 65 On Tape: Reflection Sound Studios 70 4. Rocket Man: Earl Scruggs and the Birth of Bluegrass 75 The Innovators: George Shuffler and Bobby Hicks 78 Sidemen to the Stars: Steep Canyon Rangers and Chatham County Line 87 5. From Gospel to Rhythm and Blues: The “5” Royales and the Rise of a New African American Sound 91 “Freek’n You”: Jodeci 94 “Hold My Mule”: Shirley Caesar 103 Kinston Calling: Maceo Parker 105 “Rough Side of the Mountain”: The Reverend F. C. Barnes 108 6. The American Folk Revival Comes to North Carolina: Doc Watson 109 Carrying It Forward: David Holt 113 “The Coo Coo Bird”: Clarence “Tom” Ashley 119 The Spark: Tift Merritt 124 7. Breaking Color Lines at the Beach: The Embers and Beach Music 126 Dominoes to Drifters: Clyde McPhatter and Ben E. King 128 The Pioneer: Jimmy Cavallo 137 8. The Eight-Track Era of Rock and Roll: Nantucket’s Long Way to the Top 143 Brothers of the Road: Sidewinder, Cry of Love 146 “Deliverance”: Corrosion of Conformity 151 Power Ballads: FireHouse 156 9. Combo Corner: Mitch Easter’s Winston-Salem 158 Your Sorry Ever After: The Connells 159 Time Capsule: Greetings from Comboland, Volumes 1–3 169 “Shape Up, Firm Up, Tone Up”: The Cosmopolitans 172 10. Chapel Hill: The “Next Seattle” Era 175 The New Frontier: WXYC and alt.music.chapel-hill 177 The University of North Carolina’s Hollywood Outpost: Peyton Reed, Dave Burris 187 “Carolina in My Mind”: James Taylor 193 11. How to Make It in the Music Business without Really Trying: Colonial, Sugar Hill, and Merge Records 197 “Yep Roc Heresy”: Yep Roc Records 203 “Tobacco Road”: John D. Loudermilk 206 12. Y’alternative: The Rise of Americana 215 “God Almighty, It’s a Good Feeling: Lowriding as Experience”—Excerpt of Mike Taylor’s 2009 University of North Carolina Thesis 225 Electronic Music as Campfire Folk: Sylvan Esso 229 13. Salvation Songs: The Avett Brothers 231 Greenville Calling: Valient Thorr, Future Islands 237 “Such Jubilee”: Mandolin Orange 243 14. Songs of Immigrants and Emigrants: From Nina Simone to the Kruger Brothers 246 Jazz Men: Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane 250 “Rumble”: Link Wray 253 Asheville Calling: Robert Moog 257 Genius: Rhiannon Giddens 259 “Mademoiselle Mabry”: Betty Davis 262 “Take the ‘A’ Train”: Billy Strayhorn 263 15. Hip-Hop Goes to College: 9th Wonder and Little Brother 267 “The Choice Is Yours”: Black Sheep 269 “Raise Up”: Petey Pablo 278 Dreamville: J. Cole 279 16. Famous on Television: Scotty McCreery, Clay Aiken, Fantasia Barrino, and American Idol 284 Freakonomics: Stephen Dubner, John Darnielle 292 Epilogue: September 2013 299 Acknowledgments 302 Readings 304 Selected Discography 308 Index 312 A 312 B 312 C 314 D 315 E 316 F 316 G 317 H 318 I 319 J 319 K 320 L 320 M 321 N 323 O 323 P 323 Q 324 R 324 S 325 T 327 U 328 V 328 W 328 X 329 Y 329 Z 329 This text is a love letter to the artists, scenes, and sounds defining North Carolina's extraordinary contributions to American popular music. David Menconi spent three decades immersed in the state's music, where traditions run deep but the energy expands in countless directions. Menconi shows how working-class roots and rebellion tie North Carolina's Piedmont blues, jazz, and bluegrass to beach music, rock, hip-hop, and more. From mill towns and mountain coves to college-town clubs and the stage of American Idol, Blind Boy Fuller and Doc Watson to Nina Simone and Superchunk, Step It Up and Go celebrates homegrown music just as essential to the state as barbecue and basketball. Spanning a century of history from the dawn of recorded music to the present, and with sidebars and photos that help reveal the many-splendored glory of North Carolina's sonic landscape, this is a must-read for every music lover "This book is a love letter to North Carolina's popular music in all its many-splendored glory, from bluegrass, folk, and country to R & B, rock, and pop. Though the state's diverse music scenes have often operated in the shadows of better-known hubs for popular genres-New York, Los Angeles, Detroit, Nashville, Austin, and Athens, Georgia-David Menconi shows North Carolina's influence on American popular music runs deep. He uses profiles of artists and their role in creating or shaping genres to reveal the richness of the state's musical landscape, with an arc that runs from the origin of recorded music in the state to the digital age"-- Provided by publisher