Tagging on the Leon Russell thread to mark the passing of another Southern piano player, the great Mose Allison who died yesterday at 89.
Mose was mentioned in a 2015 interview with Russell who described his music perfectly " The thing about Mose … the songs he sang were blues songs, but his piano playing was jazz, like Art Tatum or something. Very strange. I could never figure it out. All the songs he sang were blues and all the stuff he played was not." Allison's songs were widely covered by Russell ("Smashed"), The Clash ("Look Here") and The Who ("Young Man's Blues").
His thinnish, hipster, white boy tenor voice was the furthest thing possible from a Delta blues growler but his wit and phrasing made him a true original. His most popular stuff are short blues tunes released on Atlantic in the 60s but he was still able to say a lot in his relatively brief solo turns on piano.
You're sitting there yakkin' right in my face
I guess I'm gonna have to put you in your place
Y'know if silence was golden
You couldn't raise a dime
Because your mind is on vacation and your mouth is
Working overtime
You're quoting figures, you're dropping names
You're telling stories about the dames
You're always laughin' when things ain't funny
You try to sound like you're big money
If talk was criminal, you'd lead a life of crime
Because your mind is on vacation and your mouth is
Working overtime
You know that life is short and talk is cheap
Don't be making promises that you can't keep
If you don't like the song I'm singing, just grin and
Bear it
All I can say is if the shoe fits wear it
If you must keep talking please try to make it rhyme
'Cause your mind is on vacation and your mouth is working
Overtime
Mose loved green hills in summertime. Adirondacks, Catskills, Green & White mountains - he'd spend his summers at one, another or all and play piano anywhere his name would get him in. As a result, i met and bought him a drink several times - sweet man, class act, hiiiilarious, laidback duke of a man. RIP -