Macon Whoopee The Old Grey Whistle Test

OK, the noise that you can hear in the background is the noise generated by a 747 jumbo jet,

as we fly across the Atlantic on our way to Macon, Georgia,

to join the people there from the Capricorn record label.

The reason that we are going is to film the Capricorn picnic,

which is a yearly event in Macon,

which is really a party which joins up all the people involved in the label,

the executives from the record company, as well as the bands themselves.

We'll be filming the bands that appear at the concert there,

Elvin Bishop, Marshall Tucker among them.

We don't entirely know what to expect, but we are on the way,

looking forward to it, and what you see next, presumably, will be what we get when we are there.

RADIO CHATTER

CONCERT CROWD CHEERING

So the first thing I must do is introduce myself to you.

My name is Bob Harris, I'm from London in England,

and what's more, to make me even more English,

I'm from BBC Television there in London.

We are here for two reasons.

The first of all is that Southern music...

We love Southern music, and we wanted to come down and see it...

CHEERING

And because of that, the second reason,

and that is that we are filming the concert to take back

and show to the British people on the Old Grey Whistle Test,

which is the programme we have come down to film for.

So all that remains for me to do

is to say that you are going to have an incredible time.

Welcome, Wet Willie!

MUSIC: "Baby Fat" by Wet Willie

# Have you heard the news

# Talk is goin' around, yeah

# Let me tell you people

# Just what is goin' down now

# Well, it sure is easy

# To get yourself in touch, yes it is

# You better be careful, yeah

# Every time you touch

# Every time you touch

# Baby fat

# That's where it's at

# Talkin 'bout baby fat

# Let me tell you that's where it's at

# Ohhhhh, hey, yeah

# Hey there, little schoolgirl

# My, you sure look sweet

# My, you sure look sweet

# I'll give you some of my candy

# If you come on home with me

# Come on home with me, yeah

# Don't tell your papa

# What we're gonna do

# What we're gonna do

# They'll put me in the jail house Yes they will

# For the crime of lovin' you

# Just for lovin' you

# Baby fat

# That's where it's at

# Talking 'bout baby fat

# Let me tell you that's where it's at

# Break it down

# Baby

# Fat

# People try to warn me

# But I won't take their advice

# I won't take their advice

# It might get me in trouble

# But Lord, it sure is nice

# Lord, it sure is nice

# When I look around me Yeah, yeah, yeah

# And I see a sweet young thing

# See a sweet young thing

# Well, my heart just starts a'jumpin'

# And I just have to sing I just have to sing

# Baby fat

# Let me tell you that's where it's at

# Talking 'bout baby fat

# Tell you that's where it's at

# Baby fat

# That's where it's at

# Baby fat

# That's where it's at

# Baby fat

# Baby fat

# Baby fat

# Baby, baby! #

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Thank you!

It's also a tremendous pleasure to introduce one of my favourite bands.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Marshall Tucker Band!

MUSIC: "Blue Ridge Mountain Road" by the Marshall Tucker Band

# It's a lonesome road

# And a hard way to live

# But it's the only life that I know

# I meet some people I travel around

# But home's always the best place to go

# It's a lonesome feeling in my mind

# A feeling that I can't seem to leave behind

# Carolina's where I'm at And I'll always hang my hat

# Under those Blue Ridge Mountain skies

# I got me a woman back home

# She gave me a baby, too

# And she stands by my loving side

# And does anything I ask her to

# It's a lonesome feeling in my mind

# A feeling I can't seem to leave behind

# Carolina's where I'm at And I'll always hang my hat

# Under those Blue Ridge Mountain skies

# There's an old man sittin' in a rockin' chair

# He's got the best beagle dog in the county I've been told

# But his shotgun done got too rusty

# That 'ole beagle dog he done grown a little too old

# As he stares up into heaven

# I'm sure I know the reason why

# He's thinking about that promised land

# In them Blue Ridge Mountain skies

# It's a lonesome feeling in my mind

# A feeling I can't seem to leave behind

# Carolina's where I'm at And I'll always hang my hat

# Under those Blue Ridge Mountain skies

# Blue Ridge Mountain skies. #

MUSIC: "Ramblin' Man" by the Allman Brothers Band

# I was born a ramblin' man

# Tryin' to make a livin' and doin' the best I can

# And when it's time for leavin' I hope you'll understand

# That I was born a ramblin' man

# My father was a gambler down in Georgia

# And he wound up on the wrong end of a gun

# And I was born... #

How you doing? We're on the Interstate number 16.

And we are heading up now from Charleston, South Carolina,

which is where we were yesterday.

We were filming down there, as you know, the Marshall Tucker Band and Wet Willie.

We are on our way up now to Macon, Georgia, to join the Capricorn Picnic.

With me in the truck here is Carl,

who's an engineer from the studio down in Miami,

and we'll be learning more about that in just a few minutes' time.

And Carl is Carl Richardson, out of Criteria Sound Studios in Miami.

Engineer to Eric Clapton and co-producer to the Bee Gees.

It always interests me, the crossover from one side of the Atlantic to the other,

because so many people in America say it is great to get that British sound,

and working and living in London, everybody, or most people anyway,

very much enjoy the American sound.

But I understand that there is a big standardisation going on in studio sounds in America?

Westlake, particularly.

Yes, there is.

-We're not at Westlake studio.

-No, I know that.

But there is, yes.

I still believe there are three different philosophies in recording.

There are the European, or mostly the London sounds.

There is the east coast of America sound, the New York sound,

more or less, Miami criteria, southern sound.

There is the West Coast sound - Los Angeles, San Francisco.

I still believe that those three philosophies of recording exist,

and you can pick it out in an awful lot of LPs that you buy today.

# ..Born a ramblin' man

# Lord, I was born A ramblin' man... #

I was conscious last time I was over of the East course being heavy metal and soul,

the West Coast being much more Orleans, you know,

I was aware of that difference.

You just scared me to death!

Oh, no, I'm having a hard time following your form of expression.

I think geography contributes a lot to it, especially in the South.

I think this one area that we're in as a well-defined, more or less,

sound, and its roots are really blues and country.

Of course, there's New Orleans jazz thrown in, which is lovely.

I think I want to go left.

Our first port of call was to a marvellous wood-built house

20 miles outside Macon, Georgia

to visit Dickey Betts of the Allman Brothers to talk with him

and to listen to and discover some of the roots of his own music.

# Love somebody And they don't love you

# There is nothing you can say

# You don't want to go But you're leaving anyway

# Well, her beauty Took me by surprise

# She was the woman of my dreams

# Could not see beyond her eyes

# She turned round and left me Somewhere in between

# There ain't nothing You can do... #

'Very young, I remember the radio, sitting on the kitchen window

'and sitting there as a little child and Hank Williams would be singing.

'He was such a powerful artist, Hank Williams,

he's an immortal artist here in this country.'

And, uh...

That has influenced my lyrics and singing style.

Jimmie Rodgers, of course, goes back into the '30s.

Jimmie Rodgers was called the father of country music.

And he's influenced me quite a lot.

# Something about you, Mama

# Sure gave me the blues

# Something about you, Mama

# Sure gave me the blues

# It ain't your drop-stitch stockings

# It ain't your blue buckle shoes

# Yodel-eh-hee-ooh-eh-eeh

# Oh-dee-yodel-eh-hee

# I got me a pretty mama

# Got a bulldog, too

# I got me a pretty mama

# Got a bulldog, too

# But my pretty mama don't love me

# But my bulldog do

# Yodel-eh-hee-oh

# Yodel-eh-hee-hey

# Yodel-eh-hee... #

GUITAR PICKING

Hey-hey.

That's the short version.

And, then the old blues style

that would go along with the Jimmie Rodgers period, you know,

would be, uh, Blind Willie McTell, who played slide 12-string guitar.

In fact, Blind Willie McTell wrote Statesboro Blues.

And Robert Johnson, he's another, just genius, player.

Of course, he played solo, he didn't have any band, just guitar and himself.

He wrote Crossroads, which Cream had.

That sort of thing, you know?

And Willie McTell played... Willie played kind of pretty,

Robert was real scary sounding, you know, with his stuff,

and very energetic.

Willie played... Willie McTell wrote Statesboro Blues.

He played more like, uh...

On a 12-string.

That's... That's the base of just about all of American music, those two.

When we arrived in Macon, we met the man who began working with Otis Redding,

formed a record label with the money he made,

and with it created one of the strongest label identities in the world.

The label is Capricorn, its owner Phil Walden,

and we met up to see one of Macon's historical musical areas.

The building we're standing in front was known as Anne's Tic Toc,

which was the location that Little Richard performed

many, many times in the early days of his career.

As a matter of fact, legend has it the song Miss Anne

is purportedly written about Anne who owned the bar, and, uh...

..according to Little Richard, raised him during the early days.

This would be around, this would be in the late '50s,

and from that, well, Little Richard was pretty much

the first to emerge in the area,

then James Brown, Otis Redding, and then the rock era

we of course had the Allmans and Wet Willie and Marshall Tucker.

The theatre we're approaching, the Douglass Theatre, goes way back.

It has a whole lot of black history wrapped up in that location.

It goes back to the old black vaudevillian days and whatnot.

It's my understanding that Bessie Smith played here.

A lot of the greats of that era.

How did you get involved, yourself?

Well, I was a fan, primarily,

and I wanted to be a singer, and I couldn't sing,

so the next step was to become involved in some fashion,

and I met some guys that wanted to form a singing group, black guys.

And they were having an amateur contest

every Saturday morning

here for the live broadcast.

And this one entertainer kept beating my group out,

and the entertainer was Otis Redding,

so I had a one and one and made two.

So I approached Otis Redding

about getting involved with him

and we started a relationship

-which lasted for something like 12 years.

-Yeah, cos this is the Douglass Theatre right here.

This is where I would come to find musicians, when I needed musicians.

They'd be in the pool room or the barber shop and, in latter days,

that whole concept of a stage show was sort of fading.

Black music had a broader base.

It moved up to the City Auditorium.

That was where I first saw Little Richard perform.

And where I really became a real fan, started going to the black shows.

-Phil, thanks very much indeed.

-Thank you.

-We'll see you at the Picnic.

MUSIC: "Jessica" by The Allman Brothers Band

I'll be cooking all night till tomorrow, midday tomorrow.

See, I'll be cooking all the way through the picnic,

sending them backwards and forth.

At the last hand, I'll come out.

OK, we've just left the hotel

on our way now to the Capricorn Picnic itself.

-With me here is Billy Jo.

-Yeah.

What are we going to expect when we get there?

I don't know. I ain't never been there before.

OK, we've just arrived now at Lakeside for the Capricorn Picnic.

We're going to get off the bus and join everybody just down there.

Governor Carter. First of all, thank you very much

for sparing the time to speak with me today.

-I know that you are very interested in rock music.

-Yes, I am.

I'm not only interested in it, what it signifies in our society,

but also I enjoy it.

In addition to that, I have a close friendship

with some of the performing groups

and have been helped greatly by them during the campaign.

We have a strict limit on how much any one person can contribute

to the campaign, but actually some of the recording groups

have helped me a lot.

How much of an influence do you feel rock music is,

as a cultural influence in America today?

Well, I think it's had a profound influence during times

of difficult social change

in the Vietnamese war and in the civil rights movement,

in the struggle concerning the environment,

in the desire of young people to let their voices be heard

more effectively in the political world.

In all these ways, people like Bob Dylan

and Simon And Garfunkel, The Allman Brothers and others,

have expressed in clear terms

to the young people a basic philosophy

I think of enlightenment and compassion,

the alleviation of racial discrimination,

a search for peace, the worth of a human being.

It's had a profound effect on the consciousness

not only of young people but of old people like me.

LAUGHTER

LAUGHTER

-How's it going, pal?

-I'm all right, yeah. Listen, first of all, Elvin,

-let's take you back to your own roots in music.

-Uh-huh.

How did you first get involved in rock and roll music?

Well actually, I started off as being kind of like a real blues fan

and enthusiast, you know. I didn't want to play anything but blues

for the first five years that I played.

I'm from Tulsa, Oklahoma

and when I was about 17, I went to Chicago. That's when I first started

playing guitar. I went to Chicago because I heard there was a blues scene there.

And there was and I just dove into it. I loved it.

At that time, I didn't want to hear nothing but blues.

All the rest of the music was BS to me, you know.

-How did you get involved with Paul Butterfield?

-I met him in Chicago.

I met him the first day I got there.

He was sitting down on some steps, playing a guitar.

He played guitar before the harmonica,

and I played harmonica before the guitar.

But we gradually found out what was best for us, you know.

I played with his band for about four or five years.

As a matter of fact, I was in England with Butterfield,

-I think in '68 or '69.

-I remember.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

-The tour with Eric Burdon.

-That's right.

Georgie Fame and a bunch of other people.

After that, I started... You know, I grew up in Oklahoma

so naturally I get up in the morning, go to school

and there'd be country and western on the TV every morning.

So I knew about that. After a while, I started saying "Wait a minute.

"I don't live on no plantation on the Mississippi

"and I've never picked no cotton.

"Is this really the music that really suits my personality?"

So I decided to just lay back and if I got to write a song,

just let it come out like it wanted

and not worry about what classification it would fall into.

# Hold on, I'm coming

# Oh, hold on, cos I'm coming

# I'm on my way, I'm your lover

# If you get cold, babe I'm gonna be your cover

# You don't have to worry cos I'm here

# Ain't no need for suffering, baby

# Cos I'm here, oh yeah

# Hold on, cos I'm coming

# Hold on, cos I'm coming

# O-oh, hold on, I'm coming

# O-oh, hold on, babe... #

I took a band out of mine

from Los Angeles on the road.

We stayed out about 12 weeks and did the old every night, you know.

Six nights a week, two shows a night, from here to New York.

No manager, nothing, you know.

No agent. We did it ourselves with the help of Ike Turner.

And, er...

By the time we got to New York, we were just monsters.

# Yes, I seen you with that girl and I caught you in a lie

# You think if you hurt me that I'll go away

# Well, I made it up in my mind that I'm here to stay

# So tell her I'm never gonna give you up

# No matter how you treat me

I'm never gonna give you up

# So don't think of leaving me

# Don't you understand what you're doing to this woman

# Do you see these tears here in my eyes

# Ain't no use in lying cos I'm gonna cry, yeah

# You think you're gonna take me put me on a shelf

# Girl, I'd rather die than see you with somebody else

# So throw it outta your mind I'm not gonna leave you

# Though you grieve me and deceive me, I'll never leave

# Hey, don't you understand what you're doing to this woman? #

I've just been playing football.

We're just leaving now to go across town to Uncle Sam's

for the performance there later on of Stillwater.

There'll be a lot of people jamming on stage.

Hopefully we'll be seeing Dickey Betts.

You can probably hear the cars behind me leaving now, so let's go.

Thank you. Good night, everybody.

See you later, thanks a lot.

Whoo!

Whoo! Yes!

Whoo! Just like that, folks.

This is Michael Causey on guitar.

Whoo!

Yowl!

Yeah!

Whoo!

Way to go!

Thank you!

CROWD CHEERS

The music was fantastic and so was the atmosphere,

and I hope some of that feeling

has come across through this film, Macon Whoopee.

Whoo!

Yeah!

Yeah!

Ow!

# Well, they told me not to go

# It takes so much hate to get there

# Lord, I've just figured out

# We've got to all sob somewhere

# But I keep on trying

# I ain't got nothing left

# I can't help myself

# I often wonder why

# These old blues hurt so bad

# I've got every reason

# Crying

# Lord, man, I'll keep on trying

# I ain't got nothing left

# I just can't help myself

# Whoa, darling

# I just can't help myself

# The good Lord knows

# I don't want it

# But I can't help myself

# But it gets so hot

# I might wind up in a state, oh

# Oh, yeah... #

Yeah!

Yeah!

# Oh, yeah

# Oh, yeah, baby

# Oh, yeah

# Oh, baby

# Oh, yeah

# Oh, baby

# Ever since you've been gone

# I've been crying all night long

# It was you, not me that left

# Went away with someone else

# I'm tore up over you

# I just can't find my way

# And I cried When you walked out the door

# I said, "Baby, I can't cry no more"

# Oh, honey, why did you go?

# Leave me down on the killing floor

# I'm tore up over you

# I just can't find my way... #

Everybody, come on!

# I'm tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah

# I'm tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah

# Tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah

# Tore up

# Yeah

# Tore up over you

# And I just can't find my way

# Oh

# Tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah Tore up

# Whoo-hoo-hoo

# Tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah

# Tore up

# Yeah, yeah, yeah

# Tore up over you

# I just can't find my way. #

One more time.

Yeah!

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd