Customer Reviews

King of the Queen City: The Story of King Records (Music in American Life)

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I could almost smell Syd's cheap cigar and hear his raspy voice while reading this very informative and entertaining book ! While immersing myself in every chapter , I would listen to one of King's recording artists on my turntable and pretend I was in the studio with Freddie, Ralph, Grampa and others.. Would recommend this to any lover of true American music...! Absolutely.. ! ! " Shameless' James

Here are some of the DEEP roots of American music. Any label that can present both the Stanley Brothers and James Brown deserves a serious look and JHF has done a good job at explaining the story of King Records and the one man behind it - Syd Nathan. Now, Syd had a lot of help, as Fox explains, but he was the foundation of it all and one of the great characters in a business full of eccentrics. There are some chapters that are stronger than others, but the last one detailing the Meaning of King Records is some of the best and most informative writing about the music business that you'll find anywhere. This chapter should be excerpted for any serious anthology of music writing. A very entertaining book and one that would be perfect for anyone looking to discover the roots of Americana. Highly Recommended.

Shame on the big boys for not having the guts to give music lovers what they wanted. The major recording labels tried to pretend that whites weren't listening to black oriented music back in the forties and early fifties. Most music fans know Sam Phillips proved them wrong with his Sun Records in Memphis since that's what launched Elvis Presley on the road to stardom. Far fewer ever heard of Syd Nathan whose King Records in Cincinnati played a major role in the growth of rhythm and blues into a widely accepted genre and also recorded major country stars on the day. King later was noted its two awesome bluegrass groups, the Stanley Brothers and Don Reno and Red Smiley. Besides the music, this book offers a look at a company whose behind the scenes workers were fully integrated in a city long known for its southern biases. Like many successful people, Syd Nathan was successful because of his keen sense of public taste and his hard work. His individualism also led to mistakes that held King and its artists back. The most important player in the King game was Henry Glover, an African-American who produced some of the outstanding country artists at a time when that was unheard of. His involvement in the recording of the Delmore Brothers classic "Blues Stay Away From Me" warned us that change was coming and rock'n'roll was just around the corner whether the establishment liked it or not. It's good that the King story has finally been told. I think old Syd would like it.

Though the King and Federal labels changed American culture and music in ways that many of us barely realize, I find it fascinating how rare it is to hear their names actually dropped these days... say in comparison to Chess and Stax... The reason perhaps, is alluded to in the book, when we realize that no matter how big the label got, really it was a one man operation - - the brain child of the flamboyant Syd Nathan... the label died with him, but a great deal of its stars, artists, producers and behind the scenes people when on to greater heights... at best, as hall-of-fame inductees, and at... well, most surprising to me... cast of Hee Haw membership (KING also produced "hillbilly" music.) - - Needless to say, as far as I'm concerned KING will forever be best remembered for: James Brown, Hank Ballard, Billy Ward and The Dominos, Earl Bostic and Bill "Honky Tonk" Doggett (without whom, I and any other Hammond player wouldn't be playing the Hammond today, even with Jimmy Smith!)

As for my key criticisms of the book... it would have been great if the publisher got together with COLLECTIBLES (the folks who now have the rights to the King Catalogue) and issued a CD with listening material as well as interview excerpts (fancy thinking though) and although the writing is very good, the book is often repetitive and the narrative is fascinating and draws you in, but sometimes more has the tone of an enthusiastic collector who's done his research and is simply walking you through his collection, rattling out informed facts in the process... at times there seems to be a slight lack of a cohesive narrative - - on the other hand, the author is a sober minded fact checker - - for example, often he'll present the stories of the people he interviewed, but then mention the facts and probabilities behind their stories... in doing so, he manages to walk a great line between being "academically prudent" and a skillful story teller.

Some other comments:
Like many people, I discovered those old King records in a stack in my father's basement... Their existence in my parents' basement surprised me because my father never seemed like an R&B type, but he told me that his father had a store and a guy with a truck used to bring them, so eventually he wound up with the whole collection... The book tells the story of the truck - - and why it made King so unique. (My Grandfather ran a small store that sold pens and office equipment, so Syd Nathan must have had his local's using their revolutionary self contained sales system to connect with fellow Jewish merchants - - not just the big record stories.)
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Another reviewer also pointed out the fact that an actual discography would have been nice... Still... why complain... at least someone got around to telling the story of raspy voice, cigar smoking temperamental yet visionary father figure Sid Nathan (who I first read about in James Brown's great autobiography.)
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My all time favorite King recording, incidentally is Chris Columbus's OH YEAH (featuring Johnny Hammond Smith on organ) - - and my favorite chapter is the one on white hipster Ralph Bass, who ran the subsidiary Federal label and who started out as a Bebop producer on Savoy.
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The number of people at the label who went on to become major record industry behind-the-scene movers, despite the traditional falling out with Sid was amazing...
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The book avoids the pitfall of making making it entirely the James Brown Show... though arguably their greatest legacy, the book offers equal play time to many of the artists, including the Country and Western ones who I never heard of but now have a sudden interest in.
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In conclusion... King lovers... lovers of classic blues, R&B, jump blues, country and Western, rock and roll and American music in general... your time has come... someone has finally gotten around to telling the story... now let's hope for a big big big boxed set re-issue !

This is a very good book for anyone interested in American music of the 1940s and 1950s and the transition of "vernacular music" from R&B, Blues and Hillbilly to Soul, Rock and Country. It's also must reading for anyone deeply interested in the history of race relations in the U. S. in this time period; King provides an excellent (though unfortunately atypical) "case study", well described in the book.

The author seems more into the R&B, Blues and Soul side of King than the Hillbilly and Country side. His writing seems to me more vivid and personal when talking about the former; when talking about the latter, I got the sense that he had to do some reading, listening and interviewing to write his book, and I disagree with his take on the importance of several of the musicians mentioned, most notably Don Reno.

There's nothing wrong with that. I have the Hillbilly and Country stuff more in my bones and, though I was pleased at the inclusion of some of my favorite obscure artists, like Jimmie Widener, I was disappointed by the omission of others, like Red Perkins. I suspect that Fox is better at the Blues and R&B arcana than the Hillbilly & Country arcana, but cannot say for sure, because of my own limitations on other side. There's an irony here: what was unique at King was the extent of crossover between Black and White on each others' sessions. At King, there was a long incubation together, not a transfer of styles from Black to White, as at Sun. One doubts that Henry Glover or Sid Nathan "specialized" in their knowledge of one side or the other. They imbibed them both and probably knew them both about equally well at the time. We 21st-century roots geeks, on the other hand, tend to gravitate toward one side or the other, even while we so highly praise and even revere the fact that at King, they were not only equal, but also not separate.

For me, the best part of the book is not the side that I know more about, but the side I know less about. There are a bunch of King R&B and Blues artists, and even Rock artists, that I will now go seek out. I expect that most people who are knowledgeable about one aspect of King or the other will have the same experience: maybe if you know all about Blues and R&B on King, you'll be tempted to check out a Moon Mullican CD. But you'll probably still wish the author had said more about the lesser-known King artists that you already know and love.

I cannot agree with the reviewers who wish that a discography had been included. As the author points out in the Preface, the discography, a 900-page pair of tomes by Michel Ruppli, is already available. You can get it on Amazon, but I regret to say that its already high price went up when the Fox book came out. Also, the sessionography (list of musicians) is more complete for the R&B, Blues, Soul and Rock stuff than for the Hillbilly stuff. This might just be an accident of chronology: the Hillbilly stuff started being recorded earlier, and maybe the sessions were not as well documented. So sometimes we have to resort to external research and a good ear to identify personnel on the Hillbilly sessions. But it is what it is.

Great history of King Records in Cincinnati - one of the largest and most influential Indie labels post WWII. Country, gospel, blues, R&B, and soul - they did it all. Highly recommended.

Another well written easy to digest book. King had a very wide scope of genres & Artists. the writing gives good details and ties & History. Good book to own.

King is a very important label. That's for sure. Not only was it pioneering both blues/R&B and country, it was getting their artists to mix up both. Some of the highlights on the label:

Moon Mullican: along with Jerry Lee Lewis, my favorite artist of all time. His work on King is arguably his best. Classics range from out and out blues like "Trouble trouble" and "Triflin' woman blues" to tender ballads like "There's a chill on the hill tonight" and "I was sorta wondering" to gospel ("Bye & Bye") to rock 'n' roll ("7 nights to rock", "I'm mad with you"). Indeed,some tracks like the R&B "Rocket to the moon" can be considered among the first rock 'n' roll records - before the rock 'n' roll conscious "7 nights" was done. Also, the 1946 unissued "Let me rock you baby" says a lot. Moon's classic hits, though, were squarely country - "Sweeter than the flowers" (the only successful bluegrass song on the label - Moon had another bluegrass local hit with "The leaves mustn't fall" though "Flowers" was the only national one) and "I'll sail my ship alone".

James Brown: Way before Brown became the commercial King of Funk/1st discoman with one-liner songs like "Get up offa that thang dance and you'll feel better", he was on King and other small labels cutting classic gospel-R&B hybrids - and it is this what people should remember. His Federal material like "Please please please", "Think" and "Try me" and his "Live at the Appollo" concert would not have been possible without his initial King work. James Brown's 1950s and early 1960s work is excellent and his King material is where it all started.

R&B: Roy Brown, Wynonie Harris, Bullmoose, all these were excellent. Brown's "Good rockin' tonight" and "Grandpa stole my baby" have become major rock 'n' roll standards and Brown's originals of these and others like "Midnight boogie", "Mighty mighty man" and "Love don't love nobody" are more candidates for early rock 'n' roll. With Wyonie Harris covering blues songs from country artists such as "Triflin' woman blues", the lines between R&B and country were really blurred. Lucky Millinder also did some great material as did Todd Rhodes (Rhodes recorded "Rocket 69" also known as "Rocket to the moon", once again another R&B country crossover song).

Delmore Brothers: A thing called Hillbilly boogie took off in the late 1940s. There were many pioneers: Red Foley and Hank Snow were two heavy hitters. But, King had two of the other main ones. Moon Mullican was one (his "Cherokee boogie" was a major country boogie hit) and the Delmores were the other. In the 1930s and early 1940s, the Delmores produced oldtime hillbilly bluegrass music and their early King work was among the best of this type of material (but King did not like this and did not promote it). The other thing the Delmores were great at were blues and boogie and "Blues stay away" became a major hit. "Mobile boogie", "Rounder blues" and the like all are more candidates for early rock 'n' roll and if Moon Mullican foresaw piano based rock 'n' roll like Jerry Lee Lewis, certainly the Delmores did the same for Carl Perkins and early Elvis Presley rockabilly style music. However, their oldtime country like "Someday you'll pay" is also lovely.

The only material on the label I am not too fond of is their later bluegrass. The Stanley Brothers are among my favorite artists but I much prefer their work on Mercury. Their King work is less bluegrassy and I read Syd Nathan deliberately made it so. I guess that the reason was that this music did not sell (see earlier description of Delmores). King wanted their music to reach towards the future and not the past. Bluegrass always looked towards the past and bluegrass artists tended to do better on other labels. Reno & Smiley the same. Still, a great label though. 100%.

I guess people try to give a history on Syd Nathan's King Records and although true, I feel a lot more information could have been added. There was no discography. The locations of all King branches and his Royal Plastics plants should have been included.This was a superficial job.