Faced with bankruptcy and prison, George Bailey shoots everybody at the building & loan. Then he goes to his drafty old house and kills Mary and their four children. While mowing down the crowd at Martini's, George is taken out by Bert the cop. Old man Potter pockets the $8000, and everybody in Bedford Falls buys a gun. Clarence is cast into hell. The End.

29 December 2012

Review: Buy 'Hank Williams: Lost Concerts' for the history, not the music

By Zoomer Roberts \ Special to the El Paso Times

Time-Life's new "Hank Williams: The Lost Concerts Limited Collectors Edition" includes material taped at two shows in 1952, plus an earlier radio interview.

As a casual listening experience, the album leaves a lot to be desired. The sound is often distorted, and there are places where the tape apparently broke and pieces went missing when it was spliced back together.

But for those of us who want to know about Hank Williams' life and times, this is an enlightening historical document.

First of all, these aren't concerts. They're shows. Hank goes on stage, does 30 minutes, thanks us kindly, and ambles off to sign autographs. He does two or three shows a day.

We learn that Hank's touring band has been pared down from four men to just two: fiddler Jerry Rivers and steel guitarist Don Helms. Gone are Sammy Pruett and his "boop-bop" guitar and bassist Howard Watts. Hank's rhythm guitar figures more prominently in the mix, and local bass players are pressed into service. (By Hank's own admission, some work out better than others.) Hank, Don and Jerry sing trio on the gospel numbers.

Hank tells tall tales of riding out a flood on the roof of a hotel in Bald Knob, Ark.; informs the audience how to pronounce "jambalaya" and what its ingredients are; hawks songbooks; and explains that he and Luke the Drifter are one and the same person. He tells us that writing songs brings him more joy than anything else in life. He invites us to the Grand Ole Opry (from which he will soon be fired), and suggests that while we're in Nashville we visit his store, Hank Williams' Corral. It used to be Hank & Audrey's Corral, but they're divorced now. He never mentions her. Not once.

The disc ends with a noisy 1951 radio interview in which Hank and an old friend from his Alabama honky-tonk days -- who is now a disc jockey in Wichita -- talk about old times and new records. Hank tells him to come out to the house the next time he's in Nashville, and "we'll open a can of beans."

Herein is a legend made flesh: not a pitiful derelict at death's door, but a functioning, funny, personable performer. A treasure, for those so inclined.

Zoomer Roberts is a longtime El Paso country and folk musician.

The Man That Give Me That Awful Name

When I was 17, I started following a local Bluegrass/Rockabilly ersatz Rat Pack pair of drunks named Hal Smith and Henry Beebe, who called themselves the Shade Tree Boys. They did Bluegrass songs with a Johnny Cash beat, and alcohol-fueled x-rated comedy. They played in joints: the Jade Club, the King’s X, the Gaslight Lounge at Bowlero Lanes. My Spanish teacher, Randy Earl, used to go see them and he’d take me along and claim I was his son, which, had it been true, would have made me legal. Sometimes I would sit in.

They had been through a slew of bass players -- Richard ‘Pinchi Pancho’ Chorne, Herman Glop, Thumby Zee -- and in March of 1969 they had a guy named Vince Moya who had gotten so lackadaisical that he would sit on top of his amp and play bass with one hand and eat a cheeseburger with the other. Hal and Henry got drunk one afternoon and decided to fire Vince. But who would they get? How about the kid? Henry called me and asked if I played bass. Yes, I lied. Did I want the job? Yes again, but I had no equipment. Not to worry -- I could use the equipment Vince had been using, which was on loan from the Harmony Shop, which Henry managed. And so, for the last two months of high school, I was playing four nights a week. In joints.

Hal and Henry couldn’t remember my name, which I found rather insulting. They were toying with the idea of calling me Lightning or Speedy or Flash. One night Hal was introducing the band and when he got to me he said ‘This is our new bass player. His name is…uhhh… (off-mike) What the hell is your name?’ and I said ‘Yogi Zarch.’ ‘This is our new bass player, Yogi Zarts. We call him Zoomer Zarts.’ The audience thought it was a riot. So did Henry.

And that name has stuck! It even got used at our wedding (Do you, Zoomer, take this woman...) and when I was ordained as an elder in the Presbyterian Church. That’s my story.

Zoomer's Bar Years

In 1995, KTEP "Folk Fury" host Gregg Carthy aired a two-hour retrospective of my musical career. I provided him with records and tapes and a running commentary of their origins. It was supposed to be the first in a series of programs showcasing local musicians. To my knowledge, it was also the last. My friend Ken Smith taped the broadcast off the air. A dub of that tape was later transferred to CD. It is presented here in six twenty-minute segments for easy absorption.




Listen to part 1
Listen to part 2
Listen to part 3
Listen to part 4
Listen to part 5
Listen to part 6