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"Ed King’s last gig": This week's newspaper column


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Ed King’s last gig

You’ve heard Ed King’s guitar work. He’s the musician who did the crisp, kick-off guitar line on Lynyrd Skynyrd’s  anthemic  “Sweet Home Alabama,” a song that he co-wrote.

Moreover, if you were a teenager in the Sixties, you also heard King in 1967. He was the lead guitarist for the Strawberry Alarm Clock, which had a Number One hit called “Incense and Peppermints.” Sporting Indian outfits and love beads in publicity photos, the S.A.C., an L.A.-based aggregation, epitomized the commercialization of so-called psychedelic music beyond the genre’s birthplace in San Francisco.

King was in Lynyrd Skynyrd through that band’s first three albums, and returned for several years when the band reunited in the late Eighties. When he left again, health problems were cited. His battle with heart disease was public knowledge, and in 2011, he underwent a successful heart transplant.

Retired and living in Nashville, King would occasionally make trips to the Delta area of Mississippi. Although he didn’t consider himself a blues player, he acknowledged  and appreciated the birthplace of the blues as an important geographical area of American music history.

And the last time Ed went to the Delta, a fellow guitarist who’d been in another notable Sixties rock band traveled with him.

Mark Landon had played lead guitar for the Music Machine, a band that had a unique aesthetic—again, it helps to remember it was the Sixties—in that the members wore all black outfits (including black gloves on their right hands) and dyed their hair black…and they were supposed to dress this way not just onstage, but anytime they were out in public.

The Music Machine had charted with “Talk Talk” a few months before “Incense and Peppermints” had been released.

The two guitarists hooked up a half-century after they’d gotten to know each other during their initial success, traveling to an important site in the heartland of American music in 2017. They were accompanied on their sojourn by Ed’s wife Sharon, Austin guitarist Andrew Cohen, and Delta blues historian Scott Coopwood, who served as their guide.

 Among the places the musicians visited were Clarksdale’s Delta Blues Museum and the Ground Zero  blues club, co-owned by Morgan Freeman. That town is also the home of the “traditional” Crossroads, a legendary intersection of Highways 61 and 49 where bluesman Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul.

 There’s also a dirt road elsewhere that some blues authorities consider to have been the real Crossroads, and the visitors made a pilgrimage to that site as well, where Landon was photographed kicking a bucket (since this was a “bucket list” trip for him).

“Ed may not have used the term ‘bucket list’,” Landon averred, “but I sure did! I’d had a quadruple bypass last year; it kind of sharpened my focus.”

Other sites included the B.B. King Museum and gravesite in Indianola, but it was a jam session at the Ground Zero club in Clarksdale that would ultimately become memorable for sorrowful reasons, as it would be the last time Ed King played in a public venue.

Landon had played with the Ike & Tina Turner Revue following his stint in the Music Machine, and had gigged at a now-demolished club in Clarksdale. He recalled hearing gunfire on that occasion, noting “I could swear (a bullet) flew right past my left ear; I’ll never know for sure.”

Accordingly, the ex-Music Machine guitarist considered the jam session to be a bit of a time warp experience. Moreover, Landon confirmed that King had an evocative-yet-not-necessarily-bluesy guitar style.

“I don't think people realize how good a guitarist Ed really was,” he said. “He had terrific technique, and a great ear; he told me he wasn't a blues guitarist and yet I could hear the emotion in his playing.

“Ed seemed in fine spirits and in good health considering what he had gone through a just a few years before,” said Landon. “I honestly had no inkling of any serious health issue. We all enjoyed each other's company and had a wonderful time making a lot of great memories and new friends.”

Soon after the Delta pilgrimage, King was diagnosed with a malignancy. He passed away in late August of 2018.

It’s ironic that the veteran guitarist’s last live collaboration was in an out-of-the-way club that featured the kind of music that he didn’t think he played too well. The occasion was, however, loose, fun and meaningful.

Maybe that means the Ground Zero jam was a worthwhile venue for Ed King’s final performance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Landon sent me some images from the sojourn but not surprisingly there's wasn't any room for an example to printed on the op-ed page w/ the commentary. Thought I'd post one from the Ground Zero jam and Landon's kick-the-bucket photo at the dirt/reportedly-authentic Crossroads here.

Ground Zero.jpg

dirt crossroads.jpg

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On 1/5/2019 at 8:02 AM, Willie G. Moseley said:

Landon sent me some images from the sojourn but not surprisingly there's wasn't any room for an example to printed on the op-ed page w/ the commentary. Thought I'd post one from the Ground Zero jam and Landon's kick-the-bucket photo at the dirt/reportedly-authentic Crossroads here.

Ground Zero.jpg

dirt crossroads.jpg

Now that I see the picture, I just put two and two together. Mark Landon lives here in the Austin area and is a regular at the jams around town. I had heard that he was "somebody" back in the day but had no idea he was really "SOMEBODY". This is cool. 

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Very cool. I love the delta! You can just feel the blues everywhere there....In some ways it is like stepping back in time...

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RE Landon: He was an award-winning makeup artist in L.A. for decades, and when he retired he moved to Austin. Here's a not-so-large image of the Music Machine that shows off their collective aesthetic. Landon's on the right w/ a Guild thinline single-cut. The bass player with the Eko violin-style instrument is Keith Olson, who went on to become a mega-producer/sound engineer for the likes of Fleetwood Mac, Ozzy, the Grateful Dead and many others.

250px-The_Music_Machine.png

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                                             Great article! I understand most if not all of Ed Kings guitar collection that was for sale at Carter's Vintage Guitars has been sold......................the "BIG BURST", Kings "REDEYE" 1959 Gibson Les Paul Sunburst was bought by Jason Isbell.

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On 1/7/2019 at 4:34 PM, ARM OF HAMER said:

                                             Great article! I understand most if not all of Ed Kings guitar collection that was for sale at Carter's Vintage Guitars has been sold......................the "BIG BURST", Kings "REDEYE" 1959 Gibson Les Paul Sunburst was bought by Jason Isbell.

There's still some left. Buy! Buy! Buy!! :blink:  https://cartervintage.com/collections/ed-king-collection

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5 hours ago, kizanski said:

There are several Left Nut guitars in that collection.
I wonder what the '59 'Burst went for.

                                                                                                      They were asking 650K! :o

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3 hours ago, Steve Haynie said:

Ed King had a Les Paul that was stolen and recovered.  Was that the $650K guitar? 

                                     Yes! It was, Billionaire "BURST" collector DIRK ZIFF had it in his collection......................and it was returned to King after it was proved it was his stolen guitar. Ziff bought it legit..................he did not know it was "HOT" in more ways than one. Don't worry...................Dirk has a few left.RHRqWIA.jpg

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Those three screw necks were generally looked down upon.  If that one had not been used on such an iconic song it would not be so expensive.  So, one has to wonder about what someone would pay if the guitar used for that recording was a Japanese guitar made in 1973.  The mandolin played by Ray Jackson on Rod Stewart's Maggie May was a Japanese-made "Columbus" acoustic-electric mandolin with a metal adjustable bridge and a flat back.  If it ever went up for sale, how much would the asking price be?

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