Lightnin' Hopkins_ His Life and Blues - Alan Govenar [113]
When your brother’s way over in Viet Nam?”
I told her, “He may get lucky and win some money
Before he die, he may bring some money home”
Logan was relieved to finish the session, though he realized he might need to do some overdubbing before the LP was released. But when he prepared to leave the studio, he saw the drummer who had been fired waiting near the door. “We were standing shoulder to shoulder, and Lightnin’ stepped in between us … and Wild Child said later, ‘Man, you almost bought the farm there because the guy had a knife.’ I never saw a knife … but Lightnin’ soothed him over.”32 In addition to the problems getting the drummer right, Logan also had difficulty getting Lightnin’ to sign a contract. “I had publishing contracts and recording contracts for Lightnin’ to sign,” Logan remembers, “and I said, ‘Look, man, I got the money, but I’m not going to give it to you unless you’re going to sign this contract.’ So what he did, he gave me the contract and he signed it with an X. Well I knew what to do when somebody signed it with an X, I had my witnesses sign and say that’s his signature.” But then Logan noticed that he carried a notebook around with him. “He had a list of songs written down, and in there he told me was every song that he had ever recorded since he first started recording. And who he recorded it for. And he had everything that he had recorded for us.”33 While Lightnin’ may have written down his songs in the notebook he was carrying, it seems likely that someone else, perhaps Antoinette or Harold, had helped him. He certainly was able to sign his name if he wanted to, as evidenced by other documents that exist from years earlier. By signing with an X he was simply expressing his refusal to abide by any contracts presented to him.
After Lightnin’s session with Logan, he spent much of his time during 1968 in Houston, though he did play at the Vulcan Gas Company in Austin on February 23 and 24, and in Los Angeles at the Ash Grove on April 4 and July 24–28. He was also invited to participate in the Smithsonian Institution’s Second Annual Festival of American Folklife, held on the Mall from July 3 to July 7, and for which Mack McCormick was hired as fieldworker and was likely the main coordinator of Texas talent. By this time, Lightnin’ had little, if anything, to do with McCormick, though McCormick was responsible for Lightnin’s booking at the Festival. Lightnin’ appeared on a program on Sunday night, July 7, that also showcased two of McCormick’s other main discoveries, Mance Lipscomb and barrelhouse pianist Robert Shaw, in addition to the Baca Orchestra, a group of Czech-Americans from Fayetteville, Texas.34
The scope of Lightnin’s touring expanded in 1969. The Dallas Museum of Fine Arts presented him in a program with John Lomax Jr. on March 7 and 8, and in May he traveled to California, where he recorded an album for the Vault label in Los Angeles that was produced by Bruce Bromberg. At the time, Bromberg was working in sales for California Record Distributors, a company that was owned by Ralph Kaffel and Jack Lewerke, who also started Vault as their own independent label.
Bromberg had seen Lightnin’ at the Ash Grove, and finally met him through Long Gone Miles, who most people considered his protégé. According to Ed Pearl, “Luke ‘Long Gone’ Miles [a young black singer] appeared on Lightnin’s doorstep in Houston a long while back, and Lightnin’ wanted to close the door. And Luke proceeded to just go to sleep on his doorstep…. He was a real country guy. So Lightnin’ took a fancy to him and let him hang around and he was a good singer, and Lightnin’ sometimes let him perform with him on stage. And when Lightnin’ came to L.A. by himself, he often stayed at Long Gone’s house.”35
Bromberg got to know Long Gone because he admired his singing and wanted him to join his own band. “One time,” Bromberg said, “me and my friend Walker were rehearsing at Long Gone’s house and Lightnin’ was there. That was kind of scary. Mostly he was sleeping. He was sleeping on a couch. He had his hat over his eyes and we