Lightnin' Hopkins_ His Life and Blues - Alan Govenar [114]
For the Vault LP, “Lightnin’ recorded live [with his Gibson guitar and electric pickup], no overdubs. He sang and he played what he wanted, but I had some songs that I really liked by him. I’d say you know that one … you got one sorta like that? And he’d do it. He was a pleasure, he was a prince.”37
For the Vault LP title song, Lightnin’ made up “California Mudslide (and Earthquake)” on the spot, in which he bemoaned the torrential rains and the wrath of God. He reflected on his own life as a sinner: “Why you know I must be born by the devil, Po’ Lightnin’ don’t wanna be baptized,” but then asked for forgiveness:
You know, please, please, please, forgive me for my mistake
But after all that flood come in California, do you
know The good Lord’s ground begin to shake
When Lightnin’ finished recording, Tony Joe White of “Polk Salad Annie” fame, who listened in during the session, picked up his guitar and the two jammed for a while. “Tony really knew his blues,” Bromberg says, “and Lightnin’ really enjoyed it, but he wouldn’t let us record. Tony wrote the liner notes.” But instead of providing any contextual information about the session, White was descriptive, personal, and almost trite: “And his boots were from Mexico with silver caps on the toes and brown baggy pants tucked inside … he was a soulful sight … it’s hard to say anything … as I’d much rather sit, be quiet, and listen to him. I’ve dug him since I was 12, and met him when I am 25. He can make chills run over you when he sings about ‘The California Mud Slide’ or anything.”38
From Los Angeles, Lightnin’ went to Berkeley and recorded an album on May 19, 1969, for Poppy, an independent label that had also recorded the singer/songwriter Townes Van Zandt, who had championed Lightnin’s music in Houston and had hung out with him whenever he got the chance. Van Zandt’s girlfriend Fran Petters Lohr recalled that one time, “it was announced in the paper that Lightnin’ Hopkins had died,” and Van Zandt got “real upset.” Together they drove over to Lightnin’s apartment and they knocked on the door. “Lightnin’ always had these bodyguards, these people around, so they opened the door and Townes said, ‘Oh, my God, Lightnin’. They said you were dead.’ And Lightnin’ just says, ‘I don’t think so.’ So we sat there and they played guitars and talked for hours.”39
For Lightnin’s session on Poppy, produced by Strachwitz, he was accompanied by Jeff Carp on harmonica, Johnny “Big Moose” Walker on piano, Paul Asbell on rhythm guitar, Gino Skaggs on bass, and Francis Clay on drums. Lightnin’ had flown up to the Bay Area for an appearance at Zellerbach Hall with Mance Lipscomb, Bukka White, and Son House. Concert organizer Joe Garrett, who greeted Lightnin’ at the airport, said that when he got off the plane, “he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and he drank it like you would drink a Coca Cola on a hot day, just to get his nerves back…. He was really shaken up by that.”40
About the Poppy session, Strachwitz says, “Kevin Eggers from Poppy got in touch with me and asked me to supervise Lightnin’s recordings. He wasn’t particularly interested in new material. He wanted his hits. I thought the whole thing was so-so, and he probably could have gotten one good LP out of it, but he made it into a two-volume set.”41
Often times, when Lightnin’ went to California, Strachwitz says he took the bus, but by the late 1960s, with his ever-expanding audience, he was forced to fly more often.
Strachwitz recorded Lightnin’ twice in 1969, once on May 20 for Poppy and again on December 8 for Arhoolie. Francis Clay accompanied Hopkins on drums, and with his solid backing, Lightnin’s sound was tight and yielded a few songs that were at once fresh and revealing. “Sellin’ Wine in Arizona” was autobiographical:
I was tryin’ to make a living, I even taken a quart of wine, sold it to a