Topic: Mance Lipscomb's studio recordings of "Key to the Highway"

[jphauser]

I'm working on an essay on protest in the blues, and I'm currently looking at Mance Lipscomb's version of "Key to the Highway."   I've come across a couple of Lipscomb's live recordings of the song in which he incorporates protest verses from "Ain't No Cane on the Brazos" and I'm wondering if his studio recording(s) of the song also include protest verses from that song or any other protest verses.  For example, the verse below appears in Lipscomb's version of "Key to the Highway" on his Live! at the Cabale album.

Now you oughtta been down on the river, in the year 19 and 10
Women had to wear the ball 'n' chain just like the men

Based on Stefan Wirz's blues discography website, it appears that Lipscomb made several studio recordings of "Key to the Highway."  Unfortunately, I don't have access to the albums on which they appear, and I can't find them on Youtube or Spotify.   So I'm wondering if anybody in WC might have one or more of Lipscomb's studio versions???

[Slack]

Interesting topic!  I'm not sure what you mean by 'protest verses'.  Mance was a black man living in Texas.. during Jim Crow, more or less. What stamina he had to be sharecrop by day and making great music at night!

[jphauser]

Interesting topic!  I'm not sure what you mean by 'protest verses'.  Mance was a black man living in Texas.. during Jim Crow, more or less. What stamina he had to be sharecrop by day and making great music at night!

That's a good question.  Defining protest in the blues is something I've grappled with over the years, and there have been various things written about it.  If I remember correctly, it was Lawrence Levine who wrote about the need to define "protest song" differently for black music.  Samuel Charters caused a stir when he wrote "there is little social protest in the blues," but as far as I can tell he didn't really define what he meant by protest.  He was referring to open protest when he made that statement.  He said that there was complaint, but not protest. 

Regarding complaint, an old college professor friend of mine once told me that the blues was a form of protest-- a way of saying "I refuse to wear the mask of the carefree, content, and submissive Negro that you white folks insist I wear."  I agree that a black man singing the blues in the Jim Crow south was a refusal to wear that mask; if it wasn't a form of protest, it was at least a form of racial resistance.

If a verse/song speaks out against injustice, I would call that a protest verse/song, but in my mind it's more complicated than that.  For my essay I've defined protest as described below. 

If a blues song contains lyrics which a black man living in the Jim Crow south would have feared singing in the presence of a white man, I categorize those lyrics as open or uncoded racial protest.  And if the lyrics contain a hidden, below the surface meaning, and a black man living in the Jim Crow south would have feared singing an uncoded version of the lyrics in the presence of a white man, I categorize those lyrics as covert or coded racial protest.

The definition isn't perfect (songs of open protest were recorded in southern penitentiaries), but I think it's the best fit for me and for how I hear protest in the blues.

[Blues Vintage]

The studio version is on the LP "Texas Songster, Volume 2" (ARHOOLIE F 1023).
Apparently not released on CD.

It would be perfect for the Youtube Channel (and I just posted a few Lipscomb songs, can't hurt to post one more).
Or maybe there were some (technical ?) problems with the recording?

I anyone has the record and wants to share the song please let me know.

[jphauser]

The studio version is on the LP "Texas Songster, Volume 2" (ARHOOLIE F 1023).
Apparently not released on CD.

It would be perfect for the Youtube Channel (and I just posted a few Lipscomb songs, can't hurt to post one more).
Or maybe there were some (technical ?) problems with the recording?

I anyone has the record and wants to share the song please let me know.

Thank you for the offer to help!  I've ordered a copy of his autobiography, and maybe that will provide an answer and/or provide some more info about the song and his version.  I borrowed the book from a library years ago, but only had the chance to skim through it.

One thing I remember about it is that Lipscomb claimed that "Big Boss Man" was written in the fields when the bossman wasn't around.  I believe Jimmy Reed's producer claimed songwriting credit for his hit recording of the song.  I suspect it was a money grab.  But who knows, maybe the workers heard Reed's version and came up with some of their own lyrics.

[Stuart]

I have a copy that I recorded from the LP. I've sent it to the usual suspects and if anyone else would like a copy, please send me a PM with your e-mail address and I'll send a MP3 as an attachment.

[jphauser]

Thank you so very much, Stuart and Blues Vintage!  Stuart provided the sound file of the studio recording and Blues Vintage posted it to the WC Mance Lipscomb Lyrics thread.   I never hoped for anything near as complete a response as I have received!


Six months ain’t so long, two years ain’t no great long time
Got a friend in penitentiary, doing ninety-nine


A key verse from the studio recording for me is the one above about the length of prison sentences.  That verse also appears in the live recording that I mentioned in my initial post.  I wouldn't call it a protest verse, but it indicates that that verse was probably a standard verse for Lipscomb when he performed the song.   

For several years now I've wondered about the possibility that some performers and listeners interpreted the song as being about not just a man running away from a bad relationship with a woman but also a man on the run from the law.  Possibly a man who had run out on his sharecropping debts.  If he was simply leaving his woman, why would he be traveling at night, and stop at daybreak?  And why would he wander the highway until the day he died?  Maybe he's that emotionally devastated by being mistreated by his woman, but maybe he's making a comment about the hopelessness of escaping Jim Crow.  The prison-related verses that Lipscomb includes in his performances fit with my line of thinking.  For example, the song's protagonist might be thinking about how much time he'll be serving for whatever "offense" he has committed. 


One of the main things I'm looking at in my essay on blues protest is the coded aspect of the blues.  Double-meanings.  Willie Foster touches on that in the video clip below.  He appears at about the 2 minute and 20 second mark.
https://web.archive.org/web/20240421041204/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGvs8pAHTH8

Of course, I can't prove anything about what was going on in the heads of Lipscomb and others who performed the song and their audiences, but I think it's important to explore the possibilities.  There's more that I could bring up, but I'm on the road and have a long day ahead of me.

[banjochris]

The studio version is on the LP "Texas Songster, Volume 2" (ARHOOLIE F 1023).
Apparently not released on CD.

It would be perfect for the Youtube Channel (and I just posted a few Lipscomb songs, can't hurt to post one more).
Or maybe there were some (technical ?) problems with the recording?

I anyone has the record and wants to share the song please let me know.

I have some moderately crummy transfers from LP of the few songs from the LPs that weren't issued on CD for some reason. That Key to the Highway is one, Ain't Gonna Rain No More and I think Going to Louisiana (See See Rider) from Vol. 1 also – I'll look when I get home tonight. I don't think there's anything technically deficient in the original recordings. Also the song "If I Miss the Train" on the Vol. 2 CD has a skip in it that ends up eliminating part of the first verse (maybe tape damage?).

[Blues Vintage]

Thank you so very much, Stuart and Blues Vintage!  Stuart provided the sound file of the studio recording and Blues Vintage posted it to the WC Mance Lipscomb Lyrics thread.   I never hoped for anything near as complete a response as I have received!


Six months ain’t so long, two years ain’t no great long time
Got a friend in penitentiary, doing ninety-nine


A key verse from the studio recording for me is the one above about the length of prison sentences.  That verse also appears in the live recording that I mentioned in my initial post.  I wouldn't call it a protest verse, but it indicates that that verse was probably a standard verse for Lipscomb when he performed the song.   

For several years now I've wondered about the possibility that some performers and listeners interpreted the song as being about not just a man running away from a bad relationship with a woman but also a man on the run from the law.  Possibly a man who had run out on his sharecropping debts.  If he was simply leaving his woman, why would he be traveling at night, and stop at daybreak?  And why would he wander the highway until the day he died?  Maybe he's that emotionally devastated by being mistreated by his woman, but maybe he's making a comment about the hopelessness of escaping Jim Crow.  The prison-related verses that Lipscomb includes in his performances fit with my line of thinking.  For example, the song's protagonist might be thinking about how much time he'll be serving for whatever "offense" he has committed. 


One of the main things I'm looking at in my essay on blues protest is the coded aspect of the blues.  Double-meanings.  Willie Foster touches on that in the video clip below.  He appears at about the 2 minute and 20 second mark.
https://web.archive.org/web/20240421041204/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGvs8pAHTH8

Of course, I can't prove anything about what was going on in the heads of Lipscomb and others who performed the song and their audiences, but I think it's important to explore the possibilities.  There's more that I could bring up, but I'm on the road and have a long day ahead of me.

Lipscomb improvised some of the lyrics on the spot. I mean that whatever verse came to him on a whim of the moment, he would spit that out so the speak.

The Santa Fe verse, the reap just what you sow verse, the penitentiary verse all show up in other songs he did. Santa Fe in "Hattie Green" for example.
The penitentiary verse goes way back and not specifically connected to the "key to the highway" song I think. Sure, he had a concept in mind for a particular song with set verses but would add random verses too.

Lipscomb once explained that "key" means "feet".

[jphauser]

Lipscomb improvised some of the lyrics on the spot. I mean that whatever verse came to him on a whim of the moment, he would spit that out so the speak.

The Santa Fe verse, the reap just what you sow verse, the penitentiary verse all show up in other songs he did. Santa Fe in "Hattie Green" for example.
The penitentiary verse goes way back and not specifically connected to the "key to the highway" song I think. Sure, he had a concept in mind for a particular song with set verses but would add random verses too.

Lipscomb once explained that "key" means "feet".

I appreciate your wanting to bring these things to my attention in case I hadn't been aware of them.  But I'm familiar with things like blues improvisation and floating verses.  And, of course, live performances of a song by a bluesman can far exceed the length of a studio recording of that song.  And that's why I was interested in hearing Mance's  studio version of "Key to the Highway." 

The point I was trying to make in my earlier post wasn't very clear, but what I'm saying is that I've heard two live recordings and one studio recording of the song by Lipscomb and all three have the reference to prison terms and the two live recordings also include protest verses from the Texas prison farm song "Ain't No Cane on the Brazos."  And if Lispcomb is making references to prisons in all three versions, then those verses were quite fitting in Lipscomb's mind.   

Of course, we don't know exactly what was going on in his mind, or in the minds of black people in his hometown of Navasota, Texas (the Navasota River flows into the Brazos) when they heard him sing about the the brutailty that took place on the Brazos.  But any black-skinned man in Texas, no matter how meek and law-abiding, could have ended up in one of those Brazos River prison farms. The convicts in one of those farms referred to it as "the burnin' hell'."  The fear of ending up in one of them might put you on that highway looking to escape that possibility.  But just trying to escape on that highway might lead to you finding yourself in one of those prisons, also.

There is much more that I haven't brought out here, but my essay is pretty close to being completed.  Then I'll post a link to it on WC. 

Thanks again for your help and input!