Koko Taylor
S = Standifer
K = Koko Taylor
S We're talking to Miss Koko Taylor at
the Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor and ah, Koko can you tell us, when was
the last time you were in Ann Arbor?
K The last time I was in Ann Arbor it was
last year, 1987, we were at the Ritz Café, and ah I remember Rudy pitching
a wing-ding doodle over there following my local fans, just the same as
I did here at the Michigan Theater.
S Well tonight they loved you, and I loved
you and ah...
K I love them too...
S I know you didn't want to tear yourself
away from them and they didn't want to tear themselves away from you.
K That's always how it is, that's what keeps
me out here doing it, is my wonderful fans all over the world. It gives
me so much inspiration it just keeps me going.
S How many countries have you done since
your accident?
K Since my accident... this is the fifth
gig that I did since I had my accident on February 4th.
S I see the Ann Arbor News has quite a
story on that, I guess Mr. Mottoes talked to you about that. Let me ask
you one thing, when you were tumbling down that hill in your bus with
your band, was there any thoughts going through your head.
K Well the only thing that...it happened
so fast that I was awake just like I am now and I could see it happening,
you know, and the only thing I could think of...this is it, you know,
this is the end of me. And on the way down there's three trees there that...when
the van went down and hit those three trees and some how, it was like
something you see in a movie, some how those trees prevented that van
from going all the way down to the bottom of that hill. And if it had
it would have been over, but thank God we didn't go all the way down,
and ah when I realized I was still alive the only thing that I could think
of was saying, thank-you, you know. What miracle has happened that our
lives were saved?
S It's kind of like the Trilogy you know
the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost, those 3 trees.
K Oh yeah...
S Are you a religious person...
K I am, I grew up down in Memphis Tennessee
and I grew up singing Gospel in our local Baptist Church. Also when I
was would sing Gospel I'd go to the cotton field, I was born and raised
on a share croppers farm, along with my sisters and brothers, and when
I wasn't in church on Sunday singing Gospel, we was in the field singing,
just for my own enjoyment. I used to listen to blues on my radio, back
in those days B.B. King was a DJ.
S Oh really...
K That's right, in ________ Arkansas, and
he had a fifteen-minuet program, advertising Keptacon. And we would look
forward to hearing him everyday, he would play the blues, and this is
where I got my inspiration, listening to Bessie Smith, Leroy Thornton,
______ ______, Muddy Waters, Collin Wolf and ah all these people is what
really gave me my inspirational, that I have today.
S Well you had some good people to inspire
you, I'll tell you.... well now I understand why many of the writers of
the story say that you are the direct line of the Bessie Smith and _____
____ and those great ...
K I think all of them are just wonderful...
S If there was one that you pick, perhaps
that was, that you most liked to entertain or most like to...do you think
inspirited you most, which one of those?
K I would say Muddy Waters was my number
one idle.
S I would have never chosen Muddy Waters,
but why...why
K Ah, like I said before everybody I mentioned,
some of them I haven't mentioned I love them dearly and I thought they
was wonderful, but something about Muddy Waters, that really took me on
and that's why I always say he gave me my biggest inspiration.
S Did you ever perform with Muddy Waters?
K Oh, more times than I have fingers and
toes.
S I see...is there any particular performance
that you had with him that's most memorable?
K Well the one that I did this was in Montro
Switzerland, ah where at the end of his show he called me out to do like
a finale with him, just as I did tonight with Marty Brooks and the other
guys, ah, I had just recorded this tune I got with takes and he just went
right into it and started singing it, and he gives me the mike. He was
in the wrong key for me because when I sing it was not the key I do it
in, and it was so hard you know, and I standing up there nervous and everything,
I say, I whispered to him I say; I never did this tune in this key, he
said; well you're going to do it tonight.
S But those...I think those are the memories
I think that you probably never will separate yourself from.
K Well, I'll tell you what, there's something
about his music will always live forever with me, and I believe all his
fans.
S Well, Muddy Waters, I have never had
the opportunity to video tape any with him. We did BB King, right here
in this theater, about the same chair...
K Is that right...
S Well he was on a bench first and he was
a little too heavy for this bench he said; get me a chair...so we got
him that chair that your sitting in and of course he talks about you,
and I hope I'll be able to sent that part of the tape, and he's a person
that admires you forever.
K Yeah, I admire him too...
S Let me ask you...these are just some
facts to get the people into who you are. Some...now this is an embarrassing
question but I'm going to ask you anyway. Some places I've heard you were
born in 1935 sometimes 1938, one source even says 1936, can you set the
record straight for us.
K I sure can, I was born in 1938...
S Okay thank-you do you have sisters or
brothers?
K Sure, I have three sisters and I have
three brothers,
S And where are you in that chronology,
number six, number seven...
K Well I'm next to the youngest,
S Now did any of those sisters or brothers
sing and...
K Ah, all my sisters and brothers sing,
but I'm the only one that out here doing it for you know, making a career
out of it, but they all sing. My sister is still singing Gospel in church
back in Chicago, my brothers ah, I didn't tell you when we was growing
up my oldest brother; he couldn't afford an electric guitar, so he put
some ______ and wire behind our old house, and made his self a guitar
out of it...
S Oh really...
K And my other brother, he couldn't buy
a harmonica so he made himself a harmonica out of a corncob, and I was
the vocalist...
S Oh so you had to run something...
K Yeah, so my brothers is musicians but
they're not, like I said in it for money or you know, they just do it
because they enjoy it.
S Do you get together while your traveling...
K On holidays we have like a family reunion,
when I'm not working, sometimes a lot of holidays I go on tours and I
don't get to be with my family, you know, nobody. But whenever we do get
together you know we always sing, play music and jam you know, once ourselves
are free.
S You said something, and this is ___________
but in one of the books I read, you said that you really prefer singing
with, ah, white audiences because the black audiences don't seem to respond,
or like blues as much, it that a fair statement?
K Well it speaks for itself, I was right
here in the Michigan Theater tonight and ah, you know looking out into
the audience, I could see 90% white and ah I would say 5% black, and it's
not only like that here its like that all over the world every where I
go, so this is why I always say that it's the white that promote the blues
and ah you know, come out to hear the blues. The blacks, I don't know,
you know we all, not only just me they was too bored with the blues, and
so I can't say that they're not used to the blues or know what they're
listening to so maybe that's one of the reasons why the don't come out
like they do, cause they had heard so much of it that they want to hear
something new and different.
S Oh I see...you know ah, one of the black
men back there, back stage said you know I've noticed an awful lot of
white kids out there, where are all the black kids? I said; I don't know
but every black kid I see on campus they know Koko Taylor, and he said;
well they're not out there. So you tried to put your finger on it, maybe
they wanted to be here, but think they've heard so much.
K Well and also, I'm mainly speaking about
the older blacks, because like I say they do know what the blues is all
about. But the younger blacks, they don't know very much about the blues
from those of what they heard. So they don't get to hear it on the radio
like they hear Rap Disco, Rock, Pop and Soul. Most commercial radio stations
they play tunes like for 24 hours but when it come to the blues they don't
play not one.
S I can tell you were right here on campus
in Michigan since for the past few days they've been playing Koko Taylor
right and left, you couldn't hear anything but Koko Taylor, and this is
some of the young people the black station the white station, so they
love you in this state an awful lot.
K Oh, like I say, I love them too.
S Well look at that, you said one other
thing about life when you said on the other hand, when they get a little
beer, a little drink in , a little booze involved it... they enjoy more
tunes, do you still feel that way?
K Ah...yes I enjoy blues but I still say
of younger blacks they would be more into the blues if it was promoted
more. On commercial stations, just like any other music, you know...
S Are you having easy times since you been
promoting, or you think...is blues more popular and had a more engagement
now then to say you did four years ago.
K Oh yeah, blues is much more popular today
then it was say five years ago, you know, I can see it started going to
the top, and I have a bigger audience more work, more demand and everything
then I've even _____.
S What's your latest recording,
K My latest recording was a live album on
Alligator records, it was titled live from Chicago in _____ _____.
S I see, what, how did you cut your album
there, both sides?
K Ah, there was 5 tunes on each side.
S Did you write any of them?
K I wrote two songs on there.
S Which two of those,
K One was called Devils Field Day and the
other one was Let Me Love You.
S That's a good one, I had to ask that
because also you see, I've been over it. I also read that you like writing
music and you'd like to write more. Are you writing more?
K Only when I have time, I've got haven't
got a lot of writing time because I be performing so much and I spend
more of my time concentrating on a tune that's already wrote that I'm
you know, performing on stage you know. But I do like to get around to
writing songs and I want to do an album and I have maybe one or two of
them to put on them.
S Is anyone else performing your music
that you might have written?
K Well ah, I've heard of a couple of people,
I don't know them but ah this one girl, this is a white girl, from back
in Philadelphia. She did my tune it was called Call me a Voodoo Woman;
this is one of the tunes that I wrote.
S What was the first recording that you
did, before _______
K The first recording I did was for Chess
records back in Chicago, it was what kind of night was this, and the flip
side was I have what it takes.
S Oh, I remember that. When you first heard
yourself on that recording, did you like what you hear?
K Ah...yeah I liked it, I was pretty excited
and you know impressed with it. I had never done a recording or _______
anything around recordings. Willie Dixon got me started. He said you put
your whole heart into it and what ever you put in it that's what you've
got. That's what I've been doing ever since.
S Was it a money maker...
K Huh...
S Was it a money maker...
K Well I'll tell you, I never seen a rich
blues entertainer yet, and I'm certain that I'm not getting rich myself,
and of course I'm not in it for the money, money plays a big part because
we still have to pay bills from it but ah I'm not in it for the money
I enjoy what I'm doing. I love singing I love making people happy and
this is what keeps me out here with my fans doing just like they did tonight.
And I know if I stayed home, somebody somewhere going to be disappointed
cause we had not been able to see Koko Taylor perform.
S I also saw Koko Taylor having a heck
of a lot of fun out there, cause I believe you enjoy giving as much as
you receive.
K I sure do, I enjoy what I'm doing.
S What about your mother and your father,
there's been no video about your parents,
K Well my mother and father died back in
Memphis when I was very young, and I was raised up with my father till
he passed away, and after that ah, we was kind of from pillar to post
you know. We was with aunts and uncles and different relatives all the
way up until you know, I got just about grown. When I was eighteen years
old I had a boyfriend and this boyfriend left Memphis and brought me to
Chicago with him. He came...he went to Chicago looking for better work
and that boyfriend is my husband today.
S Oh really...
K Everybody know him as Pop Taylor...
S Yeah Pop Taylor he's...
K Pop Taylor the midnight singer, that was
the boyfriend that brought me to Chicago.
S I've adopted him myself, we've had a
chance to talk a lot a while I was video taping part of your performance
he was telling me what to do and so he instructed me, I hope it comes
out well cause you'll be seeing that. He's quite a man.
K Oh yes ...
S He travels all over with you...
K Yeah, he travels with me everywhere I
go and he's been my backbone all through the twenty-five years I've been
out here.
S Now I've seen you in a variety of costumes
and clothes. Do you design your own clothing?
K Ah, some of them, I'm not you know a seamstress,
just sometimes I just come up with certain ideas on something I especially
like, and sometime I just go in a store and see what I like and I buy
it. And then again I go to a seamstress you know and I have something
made and have ideas and tell them how I want it done, that's all.
S Well let me ask you one other question
too. In terms of when you were say a little girl, did you in all the break
of beginning to love and sing to those singers, did your parents let you
go out and sing in clubs.
K No, I never went out in front of a club
till I went to Chicago, and that's when I started singing and sitting
in most clubs for my own enjoyment with all of these people that I had
been hearing all the records, seemed like they were always living in Chicago.
S How old were you.
K That's where I got a chance to meet them,
I was eighteen years old.
S Oh so you didn't sort of get your feet
wet until you were well in your teens then.
K Yeah...
S In terms of people like Alberta Hunter
who just recently died, not recently died, or Edith Wilson, Mommy Yancy
did you ever have a chance to...
K I never got a chance to meet with them
I just know them from their music and hear about them and read about them
and just know their wonderful great ladies.
S Well I've talked to their Mary Lecher
in Los Angeles and she mentioned you name, so you know they evidently
know Koko Taylor though.
K Right...
S Now I know you had a long performance
tonight, so I'm not going to bore you with _____ questions that I have
here. Tell me what is your blue style, everybody... I'm not sure you can
answer that ...
K Well my blues style is some people label
me as nitty-gritty they say I sound like frogs in a swamp and all this
kind of stuff. So I would say its kind of rough and tough and nitty-gritty
too, you know, it's just nothing that I rehearsed for or went to school
for it just comes out of a natural God given talent the way you hear it.
S What kind of ensemble that you usually
want to...the one that you have now, with three pieces ah to ____ and...
K I have four pieces now and ah if you're
speaking of a big orchestra, it don't take a big crowd of musicians to
play the blues. So those four pieces if your not standing out there looking
at them you'd swear to God I had as many as the average band that has
five or six men up there performing, so someday I might ah, you know I'm
not adding another piece you know, but I'll probably have just a huge
band, not to play the blues.
S Well back to Miss Koko Taylor and ah
Koko has given me the great men that call her Koko. Koko let me ask you
how do you want to be remembered? Let's say if you stopped singing the
blues some night, how do you want to be remembered?
K I would like for everybody, especially
all my great fans, I'd like to be remembered just by my music, remember
me as putting all that I have into what I'm doing. Trying to give to the
people what they give to me, and that's out there for me you know, when
I perform. I would like to be remembered by that and also just hanging
in there women that have sung the blues in the past, like the great Bessie
Smith, Ma Rainy and all those people you know, and just know that I did
a wonderful job.
S I think that's a wonderful statement.
Let me ask you another one, every important and especially a rising star,
you still are a rising star. Writers say all kinds of things, some things
are true and some things are not so true. If there's anything that you
want...that you've heard about in print is there any one or two things
that you think is not entirely true that you'd like to be know?
K Well I can't think of anything or remember
anything that anyone said that you know that just wasn't true, there might
have been some things that wasn't true, not speaking of what I read myself.
But ah, normally most writers and most things that I've read about myself
that people said, I would say that it's true, they all spoke highly of
me, they spoke good about me, they always talked about you know how I
you know, how I really put so much energy and stuff when the bands playing
things like that. What I give into my music, I would say it's very true.
S I'll vote for that one...tonight I was
very impressed with something I saw, Candy Man, who was Candy Man?
K Candy Man is my little nine-year-old grandson,
and he's learning to play drums as you saw him playing drums tonight.
He's also learning to play guitar, and he told me two Christmas's ago,
he said; grandma if you buy me some drums for Christmas, and that's how
long he's been on drums, for two years and he been trying to play guitar
for...ever since he was four years old.
S Well I can tell you one thing...he is
awesome. I took about ten pictures of him playing his drum set and he's
as good as a professional right now. I'd like to see him when he gets
to be about twenty. He's going to be out of sight.
K I don't think so...Ha, ha...
S Koko it's been a marvelous pleasure for
me, a special pleasure to hear you play and perform and to see you sitting
there alive and well I think it's about...
K Thank-you sir...
S And any time you want...oh give me off
tape, could you give me an address and I can send the materials to you.
K I sure will...
S Okay. Thank-you very much Miss Koko Taylor
K Nice talking to you...
END OF INTERVIEW