Bonnie Raitt

Back in The Fifties, white rock and roll musicians rarely wrote their own material. While Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Fats Domino were making their reputations and fortunes not only from their singing and instrumental work but also from their genius as songwriters, the major white talents of the time--the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holy, Jerry Lee Lewis, and, of course. Elvis--had little facility for composing and were therefore dependent upon full-time songwriters, who lacked either the desire or the ability to be performers themselves.

The coming of the Beatles in the mid-Sixties changed all that, as it changed almost every facet of white pop music. As the Fab Four progressed from writing most of their own material to writing all of it, rock fans began to show somewhat less interest in the style of performance and more interest in the actual quality of the song as a piece of writing. Accordingly, a Lennon-McCartney song recorded by a mediocre group (such as "Bad to Me" by Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas) would become more popular than a rehashed oldie by the Beatles themselves. Even the Rolling Stones, who made their name and their first few hits as interpreters, and sometimes imitators, of other people's songs, had to shift to a format of all originals by 1966.

The pressure on white performers to write had two large negative effects. Firstly, competent musicians with no talent as songwriters deluged us with atrocious songs. Secondly, independent songwriters, who lost the bulk of their market in the change, either faded into obscurity (like Doc Pomus and Mort Schuman) or were forced to become performers themselves. Some, like Carole King, made the transition gracefully, whereas others, like Leonard Cohen, produced disastrous results.

In the two last years, however, this trend has reversed with the emergence of several young singers who do not attempt to write the bulk of their own songs. Faced with the dearth of behind-the-scenes composers, they have had to rely on familiar, previously recorded material. A few, such as Rod Stewart and Joe Cocker, have distinguished their renditions through unique vocal styles and new arrangements, while some, like Janis Joplin, create remakes that are invariably inferior to the originals.

The latest of these basically interpretive artists, and certainly one of the best, is Bonnie Raitt, who has just released her first album on Warner Brothers. Bonnie used to go to Radcliffe, but had the good luck and good sense to drop out. She spent the past two years working her way from playing bars and clubs to getting second billing at major concert dates. Despite the eclectic approach of her first record. Bonnie is primarily a blues musician: what she has learned abut the blues, both technically and spiritually, from her close association with such brilliant musicians as Buddy Guy. Junior Wells, and Mississippi Fred McDowell, has helped her develop into one of the best white acoustic blues guitarists alive. Her instrumental work is never too flashy and serves mostly as an accompaniment to her vocals. Among white female singers, her only equal is Tracy Nelson.

Bonnie's music, hear live, is very loose and funky. In order to capture these qualities on the album, she decided to avoid the hassle of the usual rushed New York studio scene. Instead, she rented a small studio in an abandoned summer camp in the country outside Minneapolis and invited some of her best musician friends to come along for a month of drinking, fishing and playing. What appears on the album must be a pretty accurate reflection of the mood of that month--dirty, drunk and digging it.

Recorded under the guidance of Willie Murphy and Dave Ray, both of whom should be remembered for their great work with Spider John Koerner in the sixties, the album is about half blues, and half old pop tunes, with only two new songs (which comprise two-thirds of Bonnie's song-writing output). One of the originals, "Finest Lovin' Man" is a straight blues, featuring exciting instrumental work by Bonnie, Junior Wells on harp, and Danny Freebo on Bass. "Thank You" is a pretty ballad in the Curtis Mayfield vein, with Bonnie on piano and Willie Murphy playing a beautiful soft lead guitar.

Strangely, however, it is not in her own tunes that Bonnie's music is best expressed, but in the familiar oldies that are revitalized by her treatment. She takes two over-recorded country blues songs like Robert Johnson's "Walking Blues" and Tommy Johnson's "Big Road" and gives them new energy through the tension between her voice and her searing guitar accompaniment. Her version of the Steve Stills song "Bluebird" (which has been turning up on WRKO lately) rocks and stomps without a let-up through a great Fifties rock sax break and a doo-wop vocal arrangement that elicits a whole new mood from the song.

"Since I Fell For You" is an old torch song that has been recorded by numerous artists, but Bonnie's version displays a sincerity and feeling that has only been surpassed by Lenny Welch, whose rendition was a big hit in the early sixties. "Any Day Woman", a recent Paul Siebel composition, is almost too pretty a song for my tastes, but is redeemed by the sympathetic vocal interplay between Bonnie and Willie. Her remake of John Koerner's "I Ain't Blue", one of the record's high points, creates an entirely different, but no less powerful, feeling than the original (which was on the Spider John Koerner-Willie Murphy album, Running, Jumping, and Standing Still a turly great record that is currently available for $1.98 around the Square.)

The only cut that doesn't really get it together is "Danger Heartbreak Dead Ahead", an old Marvelettes number on which the backup band never quite seems to find their groove. The album closes with "Women Be Wise", a Sippie Wallace blues that features truly demented piano and trumpet solos. (The piano player sounds like Erroll Garner with a stomach ache.)

The album has a goodtime feeling throughout that makes it grow on the listener with repetition. It also clearly marks Bonnie Raitt as the best new signer to come out of the Boston area in a long time. Real nice lady, too.