Shame Shame Shmae

Dear Joe, I’m sending this to you early for your editing purposes. I cannot stress enough that you can’t post this till 11 PM EST today.

Thanks,

Davis

Episode #5, titled, Shame Shame Shame.

“Shame Shame Shame” by Smiley Lewis

Today I’m going to expound a bit about the song that the episode takes it’s title from.

Treme touches on almost every style of New Orleans music: brass bands, modern jazz, traditional jazz. Hip hop and bounce, in my opinion, kinda get shorted in season one and punk and sludge metal are shut out, so you know what I’m lobbying for in season 2.

Season one definitely turns a fond and loving spotlight on Classic New Orleans Rhythm and Blues. Classic NO R&B is the music from the late 40’s and early 50’s. One foot in jump blues and one foot in rock and roll. Roy Brown’s “Good Rockin Tonight” - first time Rock is used in a song title. Guitar Slim’s “Story of my life”- first recorded use of feedback in a guitar solo. Many of the great records and artists from this era were made by the team of producer Dave Bartholomew and recording engineer Cosimo Mattassa.

Dave Bartholomew will turn 90 this year. David Simon and I had the privilege of attending a concert, hosted by Allan Toussaint, in honor of this and the 60th anniversary of two of Dave’s earliest records, Jewel King’s “3 x 7” and Fats Domino’s “The Fat Man” breaking the race barrier on the pop charts and becoming #1 records. It was at this concert that Bartholomew lamented that singer/guitarist Smiley Lewis never received the commercial and popular status of Bartholomew marquee artist, Fats Domino. A comparison of Lewis’ and Domino’s versions of “Blue Monday” pretty much tells the story. Lewis’ is grittier, slower and face it, he sounds Blacker. Often Lewis was on the verge of having a big national hit “I Hear You Knockin,” or “One Night of Sin” only to have it covered by a White artist, Elvis Presley, Gail Storm or Pat Boone, who scored hits with their sanitized versions.

The original “Shame, Shame, Shame” was written by Lewis and Bartholomew for the Elia Kazan/Tennessee Williams 1956 film “Baby Doll.” It’s used in the scene where Karl Malden chases Carroll Baker around her bedroom. In a “so much for a good placement and tie in” move the Catholic Legion of Decency had the film pulled from US distribution. Smiley Lewis never got the recognition he deserved in his life time, but if you have any interest in the dawn of Rock and Roll you should pick up his recordings.

“Shame Shame Shame” the scene in the recording studio.

David Simon had been telling me for a long time that he wanted to hear trumpeter Kermit Ruffins play “Shame, Shame, Shame” as Bartholowmew’s signature trumpet growl on the track isn’t far from Kermit’s stylistic bag. I said the best way to put a bug in Kermit’s ear would be to have him play it on the show, so I wasn’t too surprised when the script for #5 arrived and it had Davis, the character, writing a parody of “Shame Shame Shame” and hiring Kermit to play on it.

In terms of historical accuracy, yes, I used to be in a band with Kermit and yes, I’m pretty sure we were, as Kermit says, trifiling.

David Simon wrote a set of lyrics where the words “Shame on you Mrs. Roxy” are replaced by “Shame on you now Dubya.”

I wrote the horn arrangements and cut the scratch vocal track that Zahn uses as a template. Simon and the powers that be were so pleased with the demo recording of the “Shame” song that the scene went from a 90 second cutaway to being presented in its entirety.

The band: that’s me on piano, and yes I plan to lose some wight before season two. The bassist is Jimbo Walsh, who can also be heard on Michael Ray’s Cosmic Krewe records and his own space rock band The Other Planets. Ben Ellman, the tenor sax player plays in Galactic and produced the new Trombone Shorty record. Aurora Nealand plays with Hurray for the Riff Raff and the Panorama Jazz Band. Tyrus Chapman on trombone wrote most of the funky stuff on the Rebirth Brass Band’s record “We Come To Party.” Y’all know Kermit Ruffins by now. The three lovely ladies on background vocals are Holley Bensten, Yevette Cuccia and Debbie Davis, collectively The Pfister Sisters, a stellar early jazz vocal trio. I am not sure if, or when, this recording will be commercially available, but again I encourage everyone to pick up on the original.