Tag: Doug Sahm

Doug Sahm – Groover’s Paradise

A groove you can drive a truck through
wider than a Texas mile

I’ve been waiting until I could start listening to the former lead singer of the Sir Douglas Quintet. The time has arrived, and I knew it would be some quality music, and I’ve enjoyed dipping my toe in the Doug Sahm waters. I’d heard his music from the ’60s and ’90s, but didn’t know much about the 1970s; it didn’t disappoint.

Texan Doug Sahm was an exceptional talent. By the time most kids were still figuring out how to play Little League, Sahm was already on stage. At age 11, he played steel guitar at the Skyline Club in Austin, sharing the bill with Hank Williams on what was one of Hank’s final performances on December 19, 1952.

Why choose one genre when you can play ‘em all? He could play country, blues, Tex-Mex, rock ‘n’ roll, R&B, and anything else that came his way. He was one of those musicians who seemed to be a walking jukebox.

This song is very country-rock and has a San Francisco hippie feel to it. He was basically Americana before Americana was a popular word. He didn’t chase trends at all; he did what made him happy, and that is why his music sounds so genuine. He hung out in San Francisco for a while in the early seventies. Among his friends were Bob Dylan, Dr. John, Willie Nelson, and the Grateful Dead. But he always went back to Texas.

This song is the title track from his 1974 album. It was produced by none other than Doug Clifford and Stu Cook of Creedence Clearwater Revival; the album has a loose, laid-back feel, and Clifford played drums. This song is a tribute to Austin, celebrating the unique blend of hippies, cowboys, and soul that defined the city in the mid-1970s.

For me, he was like a bridge between genres and generations. He could play an accordion song, a honky-tonk ballad, then rip into a garage rock, all in the same set.

Here is one of his sons, Shandon Sahm, playing this song.

An entire concert, but I have it starting on Groover’s Paradise.

Groover’s Paradise

Go out on the highway
I thumbed myself a ride
Too long in New York City
My mind is taking a ride

I want to go back to Texas
Cosmic cowgirls playin’
I want to have some fun
in a good ole Texas way
Down in Groover’s Paradise
Groover’s Paradise, Groover’s Paradise

Told you one or two times
Ain’t gonna tell you no more
Too long in Detroit city
I can’t hardly breathe no more

I need a whole lot of cold Pearl beer
and a little Texas smile
A groove you can drive a truck through
wider than a Texas mile
Down in Groover’s Paradise
Groover’s Paradise, Groover’s Paradise

Groover’s Paradise!

Well the guacamole queen is there
Man she’ll really curl your hair
Enchiladas and Bar B Que
Come on baby what you gonna do?

Come on over here beside me
Tell me how you’ve been
When I get done layin’ it on you
Then you’ll know I am back again
Back in Groover’s Paradise
Groover’s Paradise, Groover’s Paradise

Texas Tornados – Mendocino

Last week, I posted a Sir Douglas Quintet song called She’s About A Mover. Many people commented about the song and about another Sir Douglas Quintet song Mendocino as well. So, hearing the Texas Tornados with Doug Sahm do it, I had to post about Doug again because I couldn’t resist. I’ve been listening to his other music and I love it. This song was a top 40 hit in 1969. It peaked at #27 on the Billboard 100 and #14 in Canada. The song has been covered over 100 times, according to Secondhand Songs.

They were a Tex-Mex supergroup before anyone called them that: Doug Sahm (Sir Douglas Quintet), Augie Meyers (Sir Douglas Quintet), Freddy Fender (the man of many hits), and accordion ace Flaco Jiménez. They first gigged under the name “Tex-Mex Revue,” then took the name from Sahm’s earlier Texas Tornado. They formed around 1989-1990. It was lightning in a bottle.

Sahm wrote it, he rode it up the charts with the Sir Douglas Quintet back in 1968-69, and then, a couple of decades later, he brought it back to the table with his Tex-Mex supergroup, the Texas Tornados, Augie Meyers, Flaco Jiménez, and Freddy Fender. Flaco Jiménez, who had a long career, just passed on July 31 at age 86.

What I love here is how the Tornados make nostalgia feel alive. Plenty of bands drag their old hits around like they are carrying bulky luggage; these guys plug in and let it go. They play loose, not trying to change the song, but not bound to the original record. They revitalize this song, and it sounds like it was written yesterday. It’s not an easy thing to do, but they pull it off.

BTW… Mendocino is a small town located in Northern California; it’s about 150 miles north of San Francisco. 

This song was off the album Live from Austin, TX released in 2005 from a performance in 1990.

Here is the original band, Sir Douglas Quintet, doing Mendocino. This is the Playboy After Dark studio. Bring back muttonchops!

Mendocino

Teeny Bopper, my teenage loverI caught your waves last nightIt sent my mind to wonderin’.You’re such a groovePlease don’t movePlease stay in my love house by the river.Fast talkin’ guys with strange red eyesHave put things in your headAnd started your mind to wonderin’I love you so, please don’t goPlease stay here with me in Mendocino.Mendocino, Mendocino,Where life’s such a grooveYou blow your mind in the morning.We used to walk through the park,Make love along the way in Mendocino.(Ah, play it, Augie! Yeah!)Like I told you, can you dig it?If you wanna groove, I’ll be glad to have you.‘Cause I love you so, please don’t go,Please stay here with me in Mendocino,Mendocino, MendocinoWhere life’s such a groove,You blow your mind in the morningWe used to walk through the park,Make love along the way in MendocinoMendocino, Mendocino, Mendocino

…

Sir Douglas Quintet – She’s About a Mover

I’ve known this song since the 1980s, when I heard it many times on oldies channels at work. This Doug Sahm-written song has stuck with me through the decades. I thought about it recently when I ran across an ’80s or ’90s live version that he and keyboard player Augie Myers played. 

This song is a blend of Tex-Mex and garage rock, one of the best examples of 1960s garage rock. It’s bigger than the chart position suggests. It paved the way for the Tex-Mex sound to seep into rock, a little taste inside a pop single. Sixty years on, it still works.

It was 1964, the height of Beatlemania, and producer Huey P. Meaux had an idea. The British Invasion was cleaning up the charts, so why not package a bunch of Texas guys to look like they’d just flown in from England, but still sound like San Antonio? He slapped the name Sir Douglas Quintet on Doug Sahm’s new band, dressed them in matching suits, and let people assume they were another English import.

The band cut this song in Houston’s Gold Star Studios in late ’64. It was a fast, live-in-the-room recording session. Sahm had the riff for a while, but the groove came together when the drummer, Johnny Perez, locked into that hypnotic drum beat, pushing the song forward.

Augie Meyers’ organ was the hook. Huey Meaux knew the song’s repetitive, almost trance-like quality would make it stand out on the radio. The song peaked at #13 on the Billboard 100 and #15 in the UK in 1965. The song was named the number one Texas song by Texas Monthly. 

Doug’s voice has a Ray Charles-like sound, and they ended up with 3 top 40 songs and 4 songs in the Billboard 100.

I usually try to add live versions of the song in the era it came from, but I could not pass this one up…it’s just TOO good.  Doug Sahm and Augie Meyers are doing their thing in Austin, Texas, in 1975. I can’t stop listening to this version. Sahm had a great stage presence. 

She’s About a Mover

She was walking down the street
Looking fine as she could be, hey, hey
She was walking down the street
She’s looking fine as she could be, hey, hey
You know I love you, baby
Oh hear what is say, hey, hey

She walked right up to me
Said, “Hey, big boy, what’s your name?”
She walked right up to me
Said, “Hey, big boy, what’s your name?” Hey, hey
We had love and conversation
Oh yeah, what I say, hey hey

She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
Hey, hey

She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
You know I love you, baby
Oh yeah, what I say, yeah, hey

Now, she walked right up to me, talkin’ about me
She said, “Hey, big boy, what’s your name?”
Well, she walked right up to me
Said, “Hey, big boy, what’s your name?”
We had love and conversation
Oh yeah, what I say, hey hey

She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover
She’s about a mover, hey