Creole Song
Heebie Jeebies
Black Cat On A Fence
Salutation Stomp
Hiawatha Rag (version 1)
Bogalusa Moan
Chimes Blues
Cradle Song
Corrine Corina
The Entertainer
It Looks Like A Big Time Tonight
The Sheik Of Araby
Hiawatha Rag (version 2)
Dallas Blues
If I Ever Cease To Love
Redwing
Midnight Special
Casey Jones
K.C. Moan
Take This Hammer
Go Down Old Hannah
Down By The Riverside
Streamline Train.
This is a triptych of early
Colyer. First there’s the band led by the
Christie Brothers, Ian and Keith, and called
the Christie Brothers Stompers. Then there’s
Colyer’s own Jazzmen. And finally that brief
offshoot, the Ken Colyer Skiffle Group, which
took advantage of the craze for broom handles
and embarrassing accents.
Pianist Pat Hawes was quite
right to note that despite the austerity of
Colyer’s pronouncements on the subject of
the purity of New Orleans jazz, his recordings
with the Chrsitie Brothers prove faithful
adherents of the Mutt Carey-Kid Ory model,
not that of Bunk Johnson-George Lewis. The
tight, forceful rather whinnying lead practised
by Carey – a much underrated player – finds
an apostle in Colyer and Keith Christie’s
powerful Ory-ish trombone shows only vestigial
signs of any Jim Robinson influence. Their
attempt at a Rag, later a Colyer forte, simply
proved that back then enthusiasm triumphed
over elegance. The recordings are all rather
tough and ready but certainly acceptable to
the many admirers of this invigorating and
exciting band.
Now with his own band and
once free of those arch modernists Monty Sunshine,
Lonnie Donegan and Chris Barber (one track
here) - with their reprehensible taste for
the de Paris brothers and Sister Rosetta Tharpe
– Colyer donned sackcloth for the remainder
of his career. Here we have possibly the finest
of his bands with Mac Duncan and Ian Wheeler
on board. The Rags are much tighter, better
rehearsed and more consistently impressive
than ever before, and the band has by now
settled into its familiar repertoire and style.
By far the best performance comes on If
I Ever Cease To Love where the fire and
the ebullient swing are a real tonic. Elsewhere
there are signs of the many Colyer bands to
come with their sometimes leaden tempi and
unvarying front line responsibilities. We
can search for this less pleasing side in
Dallas Blues where for all the varied
colour up front – notably Duncan’s righteous
trombone – there’s a seeping air of predictability
to the proceedings.
Nasal American accent to
the fore the skiffle tracks are interesting
not least for the titanic Alexis Korner whose
guitar and mandolin playing enhance the session.
By the time we get to Go Down Old Hannah
the skiffle group is relaxed and in full
cry, not simply mouthing Leadbelly witticisms
– and generating plenty of heat as well.
Maybe the standards here
vary from session to session but this is otherwise
a rather compelling summation of five years
in Colyer’s musical life.
Jonathan Woolf
CD Reviews
LAKE LACD 236 [78:35] 
