Booker's Bio, or "Time is Tight"

No matter how sophisticated we think we are, most music fans are believers in mythology. Even if we're canny enough to see through press releases and hagiography, music affects us so personally that we still cling to illusions about our favorite musicians, attributing sensitivity and wisdom that they might not deserve. Sure, we know that dude from KISS isn't really from outer space, and the Clash weren't urban guerillas, but we might gloss over Miles Davis and John Lennon’s history of abuse, and hope that Morrissey actually died a few years ago and all the right-wing nonsense he’s been spouting is really coming from his evil twin brother.

Similarly, I’ve often felt Stax Records represented the best of the American ideal. In the deep South, in the midst of segregation, groups of people - men and women, black and white, from all different classes - worked together to create something better than themselves - a music that reached deep into the human soul and expressed what it was to be human, in all our messiness and glory.

Naturally, the truth was a bit more complicated, and it's easy to see why, as a middle-aged, politically liberal, white southern male, I, like many others, clung to this inspirational ...well, more like an exaggeration than an outright lie. Still, seeing the integrated Mar-Keys, and more importantly Booker T. and the MGs playing as one in Memphis in the '60s, well, it gives you hope that we can figure out this race thing, eventually. 

Just some dudes crossing the street.

In "Time is Tight," Booker T. Jones, bandleader of the MGs, shows the humans behind the myths, the pressures felt by representing a segregated band at the time, and describes a life full of music that few other music bios have.

While the book is mostly linear, Jones is more interested in creating a tone, so a section on his childhood might shift into a story about working at Stax or living in California. It’s a nice touch, and creates an almost conversational tone, like how one memory triggers another. It’s also well-written – as opposed to most pop musician bios, Jones seems have actually come into this project with some thought and maybe an outline.

Which makes sense, because dude possessed a fierce work ethic and love of music almost from birth. A multi-instrumentalist, he backed up Mahalia Jackson at 12, then worked and expanded a long-ass paper route, played in the school band and nightclubs, and somewhere in there went to high school. Working at Stax since 16, he continued playing and touring while attending college for music in Indiana, all while turning out jams like “Green Onions” and “Time is Tight.”

As an integrated band, the MGs became a symbol, a myth, that, while accurate, had some occasional fissures - the worst of which happened after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., when white guitarist Steve Cropper said in an interview "I don't think anywhere in the universe was as racially cool as Memphis was until MLK showed up…,” continuing way past the “All lives matter” lameness scale almost to the “outside agitators” level. This, naturally, caused some friction.

Jones was becoming disillusioned with pay and social pressures within Stax at the time, so that made it easy for him to head off to California and begin producing, notably for Bill Withers and Willie Nelson (If you haven’t listened to “Stardust” in a while, revisit it. Such a terrible idea on paper but the spare arrangements add so much). Along the way, he marries a few times and has terrible luck with houses, then ends up happily married and recognized for his contributions to awesomeness (Obama said he’d much rather be announced by “Green Onions,” instead of “Hail to the Chief” which sadly, did not become law).

"Time is Tight" contains more actual music than any music bio I’m going to come across. Jones even closes the book with a section of time signatures and chord progressions, which Flea, Blondie, or Moby didn’t think to add. He also has a section about working with Otis Redding (who I have yet to find a bad word about) on “Try a Little Tenderness” that puts the reader into the session room: 

"Otis said, 'You got ta' (Now marching, left, right.) 'Squeeze her! Tease her! (Full-out stomping, arms flailing, waving side to side). 'Never leave her!' Otis jumped in front of the drums and glared at Al. Al played a fill, inciting the band to break. The band broke. (Silence.) Al glared playfully at Otis.

 He responded: 'Nigh, nigh, nigh! X3 Try a little ...tenderness!' Otis shouted.

We all hit the downbeat together. It was a release. A musical explosion.

Then, we walked the chords down, back down, to the same place as the first turn and it became apparent that it was going to happen again.”

This goes on for about a page, and it is exactly the myth I’d like to keep believing in.

Drugs/Sex/Bad Behavior  - 4/10   Lots of weed, a bit of sex, and no real bad behavior

Opens in media res - Sorta? It starts with this thing about smoking weed and riding horses in California. With the whole thing going in and out of time,

Namedropping  -  Almost none, the famous people stories flowed well. 

Percentage of Music in the bio  - Close to 90. Jones knows his stuff, and can describe it both technically and lovingly.

Buy, Borrow from the Library, or Pass – While definitely entertaining and definitely worth reading, I’d give this one a ‘borrow,’ unless you have enough aptitude to do something with the musical charts at the end of the book.