People are always making suggestions

People are always making suggestions. Why don’t you play this or that? It’s always helpful and quite often it can lead me down some interesting musical by-ways.

A BB King fan recently suggested that I put together a programme not, for once, on the productive theme of the chicken in music, but rather on artists with the name King, beginning with his hero Riley B. King of Indianola, Mississippi – known to the world, the Pope and U2 as B.B.

It’s a name with a great blues pedigree. Eric Clapton fans are probably aware of Freddie King, who they can hardly dispute sounds very much like the old Cream God. The reality of course is that Clapton sounds very like Freddie King who was one of those guitarists who most influenced the British Rn’B Boom. His greatest hits include ‘Have You Ever Loved a Woman?’ which was written by B.B. and covered notably by Peter Green and Fleetwood Mac back in the days when they were listenable. ‘Hideaway’ is another big Freddie King number and another staple of the Mayalls, Greens and Claptons of this world.

Albert King smoked a pipe and sang ‘Born Under a Bad Sign’ while backed up by Booker T and the MGs. His album King Does the King’s Things was a gather up of songs which had become rather more associated with Elvis Presley – a King of another sort altogether. Albert recorded for Stax Records and turned out some fine selections of funky blues and in later years did a turn with Gary Moore.

King Curtis was a horn player who honked along on things like ‘Yakety Yak’ by The Coasters and also made some fine party blues of his own. He worked as Aretha Franklin’s arranger and bandleader, played on John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’ and died on a New York sidewalk, trying to break up a fight outside his home. His real name was Curtis Ousley.

King Tubby operated a reggae sound system and was a pioneer of dub. An innovator along with Lee Perry, King Tubby was also known as Scientist and his great recordings are now available on CD on Blood And Fire records.

Other Kings include Carole King who wrote nearly every pop song on the planet including ‘Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?’, ‘Up on the Roof’, ‘Crying In the Rain’, ‘Natural Woman’ and so on – every time you see the name Goffin-King, – that’s her. Ben E. King sang ‘Save the Last Dance For Me’ when he replaced Clyde McPhatter in The Drifters. His real name is that of a minor royal – Benjamin Earl Robinson – and as a solo act, he recorded ‘Stand By Me’ – a song which he wrote with Leiber and Stoller. King Oliver predated Louis Armstrong, King Pleasure was a jazz vocalist well worth checking out, The Kingsmen recorded a fine version of ‘Louie Louie’, King Crimson were prog-rock, Paul King wore a Claddagh ring and Jonathan King just annoyed people.

The remainder of any programme on the royal theme might include Prince, Prince Far I, Prince Buster, Gene Chandler (The Duke of Earl), Bob & Earl, The Asbury Dukes, George Duke, Duke Ellington, The Majestics, Lord Kitchener, The Regents, The Five Royales, Queen, Queen Latifah, The Teen Queens, the Monarchs and The Del-Lords.

So thank you to the BB King fan for his suggestion. A radio show with some (but not all) of the above would do just royally. And I almost forgot – The Royal Showband. And the new album from King Sunny Ade. Long live, etc.

• John Kelly presents the Eclectic Ballroom, Mon-Fri on Today FM – 7-9pm.