1951


"that's where the men hang out at"

B.B. King, Three O'Clock Blues.

"H-Bomb" Ferguson first met B.B. King before King's debut at the Apollo in Harlem.

"When I saw B.B., man, I laughed. This cat came out on stage with a purple suit, red shirt and green tie."

King begged to differ: "No, it was a red suit with a red tie with red shoes. Red and black socks and black shoes...they just talked about me so much, talked about me so bad that I went and changed it." (from a 1992 article by David S. Rotenstein.)

Lowell Fulson's "Three O'Clock Blues" was King's seventh single, RPM 339, which by Christmas 1951 had become his first number-one R&B hit. (Ike Turner might be playing piano on it.) You can find it here.

Note from the Mgt.: Wrapping up 1951 next week. And rather than going straight ahead into '52, there will be...something else. I found that I enjoyed doing the New York song sets back in April, so I'm doing more thematic sets between "years". Hope you enjoy.