Buddy Ace "What Can I Do" (Duke, 1961) Jonathan Toubin's NY Night Train Party Platter

Born in Jasper, TX in 1936, Jimmie Lee Land was raised in a musical family in Baytown, a booming refinery town outside of Houston. He was in a gospel quartet in high school with the one and only Joe Tex. Tex won a number of Houston talent shows, including one that included the trip to New York where The Rapper won Amateur Night at The Apollo four times and was signed to King Records by legendary producer Henry Glover. Similarly Jimmie Lee Land was discovered at a Houston talent show by Duke/Peacock big bossman Don Robey. After the tragic oft-disputed suicide of Duke's biggest hitmaker Johnny Ace backstage at Houston’s City Auditorium Christmas Day 1954, Robey christened his top star’s brother, St. Clair Alexander, “Buddy Ace” to cash in on his famous sibling’s popularity. When the move didn’t pan out, Jimmie Lee Land became Duke Records’ new “Buddy Ace”. While never striking gold, he recorded a few minor hits and a number of standout sides during his Duke Records tenure that spanned a number of distinct musical eras, 1956 to 1969, from early rock’n’roll to funkier times. Buddy Ace, who went grey in the 1970s and became known as “The Silver Fox of the Blues,” continued to record and slay audiences on the road all the way up to his fatal heart attack onstage in Waco, TX December 26, 1994 - 40th years and a day after Johnny Ace’s death.

The "Screaming Please" writing credit Brown/Malone means that Texas Johnny Brown, the legendary Texas guitarist and author of Bobby Blue Bland's iconic "Two Steps From The Blues," was probably the writer. Deadric Malone is the pseudonym Don Robey to get writing credits on a number of Duke sides he wasn’t involved in composing. As this reveals so many of the dynamic brassy hallmarks of the stellar Bobby "Blue" Bland material of the era, until someone shows me different, I will conclude for now that 1) Duke's house arranger/trumpeter Joe Scott is threading the elaborate tapestry and 2) the band is the same killer all-star ensemble from "Two Steps From The Blues" driven by the dynamic beat of earth-shattering future James Brown drummer John "Jabo" Starks.