Danny Coleman Interview of Texas Scratch
“I’m near Dallas Fortworth Airport; only about 15 minutes from there,” began guitarist BudWhittington of the “Sort of” recently formed band, Texas Scratch.
“Texas Scratch” is the name of the album but it’s become the name of the band as the band exists,” he continued. “Jim and I live close together, he lives 30 miles from me in Dallas and we see each other quite often but Vince lives in Denver these days and hopefully, maybe this Spring when everything clears up a little bit, we can get out and play a little bit. It was the original guy in New York who recorded this thing who called it “Texas Scratch” because I’ve got this song I contributed to this thing called, “I’ve Got The Itch But I Ain’t Got The Scratch” and he said, “So, let’s call it “Texas Scratch” and I said, “Why would that be?” He goes, “Well; doesn’t scratch mean money?” I said, “Well, I guess it could be construed that way” and that’s how that got going.”
Whittington, who has 15 years of playing with John Mayall on his resume and his friend, the aforementioned Jim Suhler, a long time member of George Thorogood’s Destroyers, along with guitarist and also previously mentioned Vince Converse teamed up to form this unit which also utilizes fellow Destroyer Jeff Simon on drums and former Savoy Brown bassist Nathaniel Peterson in the studio and previous live performances.
With that many heavyweights in the Blues music realm and a slew of quality recording studios in Texas; why did they come here, to Jersey to record the record?
“I was with John Mayall until around 2008 and it was a wonderful time of my life; you can only get what you can get when you can get it; you know what I mean? It was a wonderful 15 year period. I got to play with all of my heroes and see the world; at the time we had a three year old and an infant and I said, “Hey babe, I’m hitting the road with John Mayall (laughs)” but everything worked out fine, my house is paid off and both kids are grown so we must’ve had some success.”
“Yes,” he went on, “Simon plays with George Thorogood also and so does Jim and we came to Jersey to record the album,” he started slowly and with a laugh. “We jumped in Jim’s van one night and took off for Dover, NJ and went to a place called Showplace Studio which is an unusual little place; it’s half strip bar and half recording studio (laughs). There was a poster on the wall that Leslie West had signed and it said, “The Showplace, best sounding room, worst looking girls.” When told that all they needed were whiskey and cigars; he continued, “You probably could’ve found both if you looked around a little bit.”
Interestingly enough, the current record isn’t really that “Current” as the “New” album was actually crafted in the past.
“It has been so long ago, it’s hard to remember every detail but Arnie Goodman in New York had Blue Storm Records and he had been working with Vince Converse on the Peter Green tribute album called, “Rattlesnake Guitar” and Vince had been recording with Ben Elliott in the studio and Ben sadly passed away before the album came out and Nathaniel Peterson has also crossed over too and we knew him from playing with Kim Simmonds and Savoy Brown and we just jumped in Jim’s van, drove up there and started recording and then the album never did get completely mixed and it was put on a shelf; we did this in 2009 so, it’s been 14 or 15 years. It was picked up by Bruce Quarto and Mike Carden at Quarto Valley Records and they’ve done a really good job of getting it out there for the people to see and hear; we’re just happy to see it finally getting a little attention because we were actually sort of young men when we did it (laughs).”
When you bring this many talented guitarists together; how did they decide on the material?
“We all wrote two or three songs for the album; I think I had two plus a cover from a local guy down here in Texas who you might have heard of in the early ’70s; Johnny Nitzinger. He had an album called “Nitzinger” and there is a tune there called, “Louisiana Cock Fight” and he was a big hero to us aspiring guitar players back then and we threw that in as kind of a hat tip to him. I also had “Texas Trio” and “I’ve Got The Scratch.” Those were my tunes and Jim had “I’d rather Be Lucky Than Good” and “Showdown” and another one. Vince had a King Solomon Hicks cover and three others. We got there and started playing around with them and did the basic tracks and got that all together before we headed for home and then Jim worked on them some when he got back to Dallas. He had his keyboard player come in and do some Hammond overdubs on it and a little bit of background vocals but it’s mostly just the three of us and Jeff and Nathaniel.”
They waited more than a decade to release the record but Whittington says it won’t be that long before they hit the stage.
“We’ve done a couple of shows here locally in Texas and we’ll see what happens; we’d like to get out and do some gigs behind it. Jeff I think is up for being in it with us and I’ve been working lately with my bass player from my local band and we have Jim’s Monkey Beat band, his drummer Beau Chadwell. Once everything settles down and everybody is up for it, we’re gonna get out and get some gigs going.”
To discover more about “Texas Scratch,” please visit https://quartovalleyrecords.com/