Webb Wilder Jammin' At Hippie Jacks 2010. (Another Stinky Production)

Anyone with a passing familiarity with Webb Wilder knows The Webb Wilder Credo: “Work hard, rock hard, eat hard, sleep hard, grow big, wear glasses if you need 'em!”

He adopted the name/persona Webb Wilder from a character he played in the short film Webb Wilder Private Eye, and he went on to appear in Peter Bogdanovich’s 1993 feature film The Thing Called Love,  Blessed with a resonant, authoritative voice, he was also one of the first Satellite celebrity Radio DJ’s.

Wilder is one of those guys who has never put out a bad album, thirty-five years in, and who augments the songs he writes with great taste in covers.  He’s better than most at coming up with tasty album titles as well—like: Born To Be Wilder, Doo Dad, & Scattered, Smothered & Covered.  Not to mention naming backing bands: The Nashvegans, The Beatnecks, and The Drapes.

If this is your first exposure to “The Last Of The Full-Grown Men” I feel he dwells in the Bermuda Triangle formed in the area between Tom Petty, Dwight Yoakam, & Southern Culture On The Skids.

This is a set recorded at Hippie Jacks in 2010 that includes what I’d consider Webb’s best song Tough It Out, and wraps up with two staples of his live shows: The Flamin’ Groovies’ Slow Death and the Big Joe Williams classic Baby Please Don’t Go.  In the course of his live rendition of the latter, Webb inserts a story about asking Big Joe Williams what are your favorite songs you ever recorded?  Joe replied with Baby Please Don’t Go and Highway 49.  Webb asked: “Didn’t Howlin’ Wolf do Highway 49?  And Big Joe said: “He TRIED.”

Wilder’s stage patter, and his introductions to songs are as original, entertaining, and irreverent as the man himself.  Part of Wilder’s charm is his ability to utilize all of his talents in the course of a single show—even the solo set I saw. The big man from Mississippi powers through a performance by pulling out all his tricks from his tongue-in-cheek seriousness, his acting chops, expert pacing, reverence for the musicians that came before him, and his stellar playing and backing bands.

Regular visitors to Jokonky Blog know that trivia is “the wind beneath my stinks” and Webb Wilder shares his May 19 birthday with Joey Ramone, Pete Townshend, Dusty Hill, Phil Rudd, Grace Jones, & Shooter Jennings.  

To my knowledge, this live set is available no where else in album form—it’s another one of my Homemade Records—just like mama used to make!