Delbert McClinton: Lost In A Dream & Early Tracks

Delbert McClinton wasn’t pleased when his “Crazy Cajun Recordings” for Huey P. Meaux were released, and he didn’t cooperate or share any session information.  Delbert’s a packrat whose treasure trove of mementos was opened to his biographer Diana Finlay Hendricks (author of Delbert McClinton: One Of The Fortune Few).   

It’s common practice that early recordings get released when an artist becomes famous—or that an odds & ends album is released by their former label when an artist scores a hit on another label.   

Houston’s Huey P. Meaux had a hand in many artists’ success, producing hits for George Jones, The Sir Douglas Quintet, Freddie Fender, The Big Bopper, and Barbara Lynn.  A former barber, Meaux used to say he went from “cutting hair to cutting hits,” and he got his start when records were still being sold out of the trunks of cars.  

Delbert recounted that he was recording for Meaux’s Fort Worth’s counterpart Major Bill Smith, who thought “If You Really Want Me To, I’ll Go” might have potential.  “He called up Huey Meaux in Houston, and played it for him.  Huey offered Bill five hundred dollars for the song on the spot.  That’s when Major Bill knew he had something.”  The song was licensed to Smash Records but was pulled off the air because the ownership of the publishing was clouded—becoming a country hit for Waylon Jennings in 1967.  

Major Bill recorded artists in a basement studio at a local radio station KFJZ, often hiring Delbert & The Rondells as the backing group.  That’s how Delbert wound up playing harmonica on Bruce Channel’s “Hey Baby”.  When there was time left on the clock, he’d let Delbert cut something.  Major Bill released at least 18 singles by Delbert’s band The Rondells between 1963 and 1970, several of them becoming regional hits.

That’s where a lot of the tracks on Lost In A Dream & Early Tracks are from.  Lost In A Dream became a bit of a holy grail for me.  I was unable to track down the cassette version that I found online, but pieced together the ten tracks listed from the best available sources.  In the process I found a whole mess of tracks on YouTube, & the rest were most likely recorded for Meaux.

Ronnie Kelly, Billy Sanders, & Delbert broke away from McClinton’s previous band The Straitjackets, and they combined Ronnie & Delbert’s first names to form their new band name, The Rondells (sometimes credited as The Ron-Dells).  

Delbert Part Three!

Stinky sez: You know someone’s a great artist when you put together a “Best Of” collection, and their Grammy winning duet with Bonnie Raitt doesn’t show up until the end of the third volume!  

Volume 3 also includes tracks of Delbert McClinton guesting on releases by Roy Buchanan & Frankie Miller.  McClinton’s a great duet partner, as evidenced by his three albums with his old friend, Glen Clark.

Clark had moved from Fort Worth TX to Laurel Canyon and wrote a letter to Delbert urging him to make the trip — explaining that the artists’ community was a place where audiences were hungry for singer/songwriters. The change in audience allowed Delbert the freedom to further develop his own unique mix of Texas Roadhouse Blues, country, R&B, and soul.  

Delbert seems to have more lifetime friends than the average recording artist.  As the old joke goes: “In show business, they stab you in the front.”  There's truth to that, but Delbert’s an exception. He’s still friends with members of his first bands, as well as Bruce Channel & Glen Clark — many of whom have joined him on his annual Sandy Beaches Cruise.  The next cruise leaves Fort Lauderdale on January 13th of 2024 and returns on January 20th.  

Another Bottle Of Wine With Delbert McClinton

What put Delbert McClinton on the map (says Stinky) was the song he wrote after that divorcee (the one who accompanied Delbert from Texas to Laurel Canyon) up and left him “sweepin’ out a warehouse in West LA.” “Two More Bottles Of Wine” became Emmylou Harris’s third #1 hit, and a country music staple.

Delbert had a #8 hit with fellow Texan Jerry Lynn Williams‘ “Giving It Up For Your Love”. Delbert's solo albums are consistently impressive, but none more than 1980's The Jealous Kind, which features "Giving It Up" and a performance of the title track which rivals Ray Charles' version. Most of the songs on Volume 1 are from this period. Delbert toured almost nonstop for the next ten years. There was a glaringly obvious Peruvian Marching Powder break during the (otherwise impressive) show I caught around 1985.

McClinton moved to Nashville and continued to write hits for others, while his own albums topped the blues charts. His most recent Grammy was a duet with Bonnie Raitt on “Good Man, Good Woman”.  Another duet with Tanya Tucker was a Top 5 hit. Duets with Iris DeMent and Kacey Jones are included in today's Best of Delbert McClinton, Vol. 2.

Delbert retired during the COVID pandemic, with the exception of his annual Sandy Beaches cruise — which is scheduled to set sail in 2024 with guests The Mavericks, Marcia Ball, Paul Thorn, The Band Of Heathens, Lee Roy Parnell, and more! His biography Delbert McClinton: One Of The Fortunate Few was published in 2017.

Hey Delbert! We Wanna Know If You'll Be On Our Blog

Delbert McClinton may be best-known among other singer/songwriters (Stinky writes), despite winning 4 Grammys and releasing 20 solo albums. While still in his teens, McClinton and his band played desegregated Texas roadhouses. They backed blues artists passing through (Bo Diddley, Lightnin' Hopkins, Muddy Waters), and accompanied Jimmy Reed and Sonny Boy Williamson on short Southern tours.

Delbert’s first taste of international fame came when he played the harmonica on Bruce Channel’s “Hey Baby”, which reached #1 in the US and #2 in the UK in 1962. At the time, pick-up bands were more likely to have horns than harmonica, but Channel insisted on Delbert.

I had never really even been out of Texas, (Delbert told Lonestar Music Magazine.) So to go to England was a big deal. As for meeting the Beatles… we were all on common ground at that point. We were the same age, we had the same dreams, we were going to do the same things, and on and on and on. And it wasn’t until after I’d been back from over there, maybe a year before the Beatles broke it wide open, that John (Lennon) mentioned to somebody in an interview that he was encouraged by the harmonica on “Hey Baby.” So that has been romanticized now to the point where “I taught him everything he knew.”

McClinton’s band The Ron-Dels put out a single Delbert wrote (“If You Really Want Me To, I’ll Go”) that reached the Top 20 in some cities. They also covered “Hey Baby”, augmenting Delbert’s harmonica with 60’s-era organ.

Delbert’s friend Glen Clark had moved to Laurel Canyon and urged Delbert to join him, explaining that the artists’ community was a place where audiences were hungry for singer/songwriters. Delbert’s girlfriend had a car and a divorce settlement, so they made the trip. “And just like that, we became hippies,” as Delbert recalls. In California, Delbert further developed his unique mix of Texas Roadhouse Blues, country, R&B, and soul.

The duo Delbert & Glen released several albums. 1972’s Clean was produced by T-Bone Burnett, and 1973’s Subject To Change included Delbert’s “Let Me Be Your Lover", which was covered by Dr. Hook. Glen Clark was also a solid songwriter: his "I Feel The Burden (Being Lifted Off My Shoulders)" became a hit for Rita Coolidge. After a brief thirty-year break, Delbert & Glen released Blind, Crippled, & Crazy in 2013.

The Blues Brothers covered Delbert's “B Movie Box Car Blues”, which was pretty racy for the time with a line that sounds like, “She said she sure could dig it if I rode her.” Never mind that the lyric sheet reads: “She parked inside of town, laid the Rambler down, she said she sure could dig if I'd knew her”. After regaling his intended with tales of various hookups in a Rambler, a DeSoto, & the titular boxcar with “a hobo woman”, Delbert brings it all home with: “Look for me Sunday, gonna be there honey, with something special just for you.”

Yeah, a mouthful of hot death.

At Belushi & Aykroyd’s insistence, Delbert appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed Chuck Berry’s “Talking ‘Bout You”, which is included in Volume 1 of The Best Of Delbert McClinton. Delbert was linked to another SNL alum when his song “Weatherman" was featured in Bill Murray’s Groundhog Day. Volume 2 to follow!