GET WIRED
WALLACE MARX JR.
Larry Taylor, Jerry Lee Lewis and Gear that Comes and Goes
We’ve all seen it. That guitar we saved so long
for, that we swore we’d never sell, ends up
paying the rent one month. The amp we lusted
after as the ultimate font of tone all of a sudden
becomes fair game for a trade. Or, we go on a
hunt through the old milk crate for a stompbox
we haven’t seen in a while only to remember
that we last had it when we jammed with that
one guy who left early, and mysteriously.
Sundown Club—which would later turn into
the Red Velvet and then the Lingerie Club.
Taylor gets himself an audition and is hired
by The Killer on the spot. The next night he
plays the first gig of what would become a
year-and-a-half tenure.
amp, which he’d be in charge of. I’d adjust my
tone on the bass. And that’d be it: a Bogen
PA and a Fender Bassman.”
Larry Taylor has seen plenty of gear. Known to
some as “the Mole,” he played in the seminal
American blues band Canned Heat. If you’ve
seen the original Woodstock documentary
film, that’s him throttling a P-Bass for all it’s
got, rocking out to the extreme at sundown
on the first day. I could end this column
right there, such is the magnitude of that
statement. But Taylor’s crazy ride through
rock ‘n’ roll—and the mountains of gear that
have passed through his hands—would then
remain untold. His story goes much further,
much deeper, and much wider than almost
any other living rocker, and it’s a great peek
into how music and gear have evolved and
changed and touched upon the lives of so
many people worldwide. It offers an insight
into how the people, the gear, and the gigs
are all connected.
After some gigs around Los Angeles, Taylor
travels to Memphis in a four-door 1959
Cadillac with The Killer, drummer Russell P.
Smith, and Lewis’ manager. A set of drums, a
As the tour winds down toward the end of
1962, Taylor finds himself alone with the tweed
Fender Bassman in a Memphis hotel room. Still
in possession of his Fender bass, he had also
acquired an early sunburst Strat, one of the
first in Memphis—owned at some point by Sun
Rockabilly artist Roland Janes. Without Jerry
As the tour winds down toward the end of
1962, Larry finds himself alone with the tweed
Fender Bassman in a Memphis hotel room.
tweed Fender Bassman, and Larry’s sunburst
1957 Fender Precision bass with anodized
pickguard make the trip in the trunk. After
a couple of gigs in Memphis, the crew
heads down to Lafayette, LA, then to Lewis’
hometown of Faraday, where Taylor is taken
in by the Lewis family as one of their own.
After a few days, the group leaves the small
town to go on an extended tour of the
Southern US, crisscrossing Alabama, Georgia,
Florida, Texas, and Louisiana in their Cadillac,
playing every good hall, every bad hall, and
most every VFW in between.
Lee, without a gig, and without money, Taylor
decides the best thing to do is to make his
way back to L.A. So he packs up the gear and
sends it ahead collect, something you could do
in those days. Then he hitchhikes his way back.
So for kicks, and for learning, here’s the
story of when Taylor, at the tender age of
19, went on tour with Jerry Lee Lewis. Don’t
worry, there’s gear talk in here. It’s mid-
1961 and 19-year-old Larry Taylor is playing
bass in a regular gig at the Sea Witch on
Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. The group is
Wesley Reynolds and the West Coast House
Rockers. (Reynolds, who has the distinction
of having cut the classic single “Shut Down”
for the Valor label, moved to Chicago a few
years after the time of this little tale and was
seen by a young guitarist named Michael
Bloomfield, who would go on to say that it
was Reynolds’ playing that compelled him to
go out and learn to play the blues.)
Back at the Sea Witch a few months later,
Taylor looks down from the bandstand to see
two of Mr. Lewis’ close associates giving him
the high sign (or something similar). At break,
they inform him that The Killer wants his gear
back. Fessing up, Taylor tells them the Strat
is gone, but they can have the Bassman. Fair
enough, they say. Later that evening, Taylor
drops off the Bassman at Lewis’ hotel room,
no questions asked.
Gear cometh, and gear goeth.
Back at the Sea Witch, during a set break,
a couple of girls tell Taylor that Jerry Lee
Lewis is looking for a bass player. Lewis
was playing that week at Jimmy Madden’s
Here’s how Taylor describes the gear situation
at a Jerry Lee Lewis club gig in 1961 (think
about it the next time you do soundcheck at
your local non-smoking club where they have
an 800-watt PA, floor monitors, and a mix for
each guy in the band): “Most of the time, the
place would have a Bogen PA, like the ones
you see come up sometimes… 25, maybe 30
watts—tubes. Jerry Lee would mic his piano
with a De Armond violin pickup. They were
about the size of your thumb, maybe a little
wider. He’d wrap it in a handkerchief and
then shove that thing into one of the gaps in
the back of the club’s upright piano, right up
against the soundboard. Then he’d plug into
the Bassman. I’d plug into the Bassman, too.
There was only one set of controls on that
Wallace Marx Jr.
Wallace Marx Jr. is the author of Gibson Amplifiers,
1933–2008: 75 Years of the Gold Tone
