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Harry “Mac” McClintock, The Bum Song / Hallelujah! I’m A Bum; Victor 78
I’ve told you about how I discovered this song, and how then it turned up in the backstock on the bottom of a pile of old 78s that Justin was sorting out. I brought it home yesterday and I’ve played it about 20 times already on my Magnavox cabinet player.
Recorded in 1926, this song has to be considered one of the masterpieces in the history of American folk music. As Gerard said, the most humble and unusual song he has ever heard. There’s something magic about this - it’s the only song I’ve heard that sings praises for having nothing. And it romanticizes being a bum or a hobo - something that I’ve always secretly wished I could be (maybe for just a month or so).
You can listen here. I don’t have my 78 player hooked up to my recording program.
Somebody gave me an old oak cabinet hi-fi record player a few days ago. I’d been looking for one to play 78s, and was quite excited when I plugged it in and the old thing cranked up and actually worked. It’s a Magnavox, the first company to make one like this.
We’ve had some 78s lying around for a while in the back office, and a few thousand in the warehouse, so I dug out a few hundred and brought them to the front for a drafting battle.
As one of the perks of owning a record store, Justin and I will take some home off most collections we buy. We call it “drafting”, we’ll go through ‘em all and agree to take the ones we want, sometimes one for one, sometimes five for five, but we have to agree on each deal. There are many tricks we’ve learned to try to hustle the other out of the good ones. Yesterday was no exception. We were at it for a good two hours, arguing, pleading, refusing, agreeing, playing ‘em, and finally ending up with about 20-30 each.
They were mostly blues, jazz, rhythm and blues, and folk. My favorite was Grandpa Jones and His Grandchildren, Make Me A Pallet on King. I have a Furry Lewis version and a Mississippi John Hurt version and a few others, but I had never heard of Grandpa Jones. I also got an early Memphis Slim, a Hootie McShann, a Reverend M. Larry Franklin, and a great song about being a bum on Perfect. Justin got a very cool Jimmy Rodgers, an early Roy Milton Specialty, the original version of Rock Around the Clock and a bunch of other cool stuff that I tried to get too. It was fun, and a pretty even match.
