Hey, Pachuco!

Spit, Smoke, Switchblades, Swagger,
Satin & Soul: 
The Stylized Aura Of Willy DeVille

Remembering Willy DeVille (1950-2009), Part 1 of 3

Friday, February 04, 2011

“Willy DeVille knows the truth of a city street and the courage in a ghetto love song. And the harsh reality in his voice and phrasing is yesterday, today, and tomorrow — timeless in the same way that loneliness, no money, and troubles find each other and never quit for a minute.” ---- Doc Pomus

In the world of rock, much has been said of Alex Chilton's death in March of 2010, citing his influence on a subsequent generation of rock n' roll music makers who would routinely credit him in reverence. Likewise there's been plenty of praise for Don Van Vliet as well, a blues avant-gardist whose name is frequently prefaced with the word, 'maverick.' Admittedly, both artists played key roles in the shaping of modern music, and both mens deaths are certainly noteworthy and sad. But for me, the greater and possibly even more significant loss for rock music occurred back in 2009 with the passing of Willy DeVille. DeVille was neither a role model, nor an innovator, but rather a alchemist. A consummate showman who wholeheartedly embraced the principles of the Brill Building sound and song craft, mixing them with elements from our great melting pot ---- mariachi, blues, flamenco, do-wop --- to create an unusual blend of music that was uniquely American. But more so, DeVille was a romantic, and in my world, a sentimentalist will always trump a nonconformist, particularly if he or she carry themselves with style and aplomb. And Willy DeVille had style in spades.

"Cool is cool and it can’t be defined, refined, faked, imitated, put on, made up, manufactured, passed on, passed out, or taught in school. And Willy DeVille was definitely cool. He epitomized cool, the coolest of cats. And he could dance a little too. Angelic and tough, dapper and disdainful, feminine and manly, soul boy and rocking man, he carved out a niche that was totally his own in the infamous haze of CBGB’s burgeoning punk scene with his exquisitely monikered band, Mink DeVille. Willy was skinnier than a menthol cigarette, resplendent in luxuriant pastels, with skyscraper hair and mondo boots pumping time, suit jacket slung over his shoulder in pure Sinatra style. A suave bantam weight with pure New York vibes emanating out of every pore. Lithe and leonine, he trotted out his very own personal version of blended up blues, r&b, and 4/4 rock and roll with only an attitude that might be classified as 'punk."

DeVille commanded the stage as he switched up from guitarslinger to harp-blower to rock brayer to spotlight crooner --- a performer drenched in cool, vibrating cool, hand-delivering cool. One look at this William turned Willy and you just knew he was the all-time slow dancer, just as long as his partner didn’t mind the switchblade in his pocket that was pressing against her thigh. Assemble a checklist of rock and roll cool --- electric Dylan, purple Prince, exiled Keith Richards, junked-up Johnny Thunders, twenty flight Eddie Cochran --- and know, especially those privileged enough to have caught the man live, that Willy Boy was on the top of that chart, a significant factor in the overall annals of rock and roll. Willy may be heading where angels fear to tread, strutting the 'Cadillac Walk' or doing up the 'Spanish Stroll,' eternally searching for his 'Venus of Avenue D,' but no doubt about it, he’s bringing the 'Cool' with him."

Despite his erroneous association with the 'punk' movement, DeVille was instead a throwback to another era, a time when the look, the sound, the stance, and the chops all counted for something. His group, Mink DeVille were an outright r&b band in a 3 chord world, and DeVille himself, just an old fashioned soul singer. Together they brought the vibe and command of the Harlem's Apollo Theater to the Bowery scene at a time when ragged songs of teenaged angst played by misfits in black leather jackets, safety pins, and tight pants were all the rage. But DeVille approached his music and stage persona with such passion, authenticity, and flair that he nearly appeared to be an apparition.

To quote Neil McCormick of London's, Daily Telegraph:

"DeVille and his band reached deep into blues and soul, the classic romantic pop of Ben E. King and The Drifters, with a side order of Spanish spices and New Orleans Zydeco swing. They favored castanets over tom-toms, and accordion over distorted guitars, and Willy delivered his vocals with a sweet, tuneful flexibility that brought out the emotional resonance beneath his nasal sneer. What the wiry, dapper DeVille had that tied him to fellow CBGB resident bands like The Ramones, Television, Blondie and Talking Heads was an edge. He was drawing on some of the same musical areas that Bruce Springsteen's epic rock dipped into, but Willy was an entirely different creature, a macho dandy in a pompadour and pencil mustache, with the dangerous air of a New York gang fighter and an underbelly vulnerability that came out through the romanticism of his music. While Springsteen sounded like he was your friend in desperate times, DeVille sounded like he couldn't quite decide whether to serenade you or pull a knife on you."

And to paraphrase critic, Robert Palmer:

"DeVille embodies New York's tangle of cultural contradictions while making music that's both idiomatic, in the broadest sense, and utterly original."

Palmer's remarks are spot on. Despite DeVille's romance with a bygone era, his love for the sound and feel of those scratchy old 45rpm singles that populated his impressionable youth, allowed him to approach his own material with enough genuine understanding of the past to actually create something new out of it. To do this he recruited producer, Jack Nitzsche and saxophonist, Steve Douglas, both of whom under the tutelage of Phil Spector were the architects of the famed 'Wall of Sound.' Collectively the three men produced sounds that transcended those of the day, evoking an earlier time with such an organic feeling that it nearly seemed as though the British Invasion, Flower Power, Progressive Rock, Country Rock, Arena Rock, and Punk Rock had never even happened. Yet they made it sound inexplicably fresh and downright exciting. Then enters the legendary Doc Pomus, a songwriter's songwriter. Floored by DeVille's work, it was he himself who approached the young band leader to suggest they team up for the purpose of co-penning new material together. Armed with new validation from one the key figures in the development of popular music, Willy DeVille was given the necessary confidence to continue crafting a wholly unique and original body of work that today remains unparalleled in the history of rock music. 

About The Mix

'Hey, Pachuco!' will be the first of three posts devoted to the music of Willy DeVille. 'Spit, Smoke, Switchblades, Swagger, Satin & Soul' focuses on the Mink DeVille Band and Willy's first six recordings --- the New York and Paris years. Only his debut, 'Cabretta' and its follow-up, 'Return To Magenta' feature his original band consisting of Louis X. Erlanger on guitar, Rubén Sigüenza on bass, Bobby Leonards at the piano & keyboards, and Manfred Allen on drums. After that, all subsequent recordings under the name of Mink Deville featured the likes of various hired guns such as Kenny Margolis on accordion, the well known French arranger, Jean-Claude Petit providing string arrangements, the irrepressible Jake Allen and Bunky Skinner sitting in, plus members of both Elvis Presley's rhythm section and the Muscle Shoals rhythm section.

Spit, Smoke, Switchblades, Swagger, Satin & Soul
 
1) Spanish Stroll
2) Mixed Up, Shook Up Girl
3) She's So Tough
4) Cadillac Walk
5) Gunslinger
6) Venus Of Avenue D
7) Little Girl
8) 'A' Train Lady
9) Let Me Dream If I Want To
10) I Broke That Promise
11) Each Word's A Beat Of My Heart
12) This Must Be The Night
13) You Better Move On
14) River Of Tears
15) Savoire Faire
16) Just To Walk That Little Girl
17) Mazurka
18) End Of The Line
19) Are You Lonely Tonight?
20) Teardrops Must Fall
21) Keep You Monkey Away From My Door
22) You Just Keep Holding On
23) Bad Boy
24) Help Me Make It (Power Of A Woman's Love)





Source material for 'Spit, Smoke, Switchblades, Swagger, Satin & Soul' comes from the following:
Cabretta (Europe) Mink DeVille (US) (1977)/Return To Magenta (1978)
La Chat Bleu (1980)/Coup De Grâce (1981)
Where Angels Fear To Tread (1983)/Sportin' Life (1985)