| February 16, 2018 | |||||||||
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Lyrics: Ah, you can talk about the pit barbecue
They doing the mess around Ah, everybody was juiced, you can bet your soul They doing the mess around Now ah, when I say stop don’t you move a peg I declare, do the mess around Now let me have it there, boy Now this band’s going to play from 9 to 1 They doing the mess around Now you see that girl with that diamond ring I declare she can mess around Get It: Ray Charles’ first album doesn’t appear to be available for digital purchase on Amazon, but while searching for it, I came across this killer deal, which contains 30 of Charles’ most popular tracks for just $6. I bought it myself. If you’re just looking for the Mess Around single, you can find it here: Lastly, Charles’ posthumously released Genius Loves Company is stellar; it’s available here: |
Of course, the great Ray Charles needs precious little introduction, though I do think he is quite underappreciated among the all-time musical greats. Born Ray Charles Robinson in 1930, Ray lost his sight from glaucoma around age seven. At just three years old, Charles started playing piano, and after losing his sight he attended a school for the deaf and blind where he was taught to play classical piano. For Charles, however, learning to play meant that he had to learn via the arduous process of learning braille music, which requires the learner to learn the left-hand piano movements by reading braille with the right hand, and then learning the right-hand piano movements while reading braille with the left hand—and THEN, putting the two together. Eventually, Charles would play in a variety of bands and clubs, and he dropped his first record in 1950. However, Charles would eventually break big in 1952 with the release of his self-titled debut, which contained today’s featured track, Mess Around. Later that same year, he scored hits with It Should’ve Been Me and Don’t You Know, and recorded Midnight Hour and Sinner’s Prayer (another Dances with Bass staff fave).  Charles would go on to release 55—fifty-five—studio albums, 7 live albums, and 127 singles in his 57-year career as a musician. Among his many accolades, he was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, was one of the first inductees into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, received Kennedy Star Honors, won a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, was awarded the National Medal of the Arts, and the 2005 Grammy Awards were dedicated to him. The United States Postal Service also issued a stamp honoring Charles in 2013. So influential was Charles’ work that Rolling Stone’s music editor said, “The hit records he made for Atlantic in the mid-50s mapped out everything that would happen to rock ‘n’ roll and soul music in the years that followed.” Charles influenced the very pioneers of rock music, including artists from Elvis Presley to Pink Floyd. In 2004, Charles died of acute liver disease. At the time of his death, he was working on a compilation record, Genius Loves Company, in which he performed with a host of big-name musicians, including Van Morrison, BB King, Elton John, Bonnie Raitt, Gladys Knight, Willie Nelson, James Taylor, and Norah Jones. Charles’ duet with BB King in which they perform Sinner’s Prayer (originally written by Lowell Fulson and made a hit by Charles in 1954) is worth the price of admission. Sadly, Charles would die two months before Genius Loves Company was released. And if nothing else makes you want to listen to today’s track, I urge you to scroll down to the third video below, which is from the 1987 hit comedy, Planes, Trains and Automobiles. In this famous scene, Del Griffith (portrayed by the late John Candy) positively rocks out to Mess Around while flying down an icy highway with Neal Page (portrayed by Steve Martin) asleep in the passenger seat. To this day, when I hear a good piano boogie while I’m in the car, I think about John Candy using the dashboard as a keyboard. Video: No official video for this song was made, but I did find this nifty video of people who appear to be dancing to Mess Around. And below, I’ve included a live performance of the song and a Hollywood appearance that you’re sure to remember.
Here, Ray Charles performs Mess Around live (year unknown):
And lastly, if your sense of humor is in the same ballpark as mine, then Planes, Trains & Automobiles hits you in all the right places, too. The movie contains a number of famous scenes, but perhaps the best of the bunch is John Candy’s wild midnight drive while listening to Ray Charles’ Mess Around and smoking an ill-fated cigarette.
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