Leslie Johnson a.k.a. "Lazy Lester" was born on June 20, 1933, in Torras, Lousiana. His nickname was given to him by producer Jay Miller due to his laid-back, easygoing style.
Lazy Lester was an influential American blues musician, and a key figure in the development of the blues sub-genre known as "Swamp Blues", which incorporates elements of zydeco, Cajun, country, and rockabilly.
His distinctive harmonica playing, gnarled vocals, and guitar and drum talents made him a pivotal artist for the legendary Excello Records label in the 1950s and 1960s. During his tenure at Excello, he not only released records under his own name, but contributed songs and also served as a sideman for other blues legends such as Slim Harpo, Katie Webster and Lightnin’ Slim. His musical contributions often included harmonica, guitar, and percussion, and he frequently improvised using items like cardboard boxes and rolled up newspapers for drum sticks.
In the mid 1960s, Lazy Lester grew tired of working smoky juke joints for little to no pay, and took manual labor jobs as a truck driver, worked in a Detroit auto plant, and was even a lumberjack.
Lazy Lester was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2012 and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Boston Blues Society in 2002.
He continued to perform at major festivals, including the Ponderosa Stomp (named after one of his songs), and even appeared in a national commercial for the auto insurance company, Geico shortly before his death in 2018.
'I Hear You Knockin'! The Excello Singles' was released in 1994 on the Excello label which at the time was a subsidiary of the AVI label (it's now part of Universal Music Group).
To me, this thirty song collection is the definitive Lazy Lester release, and a great introduction to Lazy Lester's laid-back, haunting and hypnotic Louisiana sound. This is a comprehensive exploration, that delves into the singles that shaped his early career and created his legacy in blues music.
For the freeload, what was the worst job you ever had?
In 1973, my husband Jerry and I lived for a year in Bristol, England. Jerry had recently received his PhD, and was offered a position at the British Aircraft Corporation.
ReplyDeleteI took a job teaching mathematics at the Red Maids' school (founded in 1634), which was an all-girls school. It was a total nightmare! The other teachers didn’t like me, and treated me with contempt, and as an interloper. They also called me “The Yank” behind my back. The headmistress had BO, and I believe she was there for the opening day ceremony in 1634. The classrooms were cold and damp, and the “school dinners” (lunch) were a crime against humanity.
The students liked me, because I didn’t talk down to them, and I got to know some of older girls more or less as friends. One morning, as I was walking to the front of the classroom I overheard two girls talking, and one said to the other, “If you do it standing up, you won’t get 'up the duff' (UK slang for pregnant)”. When the class ended, I told the two girls to stay behind. I explained to them that they could get pregnant doing it standing up, and they should be using a condom every time (at their age in 1973 England, they couldn’t get the pill without parental approval).
About a week later, one of teacher overheard one of the girls saying, “Miss Babs said that you could get up the duff doing it standing up, and should use condoms.” The teacher reported me to the headmistress, and I was unceremoniously fired…
I was a dispatcher to drivers that travelled to either unloaded product (tank truck) or apply product (tank truck with sprayer). Besides our plant there were locations in several states that could supply product. The drivers were subject to DOT laws (drive time, regular hours, overtime hours & mileage). Sometimes drivers would leave home prepared for a 3 day trip. I was forced by my boss to keep them away for as long as was legally possible, I forget now, maybe 10 days. The logistics part was great, trying to run an efficient route & actually get them home, maintenance for the vehicles & reschedule the next trip. Somehow, my boss wound up coming up with alternate routines that would maximize time away from home. She was essentially doing the evil method of my job so I had to lie routinely to the drivers, the lying was the worst, I had no choice. Until one day I made my choice. I had just received a great review, gotten a big raise and was led to believe that I'd get to make the decisions. I got paid more but I still had to lie. I lasted 1 week after review & raise. She wouldn't stop her evil ways. There was a big, blowout fight in the office, I said things I shouldn't have that I still kinda regret - but not that much & left. I walked away from the highest paying job I ever had up to that point. I'm not a fan of lying & that's why I left, I could not continue with it, & I made sure that everybody knew. Thanks Babs
ReplyDeleteAs a teen I took a job in a donut shop. Big mistake! On my first day on the job, I was greeted by a large vet containing a rancid smelling iceberg of congealed grease. After bringing it up to a bubbling temperature, the rings of dough were deposited in the grease. Once browned on one side, the 48 sizzling rings had to be flipped very quickly using a pair of chopsticks. I proved hopeless at this incinerating more donuts than I rescued from the grease. Having failed at this key function, the manager put me to work filling the jelly filled donuts with gooey substances in various flavors. This entailed standing at a machine with two injectors and stabbing the donuts onto them, then operating the machine with a knee lever. Hold the lever a moment too long, and the donuts exploded, spattering their strawberry, blueberry, and pineapple–smelling contents all over the machine, the walls, and me. Shortly after that the manager, and I mutually agreed there was no future for me in the donut industry. One enduring effect of this experience is the fact I loathe the smell and taste of donuts to this day.
ReplyDeleteFor a Summer job while in college, I worked at a soda bottling company. All the machinery was second-hand, about 50 years old and broke down on a regular basis. One day we were filling a thousand cases of root beer or something. We started late due to mechanical problems, and once the process started it must be completed. About half way thru, I noticed that the syrup we mixed with carbonated water was almost gone. I went to the boss, but he had already gone home & left his teenage son in charge.
ReplyDeleteHe had set the ratio to double syrup and said oh well, just finish the run and don't tell anybody. I quit the next day.
When I was a little kid in Brooklyn, every Saturday the seltzer truck made a delivery to our house. Our standing order was 6 seltzer bottles (the kind used in Slapstick) for my father’s scotch and soda. They also delivered off-brand soda in very thick glass bottles that were 28oz, we’d get a mixed case of orange and lime sodas (both flavors looked “DayGlo”), that my mother liked and a case of cola for my brother and me. The cola tasted like it had at least twice the syrup of Coke or Pepsi. We loved it.
DeleteI always wondered what they did with that batch. The plant closed about a year later...
Delete2 come to mind, early on (age 18) I became a manager of one of a local chain of gas stations... the area boss wanted me to put in 12 hour days (which included evenings spying on the afternoon shift from across the street) for a paltry $500 a month. Later on I was employed by a firm owned by family friends who were driving a once profitable firm into the ground. And I'd get screamed at for doing my job...
ReplyDeleteapualing, I feel your pain. Summer I had just turned 16, 5 of us from the basketball team were hired to put up drywall by the father of one of the guys. That first day (a Monday) I ruined an impressive amount of drywall despite this poor guy in charge trying to help me. Next morning was no better and at lunch the guy's dad rolled up in his pickup, pulled me aside, handed me a broom, and said, your job is to sweep up. Friday at 4P was payday and as he handed me my 75USD or so in cash for the week he kindly told me I should find another job. Worked the rest of that summer at a department store selling blue jeans.
ReplyDeleteBest worst job I had was the summer I was 15 shucking oysters and being a barback for Coach Ruiz at his bar/restaurant which was best known for his three seriously gorgeous daughters who waited tables and were all very kind to my gangly, gawkish self. I still have a scar on my left hand I gashed open when Sharon, the middle one who was a year older than me, gave me a smile and told me I was cute. I about died--from her remark, not the gash, which AJ, the old Black man who ran the bar, "fixed" with a piece of duct tape, a miracle product I'd later learn to love in bands.
7-11 convenience store in Costa Mesa California, first job at 15 years old. Stocking the beverage cooler and sweeping but mostly playing the arcade games (~1989). Cop comes in, I'm playing video games and he asks for my home phone #. I give it to him and he calls my dad on the 7-11 phone and says something like "Sir, we have your son down here at the police station, you're going to have to come and pick him up"...
ReplyDeleteNot a job in the sense of being paid, but in 8th grade I volunteered to work at the local SPCA. Thought I would be there to feed, pet and walk the housed animals. Nah........ they had me helping to pitch drugged animals into an incinerator. Left early, went home, and refused to talk about what I had done to anyone.
ReplyDeleteoh my god
DeleteLink
ReplyDeletehttps://workupload.com/file/VbBkkwNVeRc
Dairy farm during high school. Got paid sub-minimum wage because of the agricultural exemption and risked death and dismemberment seven days a week. I still shudder over the stupid risks I took with sharp spinning implements of distruction.
ReplyDeleteWhat? No 'Derek & Clive Live' quotes?
ReplyDeleteClive:
What’s- was the worst job you had?
Derek:
The worst job I ever had? Yeah- (sniffs and clears throat)
Clive:
What, was just that? Coughing?
Derek:
Well, I had to collect up-, i-, it was a very difficult job. I had to collect up every year – financial year, you know, A-, April…
Clive:
Every ear? Whose ears did you collect up?
Derek:
… A-, no, wait, no, ‘year’. April to April.
And it gets rapidly worse from there
Y'all are making me realize how privileged I have been!
ReplyDeleteWorst job was one six-month period during a 27-year run at one company. A new general manager looked for ways to get me to quit so that he'd realize salary savings from hiring someone much cheaper than me. Unsurprisingly, I understood the "game" in that organization a little better than him (decades of working there vs. experience elsewhere), so I grit my teeth during his harassment and petty b.s. and outlasted the bastard.
The board then hired a new g.m. with extensive human relations experience; he got me laid off after six more months, but (1) without harassment, (2) by a legal and relatively-fair process, and (3) allowed me to legally collect unemployment insurance for the first six months of my job search. So, I wasn't happy about it, but I also wasn't mad or litigious.
Like I wrote, I've had it pretty easy, even if that six months was ridiculous and stressful.
D in California
Ugh, I've had a bunch of lousy jobs while an undergrad and grad student:
ReplyDelete- Delivering phone books to every apartment in our college town (since we were paid by volume, most ended up in huge piles behind my fence)
- Telemarketing tickets for the "paramedics ball," the proceeds of which didn't actually go to the paramedics. Involved laying down some heavy guilt trips on people who didn't hang up.
- Retail inventory auditor where we would count every piece of merchandise in a store. Nothing like counting nuts and bolts in a k-mart store overnight for 12 hours
- Substitute teacher for a bunch of middle and high schools. No respect I tell ya!