George Hendricks Interview, 2009

Abstract

George Hendricks was born in Alabama in 1942 and moved to Cleveland at the age of 7. He is a singer with The Hesitations and has been performing music since he was a teenager. This 2009 interview discusses his long career as a professional R & B musician in Cleveland, describing the bands and the places in which he played, his struggles to make money playing music, and how he feels the nature of both the musicians and the music industry as a whole have changed since the 1960s. A recurrent theme in the interview is the issue of racism, which Hendricks experienced both in the South and in Cleveland. He argues strongly about the ability of music to bring whites and blacks together, seeing his experiences playing music to interracial crowds as proof of this.

Interviewee

Hendricks, George (interviewee)

Interviewer

Aritonovich, Dana (interviewer)

Project

Rock and Roll

Date

10-28-2009

Document Type

Oral History

Duration

86 minutes

Recommended Citation

"George Hendricks Interview, 2009" (2009). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 200003.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/26

Related Resources

Rock and Roll @ Cleveland Voices

Transcript

Transcription sponsored by George Blake

George Hendricks [00:00:01] Okay.

Dana Aritonovich [00:00:06] Okay. Why don’t we start with you just stating your name and doing a little bit of introduction, what you’re doing with your life right now.

George Hendricks [00:00:12] Well, my name is George Hendricks, and actually, I’m doing two things. I’m into my music. I’m singing with a group, Hesitations. And also I have a regular job. Believe it or not, right now the entertainment is not paying enough to support me.

Dana Aritonovich [00:00:29] What’s your regular job?

George Hendricks [00:00:30] My regular job is I am a regional manager for janitorial company Genesis. It’s based out of St. Louis, Missouri, and we do all the maintenance for Home Depots in the area. I’m in charge of the Ohio area.

Dana Aritonovich [00:00:47] And where do you live right now?

George Hendricks [00:00:48] I live in Maple Heights.

Dana Aritonovich [00:00:50] And what year were you born in and where were you born?

George Hendricks [00:00:54] I was born in Bessemer, Alabama, August, 1942. Been around a while.

Dana Aritonovich [00:01:01] That’s all right. And tell me about your early years, like, how, you know, when you were a child and how you got to Cleveland.

George Hendricks [00:01:09] Well, actually, I lived in Alabama. My parents, they separated and divorced, and my sister and I stayed with my grandparents until my. My grandmother passed. And I was about seven years old when I came to Cleveland. And I lived with my father, my sister and I lived with my father. And I grew up on the east side of Cleveland, went to Cleveland public schools. And actually, I come from a musical family. My father sang and my mother sang. I started off singing in church choir as a little kid. I wanted to be a boxer, but I found out the way I got into music was really funny because I was pretty good at boxing because I thought it would draw the girls. But as I was leaving a place called KY Benson Boys Town [?], some guys were standing up on the corner and they were singing doowops, and it was girls around there. And then I thought about it. I said, my face is sore, and so I’m tired of getting beat up to get girls, and these guys are just singing. So the next day I went to them singing instead of boxing. And I guess I’ve been singing ever since. I was about. Probably 13. Just. Well, yeah, about twelve and 13. Just about that. About twelve. I would say, going on 13. Hadn’t quite turned 13 yet.

Dana Aritonovich [00:02:47] And what kind of music were you listening to at the time? Maybe even before you heard these guys singing? Was there music in your life, like popular music?

George Hendricks [00:02:54] Yes. Actually, my father had a barbershop, and back in those days, we had WBAQ and WJMO, which were the black stations, and you would listen to them during the day. But after, when it turned dark, they went off. So we had to listen to the others, you know, like the elevator music type stations. And so that’s why right now, today, I still know mostly all those songs because I even sing some of them today. You know, the ballads. I love ballads and old standards. That’s been my. My favorite. So I grew up with the urban music during the day and the contemporary in the evenings and on Saturdays, basically, you could get only contemporary because the urban stations weren’t playing. You know, during that time, you didn’t hear them. Sunday mornings, you hear. But it was all gospel, which is actually my favorite music is gospel, you know, because that’s where it all comes from. The roots of all the basics music today, except for the rap, the language. [Yeah, that’s not.] No, but actually rapping came from. I mean, even back in the days, there were a lot of people that were rapping, but it was positive rap. It didn’t just come from today.

Dana Aritonovich [00:04:19] And what kind of music did your parents listen to? Any contemporary music, any, like, top 40 type stuff?

George Hendricks [00:04:25] My dad did. Like I said, we were in the barbershop, you know, it was a Casey Kasem coming on, and we would listen to all of that. And then we used to watch Ed Sullivan. You know, like, then you didn’t have all the stuff like kids have now. Everybody had one place to be in the evening that was in front of the tv. So whatever was on tv, we all watched it together. It wasn’t like everybody had a tv of their own and all that. We were lucky to have the one.

Dana Aritonovich [00:04:55] And talk about, like, the neighborhoods that you lived in, what were they like? Were they integrated at all? Where was everything? I know most things at that time. Were still pretty segregated, right? What was like your. What school did you go to?

George Hendricks [00:05:06] Well, I went to Quincy Elementary school, Rawlings Junior High School. Then I went to John Hay High School. And in our neighborhood, there was one gypsy family that had a fortune. They had, like, they lived in a storefront when they lived in the back. They had the fortune telling stuff in the front, and they lived in the back. And then there was one white family in the whole neighborhood. I remember him. Eddie was one of my best friends. And, I mean, it was amazing. I mean, we never thought about it like that. Like, even today, it probably would seem out of place, maybe in some areas, but we never. I mean, we never looked at him as anybody but Eddie, you know? And, in fact, being from the south, I saw a lot of, you know, bigotry and racism. But where I grew up, there wasn’t. I guess we were isolated, more or less, because then you didn’t mix a lot. The first time I ran into a situation where I would say environment fires with racism was when I got older and started entertaining and traveling, you know, different, with bands and different things. And believe it or not, it started right here in Cleveland. At that time, it was like east and west. The blacks was on the east, white was on the west. And when we first started working a few, there was a guy called Dave C. Dave C and the Sharptones. I don’t know if you heard of him or not, but they were. He was a black guy and his band was white, so he kind of broke the ice to be playing to the white audiences. In fact, there used to be a tv show called the Upbeat tv show. You remember that? And Dave C and the Sharptones was the band that brought on. They were like the house band. And so at that time, in fact, Lou Ragland and I, we were singing together as a duet, Pucci and Ejo [?]. And we were playing with a group called the Van Doors Band [?]. And we played a club called. Well, you want me to give the names of the club? Yeah.

Dana Aritonovich [00:07:30] Yeah.

George Hendricks [00:07:30] Well, this one was called the Cancan. It was on West 25th. We were there for so long. I don’t remember how. How long we were there, but it was like. It was just every week we was there two or three, four nights a week. And when we first started playing there, the one thing I remember is we weren’t allowed to mingle. They didn’t want us to talk to the girls at all. So in between shows, we had to sit in the dressing rooms. And this hasn’t been that long ago. It’s in the sixties. So after that. Well, this is after growing up. This is like, after we were grown, you know, basically. But I skipped all past teenage years. But I guess when I got to, speaking of the integration and stuff, you know, that’s where I got to that point. Up until then, basically, we didn’t have that much contact with anybody, but just. Just other black people. Like I said, the school I went to there was. You might see one or two. And like I said, they just. At that time, they just blended in. And even when all the stuff going on down south, I remember in the summers we would go south because my grandfather was still there and he had gotten married again. So my father would send us to Alabama every summer as soon as school started, we would stay there until, you know, time to come back, go back to school. And I was old enough then to realize, you know, that there was a difference, you know, because when you’re young, you really don’t think about it, you know, not unless somebody beats in your head. And my parents were never like that. They always said, treat everybody the same unless they do something to you. You. So I wasn’t raised to hate anybody because of their color, their skin, or anything. And, well, we were brought up basically in church most of our lives, anyway.

Dana Aritonovich [00:09:35] And when you would go and visit, you know, relatives in the south, did you.

George Hendricks [00:09:39] What.

Dana Aritonovich [00:09:40] What did you notice specifically, you know, about differences in the way that you were treated?

George Hendricks [00:09:45] Well, actually, the last time I went south, I think I was about 14, because I told him I refused to go because that was during the time when Emmett Till had got lynched. And I remember incidents where, you know, we were on the bus, and we had to get up and move. If the bus was full, they had a sign white only, and then the colored, you know, then if the bus got full, they moved the sign back, and you’d have to get up, and if it got full, you’d have to stand. I remember stuff like that. I remember driving from Cleveland to Alabama and having to use the restrooms, and we couldn’t use them. You know, we had to go around the back of the building or something like that. So I actually remember all that. I remember some of that even as an entertainer, traveling, you know. And this was, like, in the sixties, like in North Carolina, Georgia, and different places like that, you know, where we could play in the clubs, but we weren’t allowed to, like, sit out in the club, or we couldn’t sit in the restaurants and eat, but we could bring anything you want back to your dressing rooms.

Dana Aritonovich [00:10:58] What kind of crowds were you playing to in the south?

George Hendricks [00:10:59] At that particular time? Basically white. You know, when we were booked up. When I was booked up with a booking agent, we did Grog Shops [?], Ramada Inns and stuff like that, basically all over. But the ones we did in the south was, you know, until later on. Then it got better, you know, after. Let’s see, I went into service in 64, and when I came back in 68, it was a little different. You know, things were, Martin Luther King had been assassinated, and, you know, Kennedy had been assassinated, and it was. People had been, you know, rioting and marching and everything like that. So it wasn’t totally, you know, free from prejudice, but it was a little better. And I found in the later years, as entertaining, the south got better than the north. Yeah, really. They treat you better. I remember going to when I was in Atlanta, and I was surprised when I went down there, how well I was treated, you know, and that was during the time when the west side was still, you know, kind of like, you know, certain areas you can go, but, you know, and it’s some places like that now, really. But as far as entertaining, music kind of breaks through the color barrier in a lot of sense, because back in the day, if you wanted to work in white clubs with it, that’s where you made most of your money. You either had a female in your group or one white horn player or guitar player, a drummer, just so you had that one face in there. Now, the females, it was easier to get females into the white clubs. We used to always say it was because they were afraid. The women seemed, well, you know, it’s not just because we were black. It’s just because women, they’re just like entertainers, and the guys didn’t particularly care for that. So in order for to keep the problems down as far as the club owners, they didn’t want any problems. So they would tell us, look, we don’t care. They’ll always tell you this, look, I’m not prejudiced, you know, I don’t care. But, you know, my clientele, I have to look out for them. You know, they don’t like it. I don’t care. I’ve heard that so many times. But, you know, we really knew what was going on.

Dana Aritonovich [00:13:46] And what kind of response did you get from the fans themselves? Was it different from the club owners or other people?

George Hendricks [00:13:48] When we were. When we were performing? Oh, I mean, they loved. They loved the show. They loved the music. But like I said, it was like when you would come down, we would find that most of the younger guys were more, you know, they would adapt to us more so because they would come up and say, hey, man, you guys sound good. Start talking to you. But, you know, the older guys, you know, they were still kind of like, they would say, I enjoyed you, but as long as you wasn’t talking to those girls, as long as he was just in your place, as they say, you had no problems. But then, I mean, there’s always been a few. I mean, even today, we haven’t done a whole lot of stuff around here in Cleveland that much because there’s really not a lot of clubs that really have, like, the kind of music that we do. You know, we do mostly R & B, doowop, the old oldies, but goodies, you know, and mostly everybody around here want hip hop, you know, and stuff. Like that. We’re too old for that. So we do a lot. We work in casinos, basically, and we do supper clubs and, you know, weddings and stuff like that. And most of our audience is, you know, a mature audience, although we do certain dance, we do bar mitzvahs and stuff like that. And of course, you have young ones, old ones and everything, you know, and everybody seems to still like our music more. Actually. I was amazed the first time we did a show at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The only black people that was there was the people that came with us, and it was having, like, old groups, you know, and I was amazed because I said, you know, this is our culture, and if it’s not Jay Z or somebody, you know, they don’t want to come out. But I’m noticing now that people are getting back to listening to words in songs again. There’s a friend of mine, in fact, Lou, and I was talking about writing a song called whatever happened to the love songs? Because there’s no more love songs anymore. All the songs about hating or who’s no good, you broke my heart or, you know, you killed a dog or shoot the police or something, you know. So basically, our songs are about love. When we do our shows, we basically do. We do what people want, but we try to build our repertoire around love songs and stuff to make you feel good, like our audience, most of the people there, the songs we sing that says, oh, man, I remember when I was in junior high, or I remember when I was to the prom, that was my favorite song, you know, and we can sit down, we can watch them singing along with us, you know, and it makes you feel good when you look out in the audience and you see them really enjoying the music now. Next. Yeah, next Friday, next Saturday the 7th, we’re going to be in Erie, Pennsylvania, with the white doowop group from the sixties. They called The Contels. And we have been working together off and on for the last two or three years. And, I mean, they’re just like family to us. But when we go there, I mean, it was like we were The Temptations or Jackson Five. That’s the response that give us up there, you know, because we’re doing that kind of music. And the audience, I’d say 45 and up in age, and they love it. They love it. They just sit there and when we’re done, it’s just sing some more, you know, and that’s the thrill when you get to be our age. It just makes you feel good. To know that you appreciate it and that people still appreciate that good music, you know, it just won’t never go away. If you ever sit up late at night and you see some of these programs where they’re telling you, mostly public tv, you ever sit, watch those at night, look in your audience, what do you see? Yeah, what do you see? The baby boomers. And most of them are young. They were the young teenage white kids then, and that’s when they first started listening to rock and roll. And they still love those songs. They still love them.

Dana Aritonovich [00:18:36] So what do you think it is about that music that keeps that draw? Because that’s what I grew up listening to was like, you know, oldies. You know, what’s now called oldies? Old records. And I didn’t realize that music was old when I was five or six years old. I just thought it was good music. What do you think it is that people respond to that, that like 50 years later they’re still listening to Chuck Berry and Elvis?

George Hendricks [00:18:54] What did you just say? It’s good music.

Dana Aritonovich [00:18:56] Exactly.

George Hendricks [00:18:57] And not only that, if you listen to those songs somewhere in your life, you can relate to them. I mean, what can you relate to with the stuff they put out nowadays? I mean, who wants to relate to it, you know? What’s that one song I heard standing in the window naked, taking your rump or something like that? What is it? This one guy says, I like big butts. He made a lot of money off of it, though, you know. But I mean, that’s not what. Will they still be listening to that 60 years from now? I doubt it. Yeah, I doubt it. But a song like my girl, just my imagination. You ain’t nothing but a hound dog or Elvis songs like that. I mean, even my favorite Elvis song is love me tender. I used to sing that song when I was. Oh, man, love that song. I still love it, too. It’s a beautiful song and it means something. I mean, if you listen to the words to most of all of your, what we say, oldies but goodies, now, they all tell a story, you know, it may be a simple story, it may be some of them are heartbreakers, but they still told the story, you know. What’s the song? I got my boyfriend back. You know, I remember when I was, like I said, in my dad’s barbershop listening to that stuff. Johnny Mathis. First time. I love Johnny Mathis, you know, and those songs people still got. I still got albums that I got, you know, that for my mom and dad, I still have albums and every now and then I sit down and I put them on. I still got one of those little jukeboxes. But Cleveland, I would say, is probably one of the most underrated cities there is when it comes to music. We have had so much good talent right here in Cleveland. The only difference between Cleveland and Motown Detroit is that we never had a Barry Gordy here.

Dana Aritonovich [00:21:12] You know, I’m glad you mentioned that, because I was going to ask about that, because that’s another future project for me. Was wondering why we do have so much talent here, and we always have. But they happen to have Barry Gordy, and we didn’t. Why do you think we didn’t have a Motown here? We had bands, but most of them didn’t go national like they did in Detroit. Why do you think that is?

George Hendricks [00:21:31] I can speak from my own personal experience. If you ever run into anybody from my era, they mentioned the group Sahibs. They would tell you we probably was the best group around. But there was nobody in Cleveland. There was a disdain named Ken Hawkins. He was like, he would bring all the big shows to Cleveland. We were on the show with everybody. Any big artists. Jackie Wilson, Theresa Franklin, James Brown, Drifters. I mean, anybody that ever came here, we were always open. It was a local actor opened up for everybody. And people used to always say, why don’t you guys go to Motown? Nobody ever said, why don’t you guys record? There was one recording studio here. It was called Boddie’s. I know Lou probably talked to you about Boddie’s, and Mister Boddie had the best studio at that particular time. But he was dealing mostly with gospel music, you know, spiritual. There was no one that was saying and say, hey, let’s get these groups and these bands together and record it via Motown. We were all trying to get to Detroit. Everybody was either trying to get to Detroit or New York somewhere, because there was no studios here. Well, I would say that was for a black entertainer. I think they had, like, what’s that? WHK? But they weren’t. They weren’t interested in what we were doing. And then Jim Brown came here, and they had Way Out Records. He invested some money in a company called Way Out. There was a few people that recorded. He put a little money in it. But the difference in the guys that was running it than Barry Gordy. Barry Gordy took every penny he had and put into his dream. These guys, everybody bought a Cadillac. And we had a lot of guys that we recorded, but none of us made any money. The records never got off. Now, it’s amazing. Some of those records from Way Out right now are selling over in England because he asked me about some of the records that were made. But most, most of. Most of those people are dead or, you know, this. Away from entertainment all together now it’s a little too late. Cleveland. Even today, if you ask any entertainer that they said, Cleveland, if you can make it in Cleveland, you can make it in anywhere. Cleveland is a hard city. It is hard. Most of the people that make it, they make it after they leave. Don’t make it. Give you a good example, O’Jays. They were from Canton originally. They were called The Mascots. They came here. They had a record. I was called Ball and Chain. They did ok, and they basically became Cleveland’s own. We were singing. We were out singing most everybody here, but we never had a record. We were on all the shows. We never got recorded. We went to. Ken Hawkins took us to Motown. And basically what they told us was, we already got The Temptations. You know, they didn’t want us to compete against The Temptations. We did a show at a place called Local 900 over there. Once we on the show with the Marvelettes, Supremes, Temptations, Contours, the Miracles, Mary Wells and Martha and the Vandellas. And I’m not bragging. We stole the show. They blackballed us. They wouldn’t let us come back over there no more for those shows because we weren’t part of the family. We’ve tried to get to be part of the family, but we would have been too much competition for the Temptations at the time. So they said, we already got one Temptations, Cleveland. I don’t know. It’s just the people that have the money. They weren’t interested in trying to build entertainment. They didn’t want to take the money or the time to invest it in talent here, the people who had the dream and the know how didn’t have the money. And that’s the way it still is, basically, in Cleveland, you know, really. I mean, people like Lou, he left here. He’s been out there. I left a few times. Edwin Starr, when he’s passed knowledge. We knew him in school as Charles Hatcher. We all grew up together, but he left. He. He wrote. He got with Motown for a time. Then there was a dispute about some of the songs that they stole from him. Like War. That was the song. He wrote that song, and they took it over anyway. I think he had a problem. They blackballed him in the States. He went to Europe and never came back. He made it good over there. A lot of your big stars today, if you look back, their roots are from Cleveland, you know, like Temptations, Paul Williams and Eddie Kendrick. I remember when we were singing a place called the Majestic Hotel. There’s a Rose Room. They were washing dishes in the kitchen. A lot of people don’t know Paul Williams and Eddie Kennedy washing dishes, bussing tables and washing dishes in the Majestic Hotel. And they couldn’t get anything going here, so they left and went to Detroit and see what happened. We should have left, but, you know, we. I don’t know. We. I guess we were such a close knit group, and nobody wanted to leave. And then as we got older, see, some of us went to the army, some of us went different ways, went different groups, you know, but that’s why now it’s just. It’s just good to see that music seems to be coming back to Cleveland. You know, live entertainment. You got a few clubs now, but, you know, what kills it is this. There used to be so many clubs you could go to and see a live show. I mean, Thursday through Sunday, they always had live entertainment. Any side of town you could go, you see a band and a group or some singers in a band, and you could go out and have a good time. You know, you could dress up. But now people don’t want to go out because everybody’s getting robbed or afraid to park. The car might get stolen. And the club owner says the only thing they could do was they went with the young hip hop crowd, which is packed all the time, but nobody’s drinking, nobody’s eating, they’re dancing. The floor is full all night, and they’re not making any money, you know. So when you come around and says, hey, man, I got a band. We want to do a gig, he says, well, how much you charge? And you give him a price. He says, oh, I can get a dj for $100 a night and have everybody dancing all night, you know, and they went away for him. But what happened was they ran away. All of the subtle people that would sit, you could have a club with 200 people in it. And out of the 200, maybe 50 or 60 drinking or eating, the rest of them are up dancing or either whatever they doing. Whereas you might get a club with 60 people in it, sitting down, drinking, they’re eating, you know, watching the show, but everybody wants the fast money. They don’t believe in that. Slow pace wins the race, cultivating. And then, too, Cleveland is not a very consistent town when it comes to restaurants, clubs, and stuff like that. They open up these clubs and they look really good, and people start going. And then all of a sudden, the service is lousy, the food is not good as it was. When they open up, drinks are watered down. Then you start running away the money spenders. Now, myself, like I said, I haven’t. I don’t really. We don’t entertain that much in Cleveland itself, but when my wife and I go out, we go out to the suburbs somewhere, because we know we can go out there and sit down and dress up and have a good meal, see a show, you know, and by me being entertained, I know most of all the spots where they got good bands and stuff. So we go as far as Motown right now, if I had the money to really open up a studio, which Barry Gordy only had $700, but that was a different time. But the talent is here. But I don’t know, it’s just the mindset of entertainers nowadays is so crazy, you know, you can say, man, you really can sing. I’d like to sign you up. Sign me up for what? You know, they want to. Then you explain everything to them. And this is. This is what you can do. But you got to sacrifice time to rehearse. The entertainers nowadays, you go to see them. I don’t even want to pay $40 to see somebody with holes in their jeans. You know, I can see that walking down the street for free. I mean, and when we go, when we do shows, we’re dressed up, we’re uniform, we wear tuxes, and people appreciate that. You know, I know if I go see somebody and I’m paying 25, $30, I’m all dressed up and then looking like somebody just came off the street, man, you charging me this much money for this? And as far as the music dj’s, I could put my CD on my car at home if I just. So I’m a live entertainment person. I love live entertainment. You know, I do it, and all my life I’ve loved it. And there’s a guy here in Cleveland, I don’t know if somebody mentioned. His name is Greg Reese. He’s the director of East Cleveland library. And also he’s like a jazz keeper. He had a book out called Jazz Keepers, and he was trying to keep live music alive. And East Cleveland Library got a beautiful, state of art little auditorium there, and he has live entertainment. Different acts come in periodically, just keeping live music alone live. But he’s been around here. In fact, he used to be a saxophone player, but now he just directs. He loves music. So he still comes around us when we’re working and there’s a few places, but I don’t know. Nobody seems to want to take the chance to invest the money to have a Motown here. We have the talent. I mean, there’s so much talent in Cleveland you wouldn’t believe. I mean, I don’t mean just mediocre talent. I mean great talent that could be American Idol or anybody else they want to be, but. And to be honest with you, most of the musicians in Cleveland are lazy. They don’t want to rehearse. We have the hardest time getting bands to rehearse right now. You know, say, for instance, if we got a month off and we want to put a new show together, we call guys and say, well, look, we got to rehearse, but we ain’t got to show till next month while we rehearse because we want the show to be tight. We want to go up to half. But, you know, you can’t go in and ask for a $1,000 when you look like ten, you know? I mean, that’s the truth. If you’re not ready, you’re only going to get paid for what you worth, you know? And then we have a. We set out a standard for our group that if we can’t get paid a certain amount of money, we just don’t do the gig. So a lot of bands, they don’t want to be with us because you guys don’t work enough. I said, but when we work, we get paid well, you know, I said, you work five gigs. I make as much on one as you make on those five. You know, they want to be seen. I said, I want money. I don’t worry about being seen. But, see, when I was young, I probably was the same way. Just to be out there in the lamb. Like, I love entertaining. I would do it for free, probably, but if I want to do it right, and I. I just feel like if you’re not entertaining the people, that’s why they say entertainer. It’s a different between being a band or a singer. You know, there’s a lot of people that are singers, but they’re not entertainers. You know, you can go see. I know some groups, they’re very good, some bands that are excellent musicians, but when you go see them, all you hear is a bunch of loud noise. It’s like a jam session. Everybody’s playing, everybody’s taking solos, and they’re sounding good. But, I mean, it’s just like a big jam session. It’s not like a show. You know, when I go entertain, or when I go to be entertained, I want to be entertained. You know, they could never make it in Vegas anywhere like that because they’re just playing music. And it’s more to it when they. When you go out there, they want entertainers. You know, it’s entertainers. California, New York, wherever you go. But I don’t know.

Dana Aritonovich [00:35:19] Well, you know, you mentioned James Brown before. And in the previous version of this project that I did, I talk a lot about James Brown. And, you know, when you talk about kind of like a work ethic, I mean, he was like a taskmaster. He wanted everybody on point all the time. He would follow people if they made a small mistake. And tell me about working, you know, what your experience was, you know, with James Brown?

George Hendricks [00:35:39] Well, we didn’t work with him as part of his act. We was just on the show with him. But watching him, I think it. That’s who, where I got a. I lot of my drive today from is watching him and some of the older entertainers. Well, see, I’m from old school. When I started entertaining, it was different. I worked with older musicians, and we worked on shows with professionals. I mean, what we call the show people, personnel. I mean, they were. Some of them had even been in vaudeville, you know, some of the old timers that we worked with. When we started out, we was most of the time the youngest group on the actual. There was a group called the Ubiquity Twelve. And all of them, they were like dancers, comedians, snake charmers. We had all, I mean, all kind of acts when we went on the road with them and they were prompt, on time rehearsal. If they said show started at ten, that don’t mean you get there ten. You better be on that stage and ready when they call you or else you don’t. You don’t work and you don’t get paid. They send a lot of people home for that. When they say be there on a half, that means if the show starts at 10:00, at 10:30, you should be ready and ready to go, because if something happens to the act previous, they’re not there. Okay, you’re up next. You got to be ready. Same thing at the Apollo. You know, they used to go to the Apollo. If you get there in the morning at 08:00 you’re there. Even if the show is not until 10:00 that night, you’re there. They don’t let you out because they want to make sure everybody’s there. They have people come and bring you food and everything like that. But you’re there, and old school people understand that. The people today say, okay, we got a sound check at 09:00. Oh, what I need a sound check for? So you can have everything, right? Then they get up there, they come in at five minutes to nine. Then they say, oh, man. Anybody got an extra cord? I can’t find my cord. See, if you’d have been here, that’s the purpose of having so anything you don’t have, you got time to get it together or. We had one instant where a guy came in and he left his piece to the suit. I didn’t want to go out. You don’t have time to go get it. So you got to get up there with just what you got on. You know? If had you been there on time, you would have taken. But it’s different. It’s just a different breed of musicians and entertainers, period. I mean, they don’t care how they look when they come on the stage. There’s a few now. There’s a group right now. My sister in law is part of them. They’re called The Girls, very professional, very professional. And they’ve been working. In fact, we worked with them last week, week before last. And they do mostly all the old Motown, the girl groups, the Marvelettes, that scene. But each one of them could. I mean, they could be a star in their own right. Anywhere. They could go anywhere right now. But we’re in Cleveland, stuck. But Lou’s working on the show and we all going to Vegas. In fact, I don’t know if he mentioned that we’re going to be doing a thing next year with the Moonglows and Ink Spots and our group, the Hesitations. We’re going on tour together. That’s the only way you can. You can’t make anything here in Cleveland as an entertainer. You’ll starve right here in Cleveland. I mean, you got a few bands that are working, but a lot of people using tracks now because of the bands, because the guys, they don’t want to rehearse, they don’t show up for the gigs. They’re late, they come in. And so you said, man, forget that. We’ll make a track. We work with the track. We’ll have to pay a band. I don’t prefer. I prefer live music. But we almost went to tracks recently because we had such a hard time putting the band together. As long as you’re working every week, you have no problem. We got guys that we call say, hey, man, we got four gigs coming up. You’re available. Yeah, yeah. Call another guy. Said, man, we got a gig in December. You’re gonna be available. I don’t know, man. I can’t tell what I’m be doing between now and December. So then you got to start looking around. But the closer you get to the gig, they start calling you. But we don’t usually have a problem getting guys. It’s just getting them to rehearse. I know you guys stuff, I said, but we changed the show since the last time you played with us. You know, they think because the musicians, they can pick it up, and that’s good. But when you hit that stage, it’s not time to learn a song or to practice. Then you’re supposed to have it tight when you get to the stage. And I know Luke could tell you the same thing. The musicians out there in Vegas are so much different than the ones here. They all believe in perfection because they play in those casinos and everything. Cleveland, we don’t have a lot for them to get excited about. So they, you know, they say, hey, club owners are going to pay me $60 anyway. So, you know, I give them $60. That’s the way they look at it. I can’t work for $60. My gas cost me that much to drive there.

Dana Aritonovich [00:41:19] What were the venues that you remember frequenting when you were younger?

George Hendricks [00:41:25] There was Gleason’s Musical Bar, the Music Box. Then we did a lot of things at Pla-mor, Skateland, Club 21. And then, like I said, the Cancan. And then we did, like I said, we did a lot of Holiday Inns, Grog Shops, and Ramada Inns. That’s when the booking agent was booking us there. We traveled around the country at that time. I was with a group called Red Top and the Young Family. I don’t know if you ever been to Fat Fish Blue. You know, Red Top played with just died, the blues man, Lockwood. Lockwood junior. Well, Red Top and I, we recorded a record back in 1970 called Love Power. But Red was. In fact, I think he still plays there, if I’m not mistaken. They play there on Wednesday nights, I believe. But Robert Lockwood, in effect, they got a name, a street name.

Dana Aritonovich [00:42:31] I’ve seen that.

George Hendricks [00:42:31] Yeah, yeah, down in The Flats. And that was. That was a strange experience with them, too. We used to travel in a hearse. That was strange going through the little city. We actually got pulled over by the police, and they would have us unload everything and looking for drugs and stuff like that. They didn’t find anything. They said, okay, you can go now. And we had a big B-3 organ, a big Hammond organ with those speakers. They were heavy. Some of those things you try to forget about. But, I mean, I could give you so much stuff for a book.

Dana Aritonovich [00:43:15] Keep that in mind. And these clubs, were these primarily black clubs, or were any of them mixed?

George Hendricks [00:43:21] Most of them were black now, except for Cancan. We worked at the Theatrical Grill and worked there. That was down on East 5th street, called Short Vincent street. And that was when you made it there. You was kind of like, say, the top of the crop. But most of our shows were like, we did the Arena. Like I said, when he would bring the big shows in, they would be at The Arena or the Pla-mor. And we did a lot of, like, arenas and party centers and stuff. He would take us around. We did a lot of shows like that also then. And also there was a place called the Syrah House [?], which is still there. It’s got new management now, but we worked the Syrah House, the Music Box, and then. That’s locally. Then we worked. This place used to be called the Manhattan Supper Club down in Akron. We were at old Baby Grand in Canton and what they call it chitlin circuit. But back in those days, they had what you call house bands. And you might work in one club for two years, you know, you might be there Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and sometime on Sundays, if you’re a house band. What they did then was you’d be there every week, and they would bring in a big name act, maybe, and you would be the opener. You’d always open up for them. That’s why we used. We got to know a lot of entertainers because we used to open up for them. We did a lot of theaters, too, back then. Like, they would have shows, big shows that the Drifters would come to town with Intruders or whoever was there, and we’d always be there opening up for them, you know. So we had a lot of experience with a lot of different shows until everybody started going there on separate ways. Like I said, I left and went to the army. When I came back, Lou and I got together for a time, and then he decided he was going west, so he went to California. Then I went. That’s when I got with Red Top, and we went south, and everybody else was different ways. And, like the group that I’m with now, the Hesitations, well, there was Art. He was one of the originals, but he was also a Sahib, too. So when they came, they wanted to get the group back together. And I don’t know. Do you know Ruthie Brown down at.

Dana Aritonovich [00:46:10] I actually did meet her about a year and a half ago when they hit a James Brown documentary, and she got me tickets.

George Hendricks [00:46:15] Okay, well, she had called Art and asked them if she could get the old guys back together. And he says, well, most of the guys, I don’t know where they are. So he called us. It’s funny because we had just got together for, like, a reunion. We had a little picnic about a couple weeks before that. So we hadn’t seen each other for, like, some of us hadn’t seen us for like, 20, 20 some years. And so he comes, amen. He said, how would y’all like to. He said, I can’t get my group back together. He said, I was singing with the band at the time. I had been with for, like, nine years. We’ve traveled a lot, he says. He says, can you do me one. One favor? Said, let’s just sing together. I need somebody for just that one show for Ruthie. I said, okay. It might be fun getting back together. So we did. And we had such a ball, people liked it. So we said, man, we should do this more often. So we started doing it, and then we rehearsed and got a show together. Then we started doing the casinos and supper clubs, and we started having so much fun, and we just kept doing it. So now we’re still doing it. But that was. You really missed this show, though. Yeah, it was so nice.

Dana Aritonovich [00:47:29] Let’s go back a little bit to teenagers over that. You mentioned Elvis before, and you were like a teenager when he started becoming popular. And I think the perception these days is that Elvis didn’t really have any black fans. That’s not true, and I know that’s not true, but I know a lot of younger black people don’t. Don’t like Elvis, and they think that he was racist and that he stole black music and all that. And give me your perception on that.

George Hendricks [00:47:55] Well, like I said, back in those days, we didn’t have black station that we could listen to 24/7 so, like I said, at a certain time or certain days, you couldn’t listen to black music. So you listen to whatever music you can find. It sounded good. So I remember what was that Carl Perkins was. Came out with blue suede shoes. Everybody thinks Elvis was the one that made it, but it wasn’t Elvis. And I remember listening to him. I remember listening to. And then Little Richard came around, and I don’t know, you probably. I know you were too young, but if you ever seen any films of Jackie Wilson now, who does he remind you of. But, I mean, who does? If you think of Elvis and Jackie Wilson, don’t they remind you of each other?

Dana Aritonovich [00:48:50] Yeah.

George Hendricks [00:48:51] Their style, their body movements and everything. And a lot of people say that Elvis was a lot like Jackie Wilson. Jackie Wilson. Of course, unfortunately, he got, you know, sick in his prime and he never recovered, but, you know, telling how big he would have been if he kept going. But we used to listen to Elvis. I know my friends. In fact, like I said, we used to sing some of their songs. I’m trying to think. And then I used to love his movies. I used to dream that I was Elvis, believe it or not, watching, because he always had all the girls. You know, I used to watch all this heartbreak hotel and jailhouse rock and all that stuff. I listened to all of those. Also Frankie Valli and what’s his name. Mel Torme was one of my favorite singers because I love ballads. And he, to me, had one of the most beautiful voices. And it’s still. Last time I heard him, it’s been years ago, but he was still sounding good. I used to listen to groups like the Diamonds, and when they. When this group came out, I remember we were saying, that can’t be a white group. Oh, man. You know, and then that’s when things started changing. The black groups were trying to sound white, and the white groups trying to sound black. This sound like, um. I’m trying to think. Oh, it says, um, I took a walking down the street late last night. You didn’t know that was a black group? Yeah, I was a white group. And then there was another one. What’s the name of this group? Oh, and it came out with happy birthday, happy birthday, baby. We thought it was a black group, but it was a white group, The Crests. So then all of a sudden, you started listening to all the music. Like, even at our teenage dances, it was nothing unusual to hear Skyliners singing song or what’s that one? Bobby Darin’s splash splash I was takin a bath. Everybody danced on that. You know, it got to be the point where it was just because it was mixing on the radios then, you know, before it was, you had a black station and a white station. All you heard on the black stations were black music. All you heard on the white station was white music. So then they started integrating it because, well, actually started right here. That’s why the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was here with Alan Freed. Then American Bandstand came out. So then it started getting a lot of exposure. A lot of people don’t know that I said, Ed Sullivan was probably one of the reasons why a lot of black artists got exposure, because it was national. I mean, everybody watched his show. There was a lot of good groups from Ohio that never got any further than Ohio. Because at that time, they didn’t have the internet. You didn’t have cable tv. So the only place you got exposure was when you played. And that’s another reason why, I guess we lost. Then people would get discouraged as, man, I can’t make no money to get a job working for the car, you know, working at the Chrysler, Ford, or something like that. They start making a good money. They said, forget that, you know. So they stopped doing it as a teenager. Well, when I grew up, you had mostly. At that time, it was groups, singing groups, male and female. There wasn’t a whole lot of just single artists. Like today. Mostly it was. Was mostly groups, because that was the thing. Doowop groups, girl groups, man groups. There wasn’t a whole lot of bands like today. Like, there wasn’t Earth, Wind and Fires and stuff like that. I think Lil Junior and the All Stars was the first band that I ever listened to. That was just a band that came out with Shotgun. Other than that, most of your bands played behind your acts. Like, there was the Funk Brothers, Motown, Popcorn and Mohawks. They played for mostly. They were studio guys that played on all the records. So when they took the shows out, they were automatically the band. The band automatically went with the show. You didn’t have to have your own band then. Whenever you went on a tour, they hired the band to go with the show. They knew they played for everybody, so you didn’t have to worry about a band. They hired guys either from the studio or if they go to New York and they saw a guitar player and he sounded good, they say, hey, man, you want to play with us? They would snatch guys off the street like that. That’s how Jimi Hendrix got started, actually got picked up by the Isley brothers. Yeah, so. But I don’t know. This Cleveland is just a hard town. It’s a hard town. People say it’s a hard nut to crack. And it hasn’t changed. It’s still hard. The few people that make it, they make it after they leave. They leave Cleveland. Even when our sports teams.

Dana Aritonovich [00:54:47] I was just gonna say the same thing. Watch the world Series. This is all Indians.

George Hendricks [00:54:48] I don’t know what it is. It’s Cleveland. I don’t know.

Dana Aritonovich [00:54:54] There’s potential, but it never.

George Hendricks [00:54:57] I don’t know. But maybe people like you can bring it out.

Dana Aritonovich [00:55:01] That’s part of what I would like to do with these projects.

George Hendricks [00:55:03] Because, I mean, it’s just got a lot of sleeping giants right here in this city. And Cleveland, I don’t know. It’s not, I don’t say they don’t support their own. Far as. Okay, a good example, far as entertainment. You got so many talented people in Cleveland that you got to be darn good for them to want to come and hear you. You know, Prince would never have a. He’ll draw a crowd no matter what. He’ll draw a crowd because he works so hard at it, you know. But then you got some groups that are just the records that sound good. I can remember when the Front Row was open and Chaka Khan came here. They actually booed her off the stage. They did. And Apollo is another place hard. They will boo you off stage, too. But I don’t know, hopefully, maybe it may be too late for me, but some of the younger talent, that’s what I want to do eventually, is take some of this talent if I don’t have the money, but I have the knowledge of a lot of them make so many mistakes. It’s not as bad now. People getting smarter. The first record we recorded, we made a penny and a half per record. Penny and a half a record. So you had to sell a lot of records. And what happened was they would tell you, well, you’re going to make your money when you’re personal appearances doing. But that wasn’t a lot of money either. But back then, if you made $100 a week, you was making, that was big time. So they would get over. But then they would say, well, when the royalty time come around and you looking for this check, and they say, well, remember we bought you the outfits? Remember the photoshops? We had to pay for that. Remember this? You got to deduct that. I’ll remember this. Remember when you came to me and you wanted to get some money for your mom’s birthday party? You wanted to do this for your mom. They start adding up and they say, no, you owe them money. So, you know, it’s. But now people are smart. And I tell all the young entertainers, if you got songs, get your own publishing before the record companies, they would tell you, well, if you want to, you have to give us your publishing rights or else we’re not going to sign you. And then when you add and you want to make it, you’ll do just about anything. So most of the people, a lot of those hit songs came from people that never made a penny off of a lot of them, especially with Motown. But, you know, what can you say? You know, if you trying to make it really bad and somebody offer you something you think is going to be a dream, you know, go for it. I’ve had some bad experiences like that in my days, too, thinking I was going to really, really make it to the real. Wait a minute. Ain’t that the song we were doing? That’s not us. Somebody made it big, but you learn. So I’m hoping that one day that I can open up some kind of little consulting or something where people, I see a lot of young talent out here and they don’t know where to go. They really don’t. I don’t have the money, but I can show them what not to do, you know, and then hopefully, maybe one day, somebody get interested enough with some money that they can take these people and not use them, you know, so they’re. So that everybody, it’s enough money for everybody. But most of the companies, all they think about is they don’t think about you. You know, you see some of those stories where the executives, they’re looking out for their customers, they’re looking out for their clients and all that. That’s not true. They’re looking out for that client because that’s their moneymaker. They don’t really care nothing about you. Every now and then you might find somebody who genuinely care about the artist. All they care about is just like in business, it’s that bottom line, you stop producing, stop selling records, people stopped coming to see you. You’re just gone, you know, that’s it. That’s why a lot of people left Motown. When Motown got to a point where it got a lot of competition. Before, Motown was it. That was the stuff. Then you had Stax, then Philadelphia International came along. And then a lot of people left and they started going to other places. California and then Atlanta. And now I think everybody got a recording company or label. Everybody got a label that they own and then they go to the company just for distribution. And now with, what’s that, YouTube and all the rest of them, you can sell all your stuff off the internet. You don’t need all that. Yeah, the industry has really changed.

Dana Aritonovich [01:00:29] When, when you were a teenager, what, where do you remember buying records? What record places around town or where’s you going to listen to music? Recorded music or live music.

George Hendricks [01:00:42] Mostly. Every neighborhood had a record shop and that’s where you go. Record Rendezvous was the one I think we knew mostly. And the one that you mentioned, oh.

Dana Aritonovich [01:00:53] Dean’s House of Jazz.

George Hendricks [01:00:54] Yeah, Dean’s House of Jazz. Yeah, Dean’s. Those are the popular, most popular. And then there was one downtown. What was that? I can’t remember the name of it, but whenever you came downtown, you would go there. But most of the time we went to the neighborhood. We didn’t come downtown too much, didn’t have a reason to. There was nothing down there for us except the movies in it. We had neighborhood movies. Cost ten cents to get in. Cost a quarter when you come downtown. Plus you had [inaudible], but had to have bus fare was $0.10. But that’s where we got mostly our records from, was from the record shops, you know. Then you had a record shop. Was a record shop. You couldn’t go to, like, the grocery store or Walmart or something, somewhere like that and find records. We went to the record shop. And the way you would know what was, like I said, the only way you would know about a record is from on the radio. And the black stations were limited, so it was kind of hard for you to really know. The way you know a lot of records was when they had the shows to come to Cleveland or the different places. That’s how you got to know a lot of artists. Not from the record, but when you see them in person, then they will say, well, by the way, we got a record out, you know, because the radio stations at that time, they wouldn’t play your records unless you already known. Unless you had that money, you know, which came up with payola. And you could go up there and you could have a record that sound just as good as anybody’s here. We can’t play your record. Why not? You know. Cause you gotta have somebody come in here that’s already into the clique. You can’t walk in there independently and do that. So then you gotta go try to peddle to somebody. If they like it, the first thing they tell you, well, it’s okay. But, you know, if you want us to handle it, you have to give us the publishing rights. And then it says, well, we signed a contract here, most of them for five years. And you’ll make this a penny and a half. But think if you sell a million copies and. Yeah, and then he said, but you know how many records you can sell? That’s a lot of money. They may not see nothing, but you’re gonna make your money off your public appearances. Because when people start buying, your records gonna be in demand and blah, blah. You’re gonna be around on all these shows back then. It was amazing. I can remember we did 31 one nighters in 31 different towns. And I don’t think we could buy a hot dog when we got back. I mean, seriously, you know, the money didn’t come to you, and you worked hard, and that’s what discouraged a lot of people, too. A lot of people. It’s not like it is today. And some people just really sacrificed. And there’s people who actually have been homeless, sleeping in their cars, waiting on a break, you know. And then some of them made it and some of them didn’t, you know. I know a few of them that have been known to sleep in their car, you know, or sleep in somebody’s basement or something like that and get the right place at the right time, you know? I tell you, the strange thing that happened to me was Edwin Starr. Speaking of Edwin Starr, when Bill Doggett was looking for a vocalist, a male vocalist, and he came to Cleveland, and we were all going to audition and everybody. So I was going to audition, and everybody kept saying, hey, man, you would go good with him. He would like your voice. Yeah. Know. So I was gonna go over audition. So by that time, I got drafted into the army. So Edwin Starr, Charles, he had just got out of the army, so he went there and got the job. But I was often wondering what would have happened if it might have been me. I might have been Edwin Starr, who knows? But, you know, that’s the way things go sometimes.

Dana Aritonovich [01:05:05] So what was your first band? The Sahibs. Was that the first one you were in?

George Hendricks [01:05:09] No, that’s. We had a little group in school. We call ourselves The Persians, but the first group that I would say of any significance was The Sahibs, because we were playing around all over, everywhere, and we were real popular. We used to wear turbans. We were The Sahibs, and we were different. That’s what I think got over with us. And we always dressed really nice, and we was real popular with the girls. We always had, like, two or three fan clubs. You know, it was. I didn’t have no gut then, had a lot of hair. But it was a good experience. I don’t really have any regrets. I never made it big like Michael Jackson. Jackson. But I’ve had. I had a good life, and I loved what I was doing. I made a little money here and there and got a lot of good memories. A lot of good memories. Met a lot of good people. A lot of experiences.

Dana Aritonovich [01:06:22] Let’s veer away a little bit from music and talk about. Because what I’m trying to do is place the music within the context of what was going on socially in Cleveland, United States. And you mentioned being in the army from like 64 to 68. [Yeah.] And then when you came back in 68, I mean, everything was just exploding in the country, and there were riots everywhere.

George Hendricks [01:06:41] Riots. Yeah.

Dana Aritonovich [01:06:44] Assassinations and. What do you remember about when you came back to Cleveland? What. How different was it for you?

George Hendricks [01:06:49] I’ll tell you what. When I got home, I just came. Came home from Vietnam in June of 68, and the first thing I remember was, as I was riding down the street, the National Guard was on the corners. I’m like, wait a minute. Didn’t I just leave this scene? You know, and I couldn’t believe it. They were having these riots and everything, and I’m looking at the National Guard sitting there on the corners, and, you know, I’m trying to figure out, well, why did I even get out? I might as well still be in the army. And I wanted to go buy a rifle. I was married at the time, and my wife says you’re not going to buy a rifle. I said, everybody else got one. But after things quiet down and I started off just. I said I was just going to be the father and family man. But then I got back into the entertainment again after my wife and I divorced, not having had nothing to do with the music. It was a lot of stuff. But then I noticed that things were different, you know, like I said, you could go to the west. It wasn’t so much like separatist, you know, it was like, see more schools have been segregated by now – I mean integrated. And it was not unusual to go. Like, when I bought my first house, we were the first black family to buy a house on that street. That was before I went to Vietnam. I was in the service. When I bought the house, though, I was in the army. And that was Rugby, which is off of 140th and St. Clair, 50 at that time, it was called. Well, it’s still Collinwood, but we used to call it Five Points. And there was probably maybe three families, three black families in the whole neighborhood. When I came home, I didn’t see any whites. It was moved out. And I like what happened. I mean, things have changed so much. And then, like I said, people, you know, it was nothing. It wasn’t that odd to see a black and white couple or go to the clubs and you see black and white sitting there together. Kind of reminded you of the only place I remember that, even back then, where it didn’t seem to make a difference was Leo’s Casino. And it was weird because the place is packed. The one night when the riots started, Hough riots. Leo’s was packed, and they had black and white in there. And so somebody came in and says, hey, man, they having a riot out in the street. And so, like, everybody in there having a good time. And I can imagine some how those people felt because they had to go through the riots to get home. Cause most of them from the suburbs, you know. And I said, wow, man, I couldn’t even believe this. I couldn’t believe it was happening, but, you know, it was happening. But Leo’s seemed to be one of the places where color didn’t matter back then during the shows. Too bad they didn’t have too many more. They should have had a lot more Leo’s. That was one of the best places you could go. You wouldn’t know about that, though.

Dana Aritonovich [01:10:18] I’ve heard, actually, everybody I’ve spoken to, Leo’s Casino. So I know that was one of the pivotal places.

George Hendricks [01:10:23] Yeah, Leo’s Casino and Gleason’s. But Leo’s was more integrated. Gleason’s was a place where all your big name black artists would come. But basically, you had. Basically, the crowds was all black, you know, but Leo’s was. That’s when they were bringing mixed crowds. It’s the first time I ever saw Ike and Tina Turner was at Leo’s. And I mean, some of you. Some of the names. Some of the big names that came through there, man, telling you, everybody went through Leo’s. Everybody that was anybody went through Leo’s, you know, and that was the center point of entertainment in Cleveland at that time. Until the Front Row came back. And that was years later. But it never did get the same atmosphere. Although he was not considered a black club or white club, it never did have that same intimate feeling like Leo’s, you know, maybe it’s because it was bigger. I don’t know what it was, but I never understood why they didn’t. Why they closed it down. Because it was always a nice place to go.

Dana Aritonovich [01:11:39] I think I closed it, like, 71 or something.

George Hendricks [01:11:41] Something like that. Yeah, yeah, something like that.

Dana Aritonovich [01:11:44] I know another person I interviewed mentioned the Jazz Temple.

George Hendricks [01:11:48] Oh, yeah.

Dana Aritonovich [01:11:49] And how there was. There was. Because that was kind of interracial, too. And there was. I think they got bombed or something. Do you remember anything?

George Hendricks [01:11:55] I remember something like that now, as you see, I’m trying to remember what year it was. I’d say, like in the early seventies. Seventies. 71. Because this is when I was traveling with Red Top and we had the record I called Love Power. And that’s when the hippies were out and everybody was peace signs and all that. That’s when you saw a lot of integration clubs, because there was a lot of, what we just call them, the poet clubs, where you people recite poetry. The coffee shops opened up, and it kind of changed the things far as, like, it wasn’t certain areas, like I said, like University Circle, mostly around your colleges. You know, it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary to see, you know, mixed couple or just mixed parties together. It was nothing. It was just, you know, nothing to it. That was one of the things that kind of. I had to get used to when I came home. You know, being in the military was, you know, didn’t even. I mean, you ran into even racism even in the military. But when you come home and you see, like, wow, when I first time I went back to Alabama, and I was like, I was surprised they were saying yes, sir to me when I grew up. It was like I had to say yes, sir to everybody, no matter how big they were, you know? Yes, sir. Yes, ma’am. So things that really changed socially during that time, when I came home from this, like I said, I did come home at a bad time when the riots started. But after the riots, things kind of quieted down. I kind of got my life in order, and then that’s when I started traveling again. Lou and I had got together for a time that he came out to camp California. Then that’s when I got with Red Top. Then we had another band around the city. You know, I kind of jumped back and forth with different bands. I went on the road, had my own band for a while. I think I went. I went to Atlanta, stayed there for a while, and just kind of bounced around trying to find myself and had those dreams still. But, you know, then I finally got tired down and started having kids, and I had to get a real job. And so that’s basically it up until now.

Dana Aritonovich [01:14:28] What do you think? Because I know we kind of touched on this a little bit before about the kind of music you listen to and, you know, like, white groups are trying to sound black, and black groups, you know, kind of like in the early days. What do you think the effect of this? It’s. And it’s all black rooted music, as we said earlier. What do you think that effect, the effect of that has been on race relations? Like, and maybe, you know, it’s probably different for whites and blacks, but what do you think? Do you think it’s had an effect on the way the races see each other.

George Hendricks [01:14:58] I would say it depends on who you talk to, because I got some friends, black friends that think, like you said before, they stole our music and this that and the other. Whereas I don’t look at it like that. I look at it like, hey, music is universal. And probably without music, a lot of people wouldn’t be talking today about they wouldn’t be friends. Music has brought a lot of groups together. I mean, blacks and whites that come together in the music. There’s white guys that come to black bands, black guys that go to white bands and groups, and they travel together, they live together, sleep together, they eat together, they get to really know each other, you know, which is the one thing I found out in the military. Where is all your life somebody’s telling you, man, this, you don’t want to be around those kind of people. And then after you really get to know him, he says, hey, just like me, you know, we like music. So then you, your common enemies is not each other. It’s the people who don’t like your music, you know? So you got a bond there. So I found that even outside of the musicians and the entertaining itself, it brought the audience, if you look at, like, some of the old clippings, Jimi Hendrix and some of those people, like, at the rock concerts, you know, they didn’t. Nobody was worried about if he was black or white. He was enjoying the music. He was acting with the next person, you know? And that’s what I like about Europe, you know, is you don’t. You don’t even think. I mean, you don’t think yourself as. You just think of yourself as a musician or entertainer over there. They treat you so good. Much better than over here. But I would say music has been a big influence on race relationship, and music, because I would say that’s what started people to talking to each other, getting to know each other. You get interested in me. I’ve actually had white guys that used to come and ask me different stuff about, hey, man, did you ever know Jimi Hendrix? Because my last name is Hendricks, you know? And I says, well, I heard that he was a distant cousin some kind of way, but I never met him personally. And he says, oh, man, he was awesome, you know. Then we started talking about different musicians and different things, and then they would come to the shows, and we hang out after the shows or something, something like that, you know. And back then, I never got into, like, powder or stuff like that. But I loved my Thunderbird. We used to drink some Thunderbird and Kool Aid, you know, but you find that a lot of places. Then afterwards, you know, they’d have, like, places where you go eat breakfast after the shows, and a lot of people come and they would talk to you. It was different. I mean, you were a celebrity in one sense, but you were just a ragged person in another sense. It wasn’t like you didn’t have to have bodyguards to go with you. Of course, we weren’t famous like Michael Jackson or nobody like that, but, I mean, people would come to you, they would sit down and talk to you. They ask you for your autograph, they want to take pictures with you and stuff like that. And it was never a thing about, like, I got no, I don’t think I ever heard that while I was entertaining. So I got a lot of black friends. You know, there’s some of my best friends of, like, you know, I never. I mean, they just come to you and just talk to you. And a lot of that has to do with the person itself, too. Like, I wasn’t raised that way, but I do have friends. They for instance say, man, what do they want to. I don’t want to be around them, man, then go over there by yourself then, you know, man you an uncle tom and whatever. I’ve got friends like that today even, you know, and I just tell them, you know, you got wasting your time doing stupid stuff. Do it for yourself. You know, it’s. I mean, there’s some people that ain’t going to never change, I don’t think. I may be wrong, but. And it’s not just all white, either. I mean, I know just as many blacks that are just as racist as some of the whites. You know, they don’t even want to. They don’t even like dark black. They don’t even like. Some of them don’t like me. I ain’t even that light. Is there a restroom somewhere around here?

Dana Aritonovich [01:19:47] Yeah, there is, actually.

George Hendricks [01:19:50] Yep.

Dana Aritonovich [01:19:51] Okay. And then the last question. It’s kind of a broad question, but answered heavy. We kind of touched on this throughout the conversation. What do you think, or what do you hope the legacy is of this music that inspired you throughout your life?

George Hendricks [01:20:07] I would love to see it continue to each generation, because if you think about it, the love for one another came from that era. Even though they said they would call this hippies or baby boomers, whatever, but it was all about peace. And that’s when the music was. The music was the dominating factor in the world then. I mean, like, now everybody’s causes, poverty and joblessness, wars and everything. I mean, there was wars then, too, but I’d say basically everybody had one common thing that they could all relate to and that was the music. And people got to know each other whether you liked them or not. Personally, if you was around them long enough and you liked the same music, you had something in common. I think today what’s going to happen is like people like you, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and those shows you see at midnight introducing the oldies as the goodies is going to help keep it going on. Now, if you notice, I don’t know how much you listen to the radio. They used to have mostly all had a program, the oldies but goodies, and those are fading away now. You know why? I don’t know. Because people still, I mean, well, for one thing, with all the modern technology, people don’t listen to the radio that much. If they get in the car, they put in the CD, you know, they don’t listen to the radio. And then if you got a CD, you buy what you like, whereas as before, you listen to whatever they played on radio. And for the life of me, I don’t know why they put all of those oldie but goodie shows on at two or 03:00 in the morning, you know, why don’t they put a bed at 08:00 but you got so much these reality shows killing, it’s just killing everything, all these reality shows. It’s just sick, sickening. But I would love to see the music that I grew up with passed down to my kids, which my kids and grandkids, they already know about it because they’ve been hearing it all their life. That’s all they ever heard. I don’t even have a rap record in my house. I like some, I have a son that raps, too, but at least he’s positive. I told him, I said, I don’t want to hear that garbage, but I would love to see somebody, like I said, like you and people that would have something to write these articles. Like I said, my friend Greg Reese, to try to keep that music alive because eventually I think it’s going to come back. I think it’s going to be maybe not a doowop sound, but I think people are going to start realizing that it takes love to make the world go around. And that’s what it is. Sound like a good sound on it, but it does. I mean, do you know how much energy a person uses trying to be negative? You know, you wear yourself down trying to hate somebody. You know, I just don’t have the time. I love everybody. That’s why I stayed in trouble so much when I was young. I love you, girl but that was then. But that’s what I would like. I would like to see that people like you and young man over there and all of the young people to just sit down and get interested in the history of music. You know, just the history of it, where it originated from and try to carry it on. And, you know, just like I said, like pass the torch on and just keep it going. I mean, that doesn’t mean that you can’t have your music for your era too. Because I know when I was growing up, my dad used to call we was doing crazy, you know, because they was into blues. And that’s another weird thing. I wish I had more time. But do you realize that in the blues field, all of those guys that almost dug them up, like John Lee Hooker and all those guys, they were gone. I mean, out of the business. They went. Dug them up from one or two movies they wanted to make. And they used that music. And all of a sudden they became famous again. But there’s not a black kid that I know today that could name you one blues artist, not one, but you can go to the white kids and they can tell you. I was. We did a doowop show once at a supper club. It was called At The Hop supper club where they was doing the music of the fifties. They want us to do up on the street. Like they had this scene we were doing acapella streets and we were doing in the still of the night. And I’m singing. And so this little kid, he couldn’t have been no more than twelve years old, the white kid. And he came up there and he was singing word for word. I said, how do you know that song? You know, he says, my mom and dad plays it all the time. And my kids never even heard the song. My kids or my grandkids don’t even know what it is. I tell you, it’s that. I think that’s what the world needs, these more oldie but goodies.

Dana Aritonovich [01:25:56] I agree.

George Hendricks [01:25:57] But you could go back where people looked up on you and smiled at you when they spoke to you and they meant it, you know? And it’s just. I don’t know, it’s just going to take something to keep it going. It’s, you know, people writing, keep producing records, having the oldies but goodie stations talking about it. You know, I’ve talked. My kids get tired of me talking about the old days. But I said, I want you to remember this. You know, this is my history, remembrance. So when I leave here, you can say, well, my dad did this. My dad told me about that. You know, it’s not all about you today because you had to come from somewhere.

Dana Aritonovich [01:26:44] Thank you so much.

George Hendricks [01:26:45] Oh, enjoyed it.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.