Honeydripper (2007) Movie Script
Come on, lay off with that scratch!
Ain't bothering you.
Yes it is,
that ain't no kind of music.
At least I make a sound.
Yeah, and it's a nasty one.
Wanna try again tonight?
Might as well.
MUSIC PLAYS FROM CLUB
# I know a gal
by the name of Maid Lou
# She shook it so much
she had the German flu
# No matter how she done it
# Oh, no matter how she done it
# Well, no matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# The women didn't like her
# And they called her out
of her name
# But the men, they loved her
# Mmm, it was a crying shame
# No matter how she done it
# No matter how she done it
# Well, no matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# No matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# Yes, she did. #
You take it for a while.
They making all that racket again
at Toussaint's.
Yeah, all them people
over there buying drinks,
throwin' that money after them
dice and what not.
Lucky we got none of that here.
# You can drink your liquor
# You can drink your cold can beer
# You can drink your good whisky
# You can drink your cool can beer
# You can stay out
all with your sweet gal
# But, Papa,
don't you leave me here
# I hear that wild ox moaning
# Looking for that Texas... #
Sounding good, huh?
Sounds fine. Always has.
Not much of a crowd. Not a crowd at all,
just some stiffs who wanna drink themselves
to sleep without the music waking them up.
You oughta advertise.
Got an attraction like Bertha Mae.
Singing is one thing, Slick, but
whether people wanna look at you
when you do it is another.
Got quite a number
over the Toussaint's place tonight.
Sounds like it.
Lots of young folks coming in
to listen to that box of his.
I don't see why we don't just turn our box
on, let folks feed it nickels like they do.
The lady is singing.
# You hear me pleading, baby
Baby, don't you leave me here... #
But didn't nobody come
to listen to her, Slick.
# Come here, sweet Daddy
# Let me whisper in your ear... #
Like the man say,
you can't argue with failure.
You know why Slick
here's like a preacher?
Cos he do all his best work
on his knees!
Never mind him, he's just drunk.
I heard she put a ring through it,
use it to drag him round the house.
Come on, you know Tyrone
don't like no scuffle in here.
I ought to get me old lady,
help out with the groceries...
You just gotta sweet talk her some,
give her a little poke every now and then.
You gonna drink,
or you gonna lay Gentlemen!
Miss Delilah.
Let's behave ourselves.
What are you boys doing in here?
Out, out! And what are you
doing behind that bar?
It's just for a minute.
That's 60 seconds too long.
Maceo, take that child's place.
You bring people their food,
Nobody's eating!
That's cos nobody's here
but these couple of lost souls.
Haven't had an appetite since
they gave over to the devil.
Evening, Maceo,
you looking good tonight!
Likewise, Miss Nadine.
What can I do for you?
Oh, you know what you can do for me,
sweet man.
What would you like... to drink?
How many is that tonight?
Don't talk to me about that, baby.
Not tonight. I don't want
China Doll behind that bar.
She's got to help out.
Not behind there she doesn't. You
know she's not supposed to get excited.
Not much chance of that in here.
Harvest hands all crowded in
to Toussaint's place.
Young ones.
You'll get some of them.
They'll stick their noses in here, get
one little sniff of the music and go home.
Maybe that's the wages of sin.
Ain't no sin happening
here tonight, baby.
And there sure as hell
ain't no wages.
Your God wants to chastise some sinners,
he'd best go over to Toussaint's.
Got a whole bar room
crowded with them.
He's not my God.
He's everybody's God.
How did the meeting go tonight?
Viola Underwood found the Lord.
If she'd found Him last,
she wouldn't have come through.
She must have lost Him again
between then and now cos
she come down that aisle
tonight hollering in tongues.
The spirit didn't move you, though?
Not yet.
Maybe it's too late for me.
I can't believe he's serving
Alton Stokely. That poor man.
Toussaint cut his credit off.
Either he gets it here,
or he drinks that paint
peeler Willie Pettigrew
cuts up back in his swamp.
I'm gonna go home,
say a prayer for that man.
Say one for me too, baby.
Outstanding, baby.
Outstanding. You've still got the voice.
You think so? - Chills down my spine
just to hear you.
Ty, I'm gonna be
a little late Saturday.
No need to come in
if you don't want to.
I've made other arrangements.
Other arrangements?
Try something new in here.
You can't do that. Yes, he can, darling.
This is his place,
and he can do whatever he wants.
You'll know where to find me
when you need me.
Put the box on now, Ty?
Yeah, put the box on.
I'm gonna crank it up some,
see if we can draw some life in here.
LOUD JAZZ MUSIC
There it goes again.
Electricity don't like that jukebox.
Must be a short circuit
in the juke here.
Got to get the power company No,
they turned my juice off last month.
I don't want you sniffing
around that splice out Maceo did.
It's nice in here.
Kind of romantic.
I'm gonna have to go out back,
wiggle some things around.
Don't you wiggle nothing round
unless I'm there to see it.
You don't worry, folks,
bar's still open.
Evening, folks.
Evening, Sherriff.
Your light's gone out.
Looks like it.
You'll know that'll be a violation
of something or other.
We're just about to close up here.
Oh. Ooh, your wife been cooking?
Not tonight.
Went to a revival chat.
Ah, I stood by there myself.
Them niggers were singing up a storm.
I just came out here
to look in on Toussaint.
Had that shooting two nights ago.
Lots of fighting in there.
There is that.
Course, me and old Toussaint,
we got us an agreement.
Them field hands
start sucking down that whisky,
hopping them all up with music,
there's gonna be some razors drawn.
Course, he only call me
if it's a fatality.
Never been a killing here. Them
young bloods know better than to mess...
Than to mess with Tyrone Purvis.
You've got quite a reputation
round here, Tyrone.
People say you put some poor
black boy in the grave.
Just people talking.
Uh-huh.
You just remember,
this is my county, Tyrone.
What goes on goes on cos I let it.
Don't want nobody getting too big
for their breeches round here.
You folks have a pleasant evening.
Nigger ain't shit in this world.
Speaking for yourself.
You ain't had his club, Tyrone,
what do you think you'd be?
You wouldn't be nothing.
If that ain't truth,
then grits ain't grocery.
TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS
That's a terrible noise.
Just the northbound Talladega.
Sounds like it always does.
Like a soul being carried away
from this life.
Come on in, darling,
before you catch
your death out here.
You're lucky the high sheriff ain't
seen you crawling out that boxcar.
Does he come around here much?
Only when he bored.
You working on a train? Yeah,
Kansas City to New Orleans.
What did you get off here for?
I got people here. How about you?
Got tired of sleeping in a boxcar.
Is there a place to stay
around here?
Shed right over there got a cot.
And don't mind the rats.
Not unless you've got food on you.
I see you and a good meal have
been strangers for some time.
Get into town tomorrow, find you need
something, tell them Shack Thomas sent you.
They'll know who you're
talking about. Thanks.
Name like that sounds like
a good place for a musician.
Only night I ever been in jail
was a town called Liberty.
The sun come up,
you'll see where you landed.
You'd best be out that shed
by first light.
Just a weekday night.
The chicken man or the ice man
At least you don't owe
the electric company.
Yeah, that's a big relief.
You thinking about closing down?
What do you think? The biggest
act in New Orleans.
Got him a hit on the radio.
He's playing here Saturday night.
I'm thinking I wait till Bertha Mae
was gone and I put him up.
Here?
You mean like in this room here?
You know the Tomcat Club
in Texicana?
Big Jim Jameson's place?
It just went out of business.
Damn. Since Sam is getting sway over
But you ain't never had no guitar...
I'm having one now.
You just worry about getting these
hung everywhere in the county tomorrow.
Payday Saturday, he's gonna draw all them
cotton pickers and soldier boys in here.
Get us back in the black.
They're gonna take me down,
it won't be without a fight.
Guitar Sam at the Honeydripper!
Mm-hm!
Man, this joint is gonna jump!
BELL TINKLES
GUITAR STRUMMING
Somebody slipped
in the railroad yard.
You all can play that thing.
Yeah, been doing it nearby for ever.
What side of the tracks am I on?
The wrong side.
For you.
What you doing here, then?
Oh, white folks
look right through me.
Besides, how much mischief is an old,
blind spook like me gonna get up to anyhow?
Lot of people go for music
around here?
There's a couple of places just
outside of town, at the crossroads.
A long walk? Are you in a hurry?
How old is that box you're playing,
Second one ever made.
The devil got the first one.
How about yours?
Brand new. Made it myself.
Ooh, brand new! Made it hisself!
Hot dog! It's right.
So, these clubs?
Old Toussaint,
he runs the Ace of Spades.
They don't have no live music
in there.
Pine Top Purvis, he runs
the Honeydripper Lounge.
He don't care nothing
about no guitar.
He won't allow one under his roof.
That don't make sense.
Well, when a musician
put his hand to murder,
nine times out of ten
a drummer done it.
But Pine Top, he a piano man.
He killed somebody? That's the story.
But if you meet the man, you damn
well don't be asking him about it.
HONKING
Ain't seen no mule in a long time!
I knew this was Alabama,
but that's the Stone Ages, man!
Where you from, boy?
Memphis.
Down on your vacation?
Got in a piece of trouble up there
with the white folks.
Need to bide my time for a spell.
Biding your time
with them pills, man,
boss man gonna fire your ass.
Don't worry about that.
I'm a cotton-picking fool!
You a fool all right.
Where you from, brother bear?
Mississippi.
Hoo! This here
is a real step-up for you!
Folks around here have discovered
fire and whatnot!
That trouble you in,
have anything to do
with running your mouth?
It had to do with somebody getting on
my nerves and I had to deal with him.
Must have been somebody kinda puny.
As I recall, he was about your size.
What's this place we at?
Nearest town's Harmony.
This is Mr Silas Tugwell's place.
You better get to picking.
Cotton ain't going nowhere.
The more you get first thing
when the dew's still on it,
the more it weighs
when it tip that scale.
You live here too?
You got my sympathies.
Hot damn!
What's the matter? I got a shock.
I thought you used to work
for the power company.
I drove the supply truck.
Guitar Sam ain't gonna be playing
by no candlelight.
I smell bacon.
You must have burned your porky ass
with that electricity!
Breakfast's ready!
Where your mama? She already
over to the mayor's.
She told me to make sure you eat
something before you start running 'round.
That is a sweet woman you got.
You got one waiting for you
if you want her. Who, Nadine?
She come in here every night
making them cow eyes at you.
She seem like a kind
who could smother a man.
She makes all her own clothes.
Darlin', that's not
the kind of thing
a man cares about from a woman.
MUSIC BLARES
Hey, I fixed it! You ain't done
no such thing.
It just decided to come back on.
Decided? Yeah.
Just like it decided
to switch off last night.
You ain't even in the conversation!
This Nadine makes some good money,
too, sewing for people.
That woman scares me.
Last ol' boy to give her a tumble,
Napier Carpenter,
she cooked for him.
Fixed him up all kinds
of nice, new clothes...
I don't see no problem with that!
Come four, five months,
a man starts to...
Sorry, China Doll,
but this is just the way it is.
A man gots needs.
Looks like Nadine could
take care of those, too.
You eat chicken every morning,
noon and night for five months,
you get a taste
for a different kind of meat.
Maybe I shouldn't be talking
about this in front of China Doll.
You ain't gonna say something
I haven't heard worse.
Well, Napier goes out and has him
a pork chop or two, let's say.
Comes back one night
from Toussaint's place,
feeling no pain and smelling...
...Like pork chops,
the way a man will.
He falls out on Nadine's couch
and commenced to snore.
Wake up next morning, find she had taken
all his clothes off without him knowing.
The man was dog drunk!
Miss Nadine come back
with a skillet in her hand,
hot grits bubbling in it.
Says, "Baby, I got your breakfast".
"Oh, not this morning, Nadine",
he says, sitting up.
"Don't think I could eat a thing."
"Well then", she says, "we can't
let this go to waste, can we?"
and she dumped
that whole hot bubbling mess
right in that man's lap.
Ouch!
Then she got busy
with that hot iron on his head.
If screams didn't bring
the neighbours in,
she'd have killed that man.
You've got to admit it though,
the woman is an artist when
it comes to that Singer machine.
Excuse me.
Which one of you is Mr Pine Top?
We ain't hiring.
I can play anything.
I already got me a professional.
Guitar Sam really comin'
all the way down here?
That so surprising?
No, no.
Mr Shack Thomas told me...
You know Shack?
We... travelled together.
When was the last time
you ate solid food, young man?
Take him back and fix him something,
China Doll.
Standing there all hungry-eyed,
puts me off my breakfast.
That's real kind of you.
Must've come in
on the north-bound last night.
Looks like he got the cooties too.
Straw in them box cars, full of 'em.
Never cared to travel that way.
I was out there riding them rails
between the wars.
Hm...
Seen black half of the country
headin' west.
Rode past the other half
coming back east.
Yeah, every one of us,
scraping for the next meal.
This is the place.
Y'all can tear things down.
Put things up.
It's got a lot of potential.
It looks bigger than it does from the
outside. Can I help you, gentlemen?
I'm just showing the man who
gonna run this place what he got.
This is my place.
You the piano player, right?
My name's Tyrone.
They call me Pine Top Purvis.
Pine Top Purvis.
You owe 200
to Lucky Hardaway up in Little Rock.
He gonna get his.
Pine Top...
You missed last month's rent.
After this weekend.
After this weekend, you gonna be
the same raggedy arse piano player
who can't pay off his debts.
Mr Simmons here,
he's gonna be the new proprietor.
Lucky give me two weeks.
Lucky got a better offer.
He can't do that.
You don't think so?
Whoa, now!
What if we got our payments
for him Monday?
Saturday night. We can do that.
Not just no taste.
The whole 200.
And I'll throw in a 25 cent tip
for his messenger boy.
In the meantime,
we're not open yet.
That means y'all trespassing.
See enough, Mr Simmons?
I believe I have.
Somebody could do something
with this place.
Wouldn't take a whole lot of work.
We cleared over 200 that one
A couple of years back.
And we didn't have no Luther on
the guitar with the playing meter.
They say it draws them like flies.
That's what they say.
They say first thing he does
is go to the man that owns a joint,
sticks out his hand and
watch that cash money put in it.
I already sent 50 to his manager.
How much you paying him all out?
Another hundred.
We need to clear 300! What I figure
is if we charge folks 2 to get in,
then the liquor...
What I'm saying is
'less he see that green up front,
the man won't get off the train!
HORN HONKS
What's that now?
About time you fellas run by!
We're just about dry here!
Boss in?
Tyrone?
Whisky wagon come by.
Y'all a day late!
The old man Toussaint
gonna chew me out!
Toussaint went over
to another supplier upstate.
We just got you,
then we're over to the army base
to service the officers' club.
That's 56.
My credit no good anymore?
Whoa, whoa. What's your hurry?
Nobody in their right mind
sell liquor on credit,
especially not to no
dark town road house.
Listen, I got a special case, see.
We've got the harvest coming up.
Soldiers at the base gonna be let
off on leave Saturday night.
Ain't enough hooch in this truck
to satisfy what we gonna sell!
You pay as you go, that's business.
Look, you come back Monday,
get paid and take back
every damn drop that I don't sell.
OK, we got Guitar Sam
lined up here...
What... What if I throw in 5
up front for you fellas?
ENGINE STARTS
Hey! Wait.
Come on, man!
Everybody gives credit!
It's the American way!
Maybe we could buy some Bushead
from Willie Pettigrew.
With that sheriff sniffing
'round me every night,
lay my black ass in jail for good.
Then what we gonna do?
# Move it on over,
move it on over... #
Got a load of liquor
for a Mr Lucien Toussaint.
That would be me.
I trust he got my cheque all right.
Don't suppose I'd be here
if they didn't.
Pull round to the back,
we'll help you unload.
This better be some Saturday night.
Arkansas. How about you?
We come here just after mama
met my stepdaddy.
Not much going on
in a little town like this.
They started up the training base
again. Is that right?
You been in the army?
Uh-huh.
You shoot people?
Fixed radios.
They say this new war
gonna be a short one.
Might be, might not.
I was in Japan.
Yeah?
What's the people like there?
Small. Yeah?
About...
that high.
Speak Japanese.
You been to California?
Los Angeles.
Where they make the movies?
You go to movies? I've been once.
A fine looking girl like you ought
to have been all kinds of places.
I'm going to 'em, I just...
First I'm going to beauty school.
When mama saves up the money.
Then I'll have a portable skill.
Like playing music?
My stepdaddy says that ain't a skill.
It's an affliction.
Come on, China Doll.
Business in town.
You gonna help wi' it.
And you young man, you wanna point
yourself west down that highway
about three miles
to the people working in the field.
It's harvest time.
If you can stoop and pull,
they got a job for you.
Wash up the dishes before you go.
What I need is for you
to go get friendly with Luther,
then I just happen in.
We can't just ask Mr Skinner?
Mr Skinner don't want nothing
from coloured folk,
but they buy his goods
and shine his shoes.
You go on ahead now.
GUITAR STRUMMING
# It was early
# Friday evening
# And the hound began to bark
# Staggolee and Billy Lyons
# Squabbling in the dark
# Staggolee told Billy Lyons
# "What do you think about that?
# "First you take all my money
# "Then you spits
in my Stetson hat"... #
I hate that damn song.
How you been keeping, Tyrone?
Well, just...
trying to hold it together.
You've got your beautiful young
daughter with you this morning.
Don't you be studying her.
I heard tell you gonna put
on a guitar man out at your place.
Where you hear that?
Oh... The breeze.
Well, this time the breeze know
what it's blowing about.
You'd better be careful, Tyrone.
Cos you know what them
guitar players are like.
You be careful yourself.
# He shot him in the shoulder
# Three times in the side
# That's the last time he shot him
# Poor Billy up and died
# Up and died. #
The time is ripe
and the bill is passed due.
You know Mr Roosevelt would've
done it already, only he died.
They don't listen to Miss Eleanor
no more but Mr Truman,
he's starting a band, especially now
that we got this war heated up.
Brother Randolph says...
Here it comes! The gospel
according to Randolph
Tyrone! How you doing?
Oh, got my nose above the waterline.
Here's my baby. What's up, Ty?
How your mama doing, China Doll?
She doing fine, Uncle Shack.
I'm just telling the boys here
about how Brother Randolph
pushing this deal how boys are gonna
be a full part of the service.
I carried a rifle in the Great War.
Boys get in the middle
of this Korea mess,
they ain't gonna thank you
for your efforts.
If we want our full due in this
country, we've got to go ho ho!
Black folk shooting yellow folk
to keep white folks happy?
We need to move on
from that kind of thinking.
Move right on, Shack. Then come back
and tell the rest of us how it is.
LAUGHTER
That's a hard headed man.
I'd have to ask Mr Skinner.
Of course you would.
While you're at it, remind him how one
of the reasons coloured folks come here
is to get the low-down
on what's happening.
China doll! You gonna let us put
I don't think that will be
any problem at all.
That's awful nice of you, Luther.
You're looking special today.
That's sweet of you to say.
Maceo, you go with the man here,
he'll show you where
to put these up.
Darling, we've got a lot
of more places to go.
Nice to see you, Luther!
You've got that boy
eating out of your hand!
Luther is the only one
didn't pull my hair,
he sat behind me in Sunday school.
I hope you got a little
of that sugar left, cos
we got to spare some on
Miss Bertha Mae Spivey.
You gonna ask her to come sing
I'm gonna ask her for money.
Word is, she got a whole pile
of it squirrelled away.
Daddy... Hey, come on, girl,
I got to rest.
Oh, I'm sorry, honey.
You catch your breath, OK.
Yeah.
So why Miss Spivey
gonna give you money,
if you won't let her sing
at the club no more?
I'm gonna make her partner.
Partner in what?
The Honeydripper.
But all you ever say, it's just
a hole you pour good money into.
It don't matter.
I'm gonna make her proprietor.
Tress. Like waiter and waitress.
Proprietress.
She got to like the sound of that.
Lovely ladies out to make a purchase.
Is that the same Guitar Sam is
The very one.
What does he look like?
A fine looking man,
a real lady killer from what I hear.
Got that New Orleans style to him.
Well, you ought to have
a picture up there.
We'll be getting some of those
when he come in on the train.
Main thing is,
the man is electrifying
and you know what that means.
OK.
Make like we just come by
to see how how she keeping.
Then I'll kind of mention I'd been
thinking of bringing her on as a partner.
Left the door open.
She gone.
Oh. When she going to be back?
She just gone.
Woke up beside her.
Oh, damn.
24 years.
China doll, go find your mama.
She'll know how to fix up the body.
Laugh and all but...
...I've been with that woman
24 years.
She gave me the only home
I ever had.
What am I gonna do now?
What's your hurry, boy?
No hurry.
Take your hat off.
Where you headed?
I'm looking for work.
You're not from around here?
No, sir.
Stranger wandering around, no job,
that would make you a vagrant.
But I'm looking.
I got a job for you.
Get in the back.
I can always use another hand.
Well, I caught this young fella in
flagrant violation of the statutes -
gawkery, with intent to mope.
What's he going to run me?
3 a day, plus you feed him lunch.
The sentence, that all depends on how
long you're gonna need the help?
I don't get any trial?
Sure you do, boy, and a speedy
one at that. Meet the judge.
Judge Gatlin.
Grab a sack.
Oh dear, I believe
it's about that time.
Would you care to join me?
No, thank you.
Of course you won't join me,
you don't partake.
That was thoughtless of me.
No, that's all right.
So, you don't take spirits
and what else in your church?
I'm sort of between churches Oh.
I've been thinking about
changing over to the Holiness,
but I haven't been sanctified yet.
Oh.
There's been a minister
in this week.
The tent over by the fairgrounds?
The church I was raised in,
we were Pentecostals.
They wouldn't have anything but
the human voice inside the church.
Dancing, any kind of dancing,
music, card-playing.
It was very strict.
They took up serpents.
I heard of that.
I tell Floyd these stories,
and he's... He's horrified.
They have always been Methodists,
Floyd's family.
It can be a trial, married folks
differ in their religion.
And your husband is a...?
Unaffiliated.
Unaffiliated, I see.
But he has his social club.
The Honeydripper? That is such
a colourful name.
Yes.
He must have a great deal
of his energy to it.
It's just him
and Maceo Green runs it,
I go over and cook some
after I get off here.
Well, that's very supportive of you,
considering the sort of environment.
I've been in those bar rooms
most of my life, Miss Amanda.
I see.
I was a singer.
I met Tyrone in the Paradise,
down in Treefork.
China doll was only two.
And I was just...
living alone, you know,
drinking more than I ought,
and then Tyrone...
...Like a light, come into my life.
People think things
cos he owns the lounge,
but they don't know him.
Small minds are never
in short supply.
People in this town...
I suppose they expected that Floyd,
being from a prominent family,
as prominent as is possible
here in Harmony,
would have chosen somebody more...
In school,
if you didn't have shoes...
Oh, I forgot!
I was going through some of Emily's
old things the other day.
I thought this would look
just darling on your China Doll.
Oh, I don't think that would
near fit her, Miss Amanda.
Why, how old is she, now?
Oh, my...
I must have lost track
somewhere along the line.
17?
It was a very nice thought.
Mama, mama, they need you...
Oh, I'm sorry.
Miss Amanda, I didn't know China Doll!
We were just recalling
how you used to play right here,
under this table.
There's not any cash money
that I know of.
She sold a good deal
of the furniture,
but there's still a nice looking
couch in the parlour.
Didn't care about too much,
other than singing
at the Pine Top's place.
You're welcome to look
around the house,
if there's anything
your missus might like.
As long as it's not something
personal to me and Bertha Mae.
It's just...
She's got to go out in style.
You ain't never done this job before?
Can't say I have.
You want to set your pins out wide,
bend over at the hip.
Don't be bobbing up and down
all the time.
When you're up, be up.
When you're on the roll, stay down.
But most important,
you got to get a rhythm.
Everything in life got a rhythm,
even pulling cotton off the plant.
Lay it out for me. Not my rhythm,
your rhythm.
That's between you and the day
and the work you got before you.
Once you get it, don't let nothing
or nobody push you off it.
I'm going so slow.
Are you getting paid
by the pound or by the hour?
I ain't getting paid at all,
none of us are.
I suggest you work that
into your rhythm too.
Let's see more picking and
less talking over there.
Getting right to it, boss.
Them boys frying over there.
That's just Gatlin's gang.
He works them people from can
into cane, every damn day.
When the fields get picked,
he bid 'em out to the neighbours.
Harvest time come around here,
you'd better sign with somebody
fast, or get out of sight.
I ate a pick of dust today.
Why don't you get some water?
The only thing that wash out
the dust is whisky.
Ain't enough whisky in this world to
wash out what I swallowed in my life.
What are we playing for?
Two bits of ham.
Woo! That's awful steep, ain't it?
Well... I remember playing
this game one night,
Memphis's boss Crumpstown folks
is gambling before they can walk,
caught me a winning streak
that cleaned out half
the sporting men on Beale Street.
I got up from that table,
my money was long as train smoke.
What happened to it?
I spent it all on fine-looking women.
Yo, Mississippi!
His name is Hamilton. Hambo!
You want in on this?
Settle up on pay day.
That your deck of cards?
What if it is?
I'll stay clear of it then.
Are you insinuating? I'm just saying,
Looks like dinner.
A rabbit is a rodent.
A man eat a rabbit,
might as well eat a rat.
Simple country nigger,
afraid to sit down and lose
a little handful of change.
He awful big to mess with.
Don't scare me none.
I'm a stepping razor, man.
I'm trouble on two legs.
Your draw, Junebug. Don't be
dripping no sweat on my cards.
HONKING
Excuse me folks!
Look here!
Y'all heard about the show
we puttin' on at the Honeydripper.
Saturday night.
We got Guitar Sam!
I expect there'll be a nice turnout
for Bertha Mae tomorrow.
Yes, folks who wouldn't have nothing
to do with her when she was alive.
Some of them, maybe.
Still got to pay your respects.
That Slick is gonna have
to find him a new ride.
That's a terrible thing to say.
That's how the man gets over,
is all.
Always sugaring up to some woman
who's got a job or a bankroll.
That's no way to live.
Society is in whirl, baby.
A man's gotta walk through the gates
of hell to get a piece of cheese.
Not so young any more...
...Lose hold of what little he's got.
If you lose the club,
I'm sure you'll find something else.
In this town, like what?
You know, any time you want,
I could get Miss Amanda to ask...
Watch your feet, Mr Mayor!
I just done mopped the floor.
Ty, you work so hard at the lodge,
but what you bring in is...
Not even as much as you make
polishing that white lady's silver.
I didn't say that.
You didn't have to.
It'll just have to work out, then.
Meeting gonna start
and I'm not there.
Your soul's not the one
needs saving, baby.
It's all gonna be fine, Daddy.
Everybody in town talking about
Guitar Sam coming to Harmony.
# As I walked
all along this highway
# I was seeking
# My Lord each day
# She left me standing
# Out on this highway
# Oh, just wondering
which way I must go
# She left me standing
# Out on this highway
# Oh, just wondering
which way I must go. #
Amen! Amen! Sing on, choir!
Amen! Let the church say Amen.
Amen!
Let the church say Amen! Amen!
Amen!
Amen!
She left him standing
out on the highway,
wondering which way to go.
Yeah.
The highway of life.
Sisters and brothers, it will twist
you and it will turn ya.
It will run you this-a-way,
and it will run you that-a-way.
Yeah.
Tempt you with many a detour.
Yeah.
Because the highway of life
is designed to lead us astray.
Yeah.
That's not the road that we want
to be on, brothers and sisters.
That's not the path
that we need to follow.
We need to be on that other road.
We need to be on that road
that leads to glory.
We need to be on that road
that leads to the right hand of God.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
# That thoroughfare
I'm talking about
# That righteous road
we need to travel
# It's called the highway to heaven
# It is called
the highway to heaven
# But we need to know,
sisters and brothers
# We need to know
Who is walking beside ya.
# You got to be wary of who
is tryin'
# To hold you back
from your journey
# Cos many a loved ones
got to be left behind
# Cos even on the road,
you're lost in the wilderness
# You're either headin' for glory
or you're doomed for damnation
# You're either with the Lord
or you're with the devil.
# And there ain't no in-between.
# No, no,
there ain't no in-between. #
Praise the Lord!
APPLAUSE
Charleston. Yeah.
Tulsa. Tulsa ain't so bad.
But for the spit.
Got them stockyards near the jail.
Them flies.
Course, I had me in a cell
in Georgia once.
Six other men,
didn't have a one doing tall.
Must've got caught hoppin' Yeah.
Ain't no free ride
allowed through Georgia.
And the food there? Paltry.
Paltry ain't the word for it.
Breakfast is a joke.
And lunch is a rumour...
And dinner was a anecdote!
Do it the hard way, brother!
You got locked in that box.
Or one just like it.
# Wake up in the morning
# Hear the bing bong ring
# Walk up to the table
# See the same damn thing
# What am I gonna tell you
# Fork, a knife, and a pan
# If you say a thing about it
# You in trouble with the man.
# Let the Midnight Special
# Shine its light on me
# Well, let the Midnight Special
# Shine its ever-loving light
on me. #
You a singer, young man?
Yeah, I'm a singer.
I'm a guitar player.
I'm gonna be on the radio someday,
people are gonna know my name.
You keep on thinking
that way, young man.
If Judge Gatlin don't choose
to work you into your grave,
you just might do it.
# If you ever go to Houston
# Don't you stagger
Don't you fight
# Cos the sheriff will arrest you
# You're in the cooler
for the night
# He'll tie your hands together
# And he'll bring you down
# Throw you in the black river
# Penitentiary bound. #
# Early this morning
# I heard the lonesome
church bell toll
# Early this morning
# I heard the low down
church bell toll
# It brought me the sad news
# My Bertha Mae was dead and gone
# Never miss my baby
# I never missed her
till she left my door... #
First, he passed away,
and the seed was no more...
# I never missed my baby
# Until she left my door
# It breaks my heart
# Think I never see her face
no more. #
He will dwell within, he will
wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death shall be no more, mourning
and dying and pain shall be no more.
To the first things
that passed away,
I am the Alpha and the Omega,
the beginning and the end...
I hear tell Miss Bertha Mae passed.
That's right.
Yeah, she lived it.
Just like she sang it.
You waiting on somebody?
Ain't nobody on that train
gonna change your luck, Tyrone.
You're gonna have to save
your own self.
What do you know about anything?
Oh, nothing much.
But I know you.
From way back.
GUITAR STRUMS
# Mm...
# Oh...
# Oh
TRAIN HORN BLOWS
TRAIN HORN CONTINUES
Mournful end for a wayward sinner.
She always seemed
at peace with herself.
The company she kept?
The life she lived?
I never know Bertha Mae
to do hurt to a living soul.
We're all hoping to see you get over
and accept the Lord tonight,
Delilah.
I'm hoping so too.
You've been lingering at
the threshold long enough, sister.
Time to step ahead.
Tyrone! You got somebody
getting off here?
Supposed to be. Well,
what's the party's name?
Sam? Guitar Sam.
Don't know his birth name.
He's coming here? Uh-huh.
Yo, Matt!
Guitar Sam get on this train?
Nah, man, he's in the hospital
back in Little Rock.
Hospital? You know music folks.
Whatever he was doing, he must
have been doing too much of it.
Brother, maybe... Maybe he
come on in tomorrow, huh?
Matt!
All aboard!
Somebody didn't show up!
We should have made you dumb
instead of blind.
# I done had my fun
# If I don't get well no more
# I said, I done had my fun
# If I don't get well no more
# My head is spinning
# And I's going down real slow. #
A man don't take care of himself...
...With drinking and jazz and women
every night.
Don't make no difference now.
It got so bad,
I heard there was this old boy goes
round pretending to be Guitar Sam.
Fill out the gigs he misses.
He does pretty well for himself,
what I hearing.
Somebody we could find?
Hell, I don't know,
just some story I heard.
Must have been the first one.
First what?
Back in slavery days, them's the
one that work in the big house.
Might not have had shoes always,
the pants didn't have no holes in
them, they didn't pick no cotton.
House niggers. Yeah, that's
how they call them.
They had all their
African kinds of instruments.
Drums, shakers,
some kind of banjo thing.
But the piano...
They didn't bring no piano
over on those ships from Africa.
The piano was just sitting there,
in the white folks' big room,
all polished up.
I'd figure this...
first one...
He must have passed by
15, 20 times a day.
Run the corner of his eyes over it.
You see,
he was there when they'd play.
The masters.
Their minuets.
PLAYS A MINUE Him standing there,
with a tray of white people's food.
Pretending not to have
a thought in his head.
But he...
He's watching them fingers.
He's watching where them keys were.
See, this old boy, the first one,
he knows how to play all
them kinds of African instruments.
He could play mud if you
gave him a key and a tempo.
Yeah, he got music in his head
and his heart.
In every damn piece of him
there's music.
Then one day...
...The master's away.
And he alone in that room,
with that piano.
Watch out now.
And he goes over
and he sits down on the bench.
And he spreads his fingers over it,
the way he's seen
that minuet player do.
And he thinks...
PLAYS CHORD
And he thinks...
..."Lord help me."
"I could do some damage
with this thing."
I would have liked
to have been there.
I mean...
Just to hear the cat play.
Mace...
I'm gonna lose my club.
If old man Toussaint find out
you stole his liquor,
you're likely to lose
more than that.
I got no more cards to play.
If you was to go down
to see Lucky Hardaway in person...
I ain't kissing up to no cokey-nose,
coke-headed asshole!
What the hell that supposed to be?
Some kind of guitar.
A guitar got a hole in it.
That's how the sound come out.
That boy must be three bricks shy
of a load upstairs.
Daddy! They've gone and
arrested him! Arrest who?
Sonny! The High Sheriff arrested him
and sold him to Judge Gatlin!
Sonny who?! Sonny that was
here yesterday morning!
Sonny that got a screw loose?
That's why they arrested him!
Mace? Play something on that,
make some noise there.
GUITAR STRUMS
It's electric.
I could plug a chunk of stovewood
in a wall and it'd get more music
than you'd get out of that mess!
Nah, man.
No, man, it don't work
unless it's hooked up to the juice!
See, you got the juice, you don't
need the hollow inside that box.
The music just runs straight from
the strings, through the wire...
...And out of your amplifier...
...Which is what this thing must be.
Sonny said he fixed radios
in the army.
Sonny didn't do nothing
but feed bed bugs in anybody's army.
And some of them caught in his head.
I'm surprised he's even got
the wit to pick cotton.
Judge Gatlin done bought himself
a drooling idiot.
What you gonna amplify Daddy?
Unless you're gonna sit
over in your chair
and play those little Aside, man.
Sitting over there,
looking all clean and polite.
The guitar ain't been up front,
since those old pissing
moan blue shouters
sit their blind asses on the corner
hollering for pennies!
Old-time music. Daddy?
Sonny didn't do nothing
to get arrested for.
He was just looking for work.
They've hung coloured boys
for less than that, darling.
Least on the work gang they feed
them, keep their strength up.
But he doesn't belong there.
You know, Guitar Sam plays him
an electric.
But I don't think it's
this no-hole kind of deal.
Hope he plugs it into
the wrong socket some night
and electrocutes
his sorry, no-show ass.
Mace?
Now, if he showed up here
and our power went out again,
while he was playing...
Nah, I fixed it good this time, Ty.
Eh...
So he comes out, and he plugs
his axe into the wall...
He'd come out looking good,
from what I hear!
All kinds of spangly pants
and jacket!
Got his name spelt out on the back!
The clothes, right?!
All slick and shiny!
Flash them gold teeth at them gals!
Got his sax man behind him.
Maybe a piano, harmonica and drums.
Hey, you remember that night
at the Esquire Club,
when the lights went out in Mobile?
Yeah, and they took off
with the gate.
Just stole the damn register
right off the counter!
They didn't hold Reggie Porter
for it, did they?!
Nah! They knew it was
this place got robbed!
Did nobody hold it to Reggie Porter?
And nobody expected
their money to come back.
No, cos they was too busy
diving for the pot
and that trump game got interrupted.
And nobody suspected that it might
have been Reggie Porter hisself!
Hisself that pulled the lights!
No.
No, Ty. No.
No. No. No.
China Doll! You mind the place till
we get back. Hey, come on, Mace.
Where you going, Daddy?!
I promised the people Guitar Sam,
and they're going to get Guitar Sam!
Come on, Mace,
let's get out of here!
We've got work to do.
Why are you so interested
in this boy?
Got a job for him.
You must be doing pretty well
for yourself out there, Tyrone.
You're hiring new people on.
Passing well, yeah.
But this boy... Name is Sonny.
Uh-huh.
Well, he's paying off his debt
to society right now.
If I was to pull him
out of the field...
Judge Gatlin paid for your day
of prison labour.
You willing to pay for him
for the duration of his sentence?
Which might be? As long as
I care to make it.
Well, I was counting on...
more of a one-time deal.
If I can rent him out50.
It's not just the money.
There's legalistic principles
involved here. Public safety issues.
I'll pay you Sunday morning.
You going to pay me now,
or you can forget about it.
I don't have it now.
Hm.
You think you're too smart for
the rest of us, don't you, Tyrone?
Think you can go it all by yourself.
You'd rather eat roofing nails
than come to me for a favour now,
wouldn't you?
It's not a favour
if I'm gonna pay for it.
Oh, you're gonna pay all right.
If you don't hand over that money
to me by Sunday morning,
you've got yourself a new partner.
Same deal as I got with Toussaint.
What'll that be?
You'll get the 50.
And that wife of yours.
Delilah? Mm-hm.
Them fried chicken sandwiches.
If I was to come by now and then
and check in on my interests?
She be happy to fix you
whatever you want.
Good. Cos my wife's cooking
would gag a maggot.
Different people got different kinds
Yeah.
Well Lurleen ain't discovered
what hers is yet.
Let's go fetch that boy.
Is this the one you want? Mm.
You got any ideas about running
rabbit on me, best get rid of them now.
Are you paying my way out?
Till Monday.
How come?
You like dragging that cotton sack?
No. Then don't ask questions.
# Why don't you do right
# Like some other men do... #
This size, right?
But it's got to shine.
And when you need this? Tonight.
That's a tall order.
It's got to happen.
You know, I do my best work,
my fastest work,
when I'm happy.
Yeah, I suppose you do.
You gonna make me happy, baby?
Uh...
You come down by the club tonight.
We having a special show.
Tell 'em at the door, you my guest.
Food ain't the only thing
a woman needs three times a day.
What's that, baby?
Um, that boy gonna need time, try
this jacket on, see how he feels.
Later, Nadine.
You got to do something
to the boy's hair, darling.
They may not know what the real Sam
looked like, but it ain't this.
I can try.
What exactly am I supposed to do?
You're gonna stand up there
with that contraption you got,
and play Guitar Sam's numbers.
I can do that with my eyes closed.
If we can get the audience to
close theirs, we'll be better off.
Ty! I tracked Mr Trenier down.
Let's hit it.
Bye, Daddy.
You know what you're doing?
I fix Mama's hair all the time.
But you ain't been
to that school yet.
You go to school
to learn your guitar?
No.
I might pick up
some things at beauty school,
but mostly it's for my certificate.
"And that is a ticket to adventure."
That's what it says in the brochure.
People looking for beauty
all over the world.
You ought to watch out for
them wires sticking down.
That don't look safe.
Yeah, power's always going out.
People getting shocks and whatnot.
Somebody ought to fix it.
"Career and beauty
is like money in the bank."
Says that in the brochure too.
Plus it isn't physically taxing.
Yeah, can't see no pretty thing
like you behind a plough.
I had the rheumatic fever
when I was little.
It left me with a weak heart.
Oh.
Mine been acting kind of funny too.
About since I laid eyes on you.
What's that? Just some old
moonshine they keep around.
What are you gonna do with it?
They joke about how this stuff
will straighten your hair right out.
I'll just make yours relax a little.
Mr Time Trenier.
Has a name to be reckoned with.
The story goes you used
to play with Buddy Bolan.
I played with them all.
And King Oliver. One band falls
apart, you find yourself another.
There's never a shortage of bands
down in New Orleans.
I didn't know
you were giving lessons.
It pays the rent, almost.
You interested in a playing job?
If you can pay, I can play.
You've got to dress sharp.
It ain't like an all-night thing.
You just got to start out, and
then there's gonna be an accident.
An accident?
Yeah, a sudden loss of power.
Lights out.
It's your gig, man.
8 o'clock.
This ain't no coloured people's
time.
And sure ain't New Orleans time.
I mean, 8 o'clock on the money.
If you got the green,
I'm on the scene.
Then that's the deal.
You know any drummers?
I bring you one. And nothing fancy.
Just as long as he keep time.
Time is my name.
21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28.
Make your mark here, please.
You owe me 30.
The book says 28.
1.50 every 100lb, and I picked...
2 deducted for stones.
But I've got no stones in the sack.
We mill the cotton, son.
There's always stones.
But there weren't none in my sack.
We take off 2 a week for stones.
That's the way it's always been.
Ain't that right, Junebug?
Yes, sir.
Been that way my whole life.
You gonna take your pay, son,
or you gonna give it up to charity?
Wouldn't let nobody mess
with my money like that.
He took the same 2 off yours.
Yeah, but you could pave a highway
with the rocks I threw in that mess.
You country negroes
let the crackers run you like dogs.
If the sheriff wasn't here
I'd snap your neck, boy.
Don't let me stop you.
But first, you're gonna sign
that ledger like you're supposed to.
Don't want nobody crying
they didn't get their due.
DELILAH HUMS
How could you do that?
I'm gonna put it back.
You don't go gambling
with my baby's money.
I ain't got no man playing.
I don't care what you took it for.
I save for China Doll
and you ain't got not business
putting your fingers on it.
China don't need any school, baby.
She could walk into any of those
places right now and get a job.
There's got to be some line
you won't cross, Ty.
There's got to be something
you won't do.
The world start throwing me
a break woman,
maybe I'll catch religion
and walk the straight and narrow
like those Bible toppers you
set up with. But until that day...
Reverend Cutlip was right about you.
Oh, shit.
Damn!
Mr Purvis?
People call me Ty or they call me
Pine Top, it's Mr Pine Top to you.
I just want to tell you how
I appreciate the opportunity.
Right.
I know every one
of Guitar Sam's songs.
I know the chords, I know the words.
China Doll was saying
how you was famous once.
I was known,
but never what you call famous.
How do you get your start?
Down in Mobile.
An old professional.
The name of Joe Dudlow.
He'd had a stroke on one side.
Curled him all up.
Kept on plugging.
I used to come out and
play his left hand for him.
This one night,
he was going hot and heavy.
His show's just past,
right at the piano,
middle of Black Bottom Stomp.
They'd propped him up at the bar,
stuck a drink in his hand...
Told me to keep pounding
those ivories.
There was a meanness
hanging over them two johns.
There was murder in the air.
Stopped playing for the minute,
come down on you
like a flock of girls.
Hey.
This is you.
Big band days on the road.
Reginald Erskine.
I don't believe I've heard of him.
Big, tall, light skin fella
out in Carolina.
Said he was part Cherokee.
Couldn't play nothing,
but he'd raise a little stink
and he had just long greasy hair
he'd through around
like Cab Calloway.
And you were the piano man?
Piano man, arranger, you name it.
That must have been something,
travelling the country first class.
I don't know about first class,
but I seen the country.
How come you stopped?
I got tired of carrying
another man's water.
Didn't want to die in no
coloured hotel some night
in who knows where Arkansas.
Met Delilah.
Wanted something of my own.
You don't have nothing
to worry about, Mr Pine Top.
I won't let you down tonight.
No, I... I don't suppose you will.
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the fire and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the fire and the Lord
# You got to choose between
the fire and the Lord
# You're gonna make it all right
# You got to choose
# You got to choose between
the world and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose between
the world and the Lord
# You better jump on board
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the word and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the word and the Lord
# You got to choose between
the word and the Lord
# You better jump on board
# When that sun no longer shines
# God will send his final sign
# Get down sinner
You got to kneel
# You got to kneel for the saviour
and pray
# You got to kneel for the saviour
and pray
# You got to kneel
for the saviour and pray
There ain't no hiding
from the judgement day
# There ain't no hiding
# From the judgement day
# No, there ain't no hiding
# From the judgement day. #
Have a good time.
Hi there, young lady.
Good evening, welcome to the
Honeydripper. Have a good time.
Everybody's getting restless.
How we doing? We're gonna be
full up, but the food...
Is Delilah coming in?
What if I've lost her?
She won't let you down, Ty.
This ain't going to work, is it?
You just got to play it out and see.
Guitar Sam!
See if you can push another round
of drinks while I stall them.
Then you going to bring him out?
Sam!
We coming here to hear
the guitar man play!
Be on the wires.
Give them three bars Guitar Sam!
I got a baseball bat under the
counter but you out here all alone.
Just get the liquor moving, Mace.
And keep the money
where you can run with it.
Guitar Sam!
The Lord don't want nobody
to sit back and suffer.
He want you to stand up.
He want you to rise up.
He want you to step forward
and come down to the merciful arms
of his eternal salvation.
A fire is heating up,
brothers and sisters,
and judgement day is nigh.
Anybody out there tonight
want to answer his call?
Anybody out there tonight, is gonna
step forward and be saved?
Ain't no time to hesitate.
Got to come on down
and offer yourself to the Lord.
Come on. Come on, come on, sister.
I believe you hear the
Lord's voice talking to you sister.
That's the Lord's voice
and I believe you hear it.
I do believe you hear it.
Come on down.
Bring it on down to his salvation.
Feel the Lord at your back.
You got to leave them sinners behind.
Come on down.
Come on down.
I see you sister, coming.
I see the Lord is talking to you.
I hear the Lord is talking to you.
I believe you hear him, sister.
Come on down,
you hear the voice of the Lord?
You hear the voice of the Lord.
That voice is trying to tell you
where you need to be right now,
sister.
All you've got to do,
all you've got to do
is move your feet and get there.
Move your feet and get there.
You look good.
Damn.
He look good, don't he, Daddy? Yeah.
Honey, I need you to get right
by that front door
and take over collecting
the cover charge.
Anything happens,
go wrong or something,
you just step out and walk away
from the club, you hear?
What's going to go wrong?
Guitar Sam here,
gets them soldier boys jumping,
get a little rough in here.
Just stay on your toes, that's all.
OK.
China Doll?
You know there ain't a thing in
this world I wouldn't do for you?
Even if I mess up sometimes.
You know that, right?
I know that, Daddy.
You go on, now.
Well, you look like something
that would come out of New Orleans.
I forget to tell you,
I fixed your hook-up.
My what?
Your hook-up, where your
electricity comes in. It was...
Ty, we've got a situation out there.
You don't think I know that?
Got the law in the house.
Didn't think
we'd be seeing you so soon.
You got a real nice crowd
here tonight, Tyrone.
I see them army uniforms.
We got ourselves
this special attraction. See...
Chicken. Huh?
Them ribs outside smell real good,
but I'm afraid my heart's set
on some of your wife Delilah's
fried chicken.
Right.
She made it last Saturday
at the mayor's,
but old Clayford Gentry came up
and he ate all the drumsticks.
I'm partial to dark meat.
The situation
regarding... sherriff...
She is in the back there cooking,
isn't she?
Maybe, if you would come back here
a little bit later.
Regular or spicy?
They both take the same time to
fix up. I just got to know which.
I have to make mine regular,
I'm afraid, ma'am.
Spicy is just fine,
but it always comes back
to nip at me later.
It's important not to bite off
more than you can chew.
You just make yourself at home.
Good luck tonight, baby.
Slap some mayonnaise on it.
You want to wait over there,
Sherriff?
Don't want to scare off
the customers.
Here he comes!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So, here is what you all
been waiting for.
Noted performer and recording star,
direct from New Orleans, Louisiana,
here's Guitar Sam.
FEEDBACK
Sorry about that, folks.
Must have got kicked on the train.
FEEDBACK STOPS
Thank you, Jesus.
# Well, I'm gonna hold my baby
as tight as I can
# Tonight she'll know
I'm a mighty, mighty man
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Sweet Lorraine, Sioux City Sue
# Georgia Brown, California too
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Meet me in a hurry behind the barn
# Don't be afraid
I'll do you no harm
# I want you to bring
my rockin' shoes
# Cos tonight I'm gonna
rock away all my blues
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight... #
Got to check that out.
Let's go. Come on!
# Have you heard the news?
There's good rockin' tonight
# They'll all be there
Just wait and see
# Rockin' and a-rollin'
At the jamboree
# Have you heard the news?
There's good rockin' tonight
# Have you heard the news?
# There's good rockin' tonight. #
CHEERING
Oh, my soul!
Don't tire yourself out, poppa.
Me and you got business together.
I believe we do.
All right.
All you men, grab a hold of a woman.
If you ain't got a woman,
just grab a hold of yourselves.
We're gonna play this one for you,
slow and tight.
# They did the boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# They did the boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# I went to a party
# With the bobby socks
# At the party
# Man, I really got a shock... #
42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 150.
And there's another 50 in here.
Lucky Hardaware don't mind
some change, does he?
What if Mr Hardaware were to say
let the chumps keep their change?
He wants the club back,
one way or the other.
How that be?
Well, he better take that up
with my business partner.
The sheriff your business partner?
Yeah. And he's twice as mean
as he is ugly.
You must want this club
awful bad, brother.
Maybe y'all didn't notice,
but that ain't no Guitar Sam.
# At the party
# Oh, I was like a chaperone
# I couldn't boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# I like to boogie real slow
# With the blue lights
way down low. #
CHEERING
Sam!
You is a liar, boy.
I know Sammy since he was
drinking his mama's milk.
Hell, I know his mama,
she's lives up near mine.
And you ain't him.
That's Creole Sammy you're talking
about, pops. I'm Delta Guitar Sam.
As long as we straight on that.
Get on out of here
and let the man play.
Yeah.
I'm gonna play one for you right
now that I come up with today
while I was having my hair cut.
# Ch-Ch-Ch-China Doll
# Can't get you off of my mind
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# Can't get you off of my mind
# But if you're gonna be my baby,
leave all them others behind
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I think about you day and night
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I think about you day and night
# Oh, baby
When you gonna treat me right? #
INAUDIBLE CONVERSATION
KEYS THUMP
SAXOPHONE PLAYS
INAUDIBLE EXCHANGE
Y'all are in my house here,
gentlemen!
Don't have no fighting,
don't have no killing.
Don't have none of that
dismal nonsense in my house!
You understand?!
What's your name, son?
Dex.
Dexter Moncrieff. And you?
H- H-Hamilton Drinkwater.
Well, gentlemen, this is a night
there won't be no pitiful song
written about you two
killing each other.
Don't nothing rhyme with Moncrieff
anyhow! We got a problem here?
Yeah, these two gentlemen seem to have
brought something in for our collection.
Yeah? You first.
Now yours.
Y'all still wanna mess with each
other, you go outside and do it.
This world is full of people
who got no use for us,
like to see us in the grave.
We don't need to give them any help.
# Oh, China Doll
# I gotta let you into my heart
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I gotta let you into my heart
# Oh now, baby
You had me from the start... #
MUSIC CONTINUES IN DISTANCE
Sound like the music moving on
again, don't it?
It always do.
Time to make room
for whoever coming next.
That boy can play some.
Leaving?
I ain't needed around here no more.
Where you headed?
Oh...
Down the road.
Tyrone.
Who you talking to out here?
Just myself.
# It started with a 12-bar
country moan
# Then the guitar bass
dropped the saxophone
# Up the Mississippi River
came the song
# Music keeps rolling, rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Use the fender
To make the notes spark
# Then the bass guitar
got electrified
# Blues are rocking
Like a good ole stomp
# And the music keeps rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Whoo-hoo!
# Whoo!
# The music keeps
# The music keeps
# Yes, I said
The music keeps rolling on
# The music keeps rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Ye-e-es! Huh! #
Ain't bothering you.
Yes it is,
that ain't no kind of music.
At least I make a sound.
Yeah, and it's a nasty one.
Wanna try again tonight?
Might as well.
MUSIC PLAYS FROM CLUB
# I know a gal
by the name of Maid Lou
# She shook it so much
she had the German flu
# No matter how she done it
# Oh, no matter how she done it
# Well, no matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# The women didn't like her
# And they called her out
of her name
# But the men, they loved her
# Mmm, it was a crying shame
# No matter how she done it
# No matter how she done it
# Well, no matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# No matter how she done it
# She done it just the same
# Yes, she did. #
You take it for a while.
They making all that racket again
at Toussaint's.
Yeah, all them people
over there buying drinks,
throwin' that money after them
dice and what not.
Lucky we got none of that here.
# You can drink your liquor
# You can drink your cold can beer
# You can drink your good whisky
# You can drink your cool can beer
# You can stay out
all with your sweet gal
# But, Papa,
don't you leave me here
# I hear that wild ox moaning
# Looking for that Texas... #
Sounding good, huh?
Sounds fine. Always has.
Not much of a crowd. Not a crowd at all,
just some stiffs who wanna drink themselves
to sleep without the music waking them up.
You oughta advertise.
Got an attraction like Bertha Mae.
Singing is one thing, Slick, but
whether people wanna look at you
when you do it is another.
Got quite a number
over the Toussaint's place tonight.
Sounds like it.
Lots of young folks coming in
to listen to that box of his.
I don't see why we don't just turn our box
on, let folks feed it nickels like they do.
The lady is singing.
# You hear me pleading, baby
Baby, don't you leave me here... #
But didn't nobody come
to listen to her, Slick.
# Come here, sweet Daddy
# Let me whisper in your ear... #
Like the man say,
you can't argue with failure.
You know why Slick
here's like a preacher?
Cos he do all his best work
on his knees!
Never mind him, he's just drunk.
I heard she put a ring through it,
use it to drag him round the house.
Come on, you know Tyrone
don't like no scuffle in here.
I ought to get me old lady,
help out with the groceries...
You just gotta sweet talk her some,
give her a little poke every now and then.
You gonna drink,
or you gonna lay Gentlemen!
Miss Delilah.
Let's behave ourselves.
What are you boys doing in here?
Out, out! And what are you
doing behind that bar?
It's just for a minute.
That's 60 seconds too long.
Maceo, take that child's place.
You bring people their food,
Nobody's eating!
That's cos nobody's here
but these couple of lost souls.
Haven't had an appetite since
they gave over to the devil.
Evening, Maceo,
you looking good tonight!
Likewise, Miss Nadine.
What can I do for you?
Oh, you know what you can do for me,
sweet man.
What would you like... to drink?
How many is that tonight?
Don't talk to me about that, baby.
Not tonight. I don't want
China Doll behind that bar.
She's got to help out.
Not behind there she doesn't. You
know she's not supposed to get excited.
Not much chance of that in here.
Harvest hands all crowded in
to Toussaint's place.
Young ones.
You'll get some of them.
They'll stick their noses in here, get
one little sniff of the music and go home.
Maybe that's the wages of sin.
Ain't no sin happening
here tonight, baby.
And there sure as hell
ain't no wages.
Your God wants to chastise some sinners,
he'd best go over to Toussaint's.
Got a whole bar room
crowded with them.
He's not my God.
He's everybody's God.
How did the meeting go tonight?
Viola Underwood found the Lord.
If she'd found Him last,
she wouldn't have come through.
She must have lost Him again
between then and now cos
she come down that aisle
tonight hollering in tongues.
The spirit didn't move you, though?
Not yet.
Maybe it's too late for me.
I can't believe he's serving
Alton Stokely. That poor man.
Toussaint cut his credit off.
Either he gets it here,
or he drinks that paint
peeler Willie Pettigrew
cuts up back in his swamp.
I'm gonna go home,
say a prayer for that man.
Say one for me too, baby.
Outstanding, baby.
Outstanding. You've still got the voice.
You think so? - Chills down my spine
just to hear you.
Ty, I'm gonna be
a little late Saturday.
No need to come in
if you don't want to.
I've made other arrangements.
Other arrangements?
Try something new in here.
You can't do that. Yes, he can, darling.
This is his place,
and he can do whatever he wants.
You'll know where to find me
when you need me.
Put the box on now, Ty?
Yeah, put the box on.
I'm gonna crank it up some,
see if we can draw some life in here.
LOUD JAZZ MUSIC
There it goes again.
Electricity don't like that jukebox.
Must be a short circuit
in the juke here.
Got to get the power company No,
they turned my juice off last month.
I don't want you sniffing
around that splice out Maceo did.
It's nice in here.
Kind of romantic.
I'm gonna have to go out back,
wiggle some things around.
Don't you wiggle nothing round
unless I'm there to see it.
You don't worry, folks,
bar's still open.
Evening, folks.
Evening, Sherriff.
Your light's gone out.
Looks like it.
You'll know that'll be a violation
of something or other.
We're just about to close up here.
Oh. Ooh, your wife been cooking?
Not tonight.
Went to a revival chat.
Ah, I stood by there myself.
Them niggers were singing up a storm.
I just came out here
to look in on Toussaint.
Had that shooting two nights ago.
Lots of fighting in there.
There is that.
Course, me and old Toussaint,
we got us an agreement.
Them field hands
start sucking down that whisky,
hopping them all up with music,
there's gonna be some razors drawn.
Course, he only call me
if it's a fatality.
Never been a killing here. Them
young bloods know better than to mess...
Than to mess with Tyrone Purvis.
You've got quite a reputation
round here, Tyrone.
People say you put some poor
black boy in the grave.
Just people talking.
Uh-huh.
You just remember,
this is my county, Tyrone.
What goes on goes on cos I let it.
Don't want nobody getting too big
for their breeches round here.
You folks have a pleasant evening.
Nigger ain't shit in this world.
Speaking for yourself.
You ain't had his club, Tyrone,
what do you think you'd be?
You wouldn't be nothing.
If that ain't truth,
then grits ain't grocery.
TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS
That's a terrible noise.
Just the northbound Talladega.
Sounds like it always does.
Like a soul being carried away
from this life.
Come on in, darling,
before you catch
your death out here.
You're lucky the high sheriff ain't
seen you crawling out that boxcar.
Does he come around here much?
Only when he bored.
You working on a train? Yeah,
Kansas City to New Orleans.
What did you get off here for?
I got people here. How about you?
Got tired of sleeping in a boxcar.
Is there a place to stay
around here?
Shed right over there got a cot.
And don't mind the rats.
Not unless you've got food on you.
I see you and a good meal have
been strangers for some time.
Get into town tomorrow, find you need
something, tell them Shack Thomas sent you.
They'll know who you're
talking about. Thanks.
Name like that sounds like
a good place for a musician.
Only night I ever been in jail
was a town called Liberty.
The sun come up,
you'll see where you landed.
You'd best be out that shed
by first light.
Just a weekday night.
The chicken man or the ice man
At least you don't owe
the electric company.
Yeah, that's a big relief.
You thinking about closing down?
What do you think? The biggest
act in New Orleans.
Got him a hit on the radio.
He's playing here Saturday night.
I'm thinking I wait till Bertha Mae
was gone and I put him up.
Here?
You mean like in this room here?
You know the Tomcat Club
in Texicana?
Big Jim Jameson's place?
It just went out of business.
Damn. Since Sam is getting sway over
But you ain't never had no guitar...
I'm having one now.
You just worry about getting these
hung everywhere in the county tomorrow.
Payday Saturday, he's gonna draw all them
cotton pickers and soldier boys in here.
Get us back in the black.
They're gonna take me down,
it won't be without a fight.
Guitar Sam at the Honeydripper!
Mm-hm!
Man, this joint is gonna jump!
BELL TINKLES
GUITAR STRUMMING
Somebody slipped
in the railroad yard.
You all can play that thing.
Yeah, been doing it nearby for ever.
What side of the tracks am I on?
The wrong side.
For you.
What you doing here, then?
Oh, white folks
look right through me.
Besides, how much mischief is an old,
blind spook like me gonna get up to anyhow?
Lot of people go for music
around here?
There's a couple of places just
outside of town, at the crossroads.
A long walk? Are you in a hurry?
How old is that box you're playing,
Second one ever made.
The devil got the first one.
How about yours?
Brand new. Made it myself.
Ooh, brand new! Made it hisself!
Hot dog! It's right.
So, these clubs?
Old Toussaint,
he runs the Ace of Spades.
They don't have no live music
in there.
Pine Top Purvis, he runs
the Honeydripper Lounge.
He don't care nothing
about no guitar.
He won't allow one under his roof.
That don't make sense.
Well, when a musician
put his hand to murder,
nine times out of ten
a drummer done it.
But Pine Top, he a piano man.
He killed somebody? That's the story.
But if you meet the man, you damn
well don't be asking him about it.
HONKING
Ain't seen no mule in a long time!
I knew this was Alabama,
but that's the Stone Ages, man!
Where you from, boy?
Memphis.
Down on your vacation?
Got in a piece of trouble up there
with the white folks.
Need to bide my time for a spell.
Biding your time
with them pills, man,
boss man gonna fire your ass.
Don't worry about that.
I'm a cotton-picking fool!
You a fool all right.
Where you from, brother bear?
Mississippi.
Hoo! This here
is a real step-up for you!
Folks around here have discovered
fire and whatnot!
That trouble you in,
have anything to do
with running your mouth?
It had to do with somebody getting on
my nerves and I had to deal with him.
Must have been somebody kinda puny.
As I recall, he was about your size.
What's this place we at?
Nearest town's Harmony.
This is Mr Silas Tugwell's place.
You better get to picking.
Cotton ain't going nowhere.
The more you get first thing
when the dew's still on it,
the more it weighs
when it tip that scale.
You live here too?
You got my sympathies.
Hot damn!
What's the matter? I got a shock.
I thought you used to work
for the power company.
I drove the supply truck.
Guitar Sam ain't gonna be playing
by no candlelight.
I smell bacon.
You must have burned your porky ass
with that electricity!
Breakfast's ready!
Where your mama? She already
over to the mayor's.
She told me to make sure you eat
something before you start running 'round.
That is a sweet woman you got.
You got one waiting for you
if you want her. Who, Nadine?
She come in here every night
making them cow eyes at you.
She seem like a kind
who could smother a man.
She makes all her own clothes.
Darlin', that's not
the kind of thing
a man cares about from a woman.
MUSIC BLARES
Hey, I fixed it! You ain't done
no such thing.
It just decided to come back on.
Decided? Yeah.
Just like it decided
to switch off last night.
You ain't even in the conversation!
This Nadine makes some good money,
too, sewing for people.
That woman scares me.
Last ol' boy to give her a tumble,
Napier Carpenter,
she cooked for him.
Fixed him up all kinds
of nice, new clothes...
I don't see no problem with that!
Come four, five months,
a man starts to...
Sorry, China Doll,
but this is just the way it is.
A man gots needs.
Looks like Nadine could
take care of those, too.
You eat chicken every morning,
noon and night for five months,
you get a taste
for a different kind of meat.
Maybe I shouldn't be talking
about this in front of China Doll.
You ain't gonna say something
I haven't heard worse.
Well, Napier goes out and has him
a pork chop or two, let's say.
Comes back one night
from Toussaint's place,
feeling no pain and smelling...
...Like pork chops,
the way a man will.
He falls out on Nadine's couch
and commenced to snore.
Wake up next morning, find she had taken
all his clothes off without him knowing.
The man was dog drunk!
Miss Nadine come back
with a skillet in her hand,
hot grits bubbling in it.
Says, "Baby, I got your breakfast".
"Oh, not this morning, Nadine",
he says, sitting up.
"Don't think I could eat a thing."
"Well then", she says, "we can't
let this go to waste, can we?"
and she dumped
that whole hot bubbling mess
right in that man's lap.
Ouch!
Then she got busy
with that hot iron on his head.
If screams didn't bring
the neighbours in,
she'd have killed that man.
You've got to admit it though,
the woman is an artist when
it comes to that Singer machine.
Excuse me.
Which one of you is Mr Pine Top?
We ain't hiring.
I can play anything.
I already got me a professional.
Guitar Sam really comin'
all the way down here?
That so surprising?
No, no.
Mr Shack Thomas told me...
You know Shack?
We... travelled together.
When was the last time
you ate solid food, young man?
Take him back and fix him something,
China Doll.
Standing there all hungry-eyed,
puts me off my breakfast.
That's real kind of you.
Must've come in
on the north-bound last night.
Looks like he got the cooties too.
Straw in them box cars, full of 'em.
Never cared to travel that way.
I was out there riding them rails
between the wars.
Hm...
Seen black half of the country
headin' west.
Rode past the other half
coming back east.
Yeah, every one of us,
scraping for the next meal.
This is the place.
Y'all can tear things down.
Put things up.
It's got a lot of potential.
It looks bigger than it does from the
outside. Can I help you, gentlemen?
I'm just showing the man who
gonna run this place what he got.
This is my place.
You the piano player, right?
My name's Tyrone.
They call me Pine Top Purvis.
Pine Top Purvis.
You owe 200
to Lucky Hardaway up in Little Rock.
He gonna get his.
Pine Top...
You missed last month's rent.
After this weekend.
After this weekend, you gonna be
the same raggedy arse piano player
who can't pay off his debts.
Mr Simmons here,
he's gonna be the new proprietor.
Lucky give me two weeks.
Lucky got a better offer.
He can't do that.
You don't think so?
Whoa, now!
What if we got our payments
for him Monday?
Saturday night. We can do that.
Not just no taste.
The whole 200.
And I'll throw in a 25 cent tip
for his messenger boy.
In the meantime,
we're not open yet.
That means y'all trespassing.
See enough, Mr Simmons?
I believe I have.
Somebody could do something
with this place.
Wouldn't take a whole lot of work.
We cleared over 200 that one
A couple of years back.
And we didn't have no Luther on
the guitar with the playing meter.
They say it draws them like flies.
That's what they say.
They say first thing he does
is go to the man that owns a joint,
sticks out his hand and
watch that cash money put in it.
I already sent 50 to his manager.
How much you paying him all out?
Another hundred.
We need to clear 300! What I figure
is if we charge folks 2 to get in,
then the liquor...
What I'm saying is
'less he see that green up front,
the man won't get off the train!
HORN HONKS
What's that now?
About time you fellas run by!
We're just about dry here!
Boss in?
Tyrone?
Whisky wagon come by.
Y'all a day late!
The old man Toussaint
gonna chew me out!
Toussaint went over
to another supplier upstate.
We just got you,
then we're over to the army base
to service the officers' club.
That's 56.
My credit no good anymore?
Whoa, whoa. What's your hurry?
Nobody in their right mind
sell liquor on credit,
especially not to no
dark town road house.
Listen, I got a special case, see.
We've got the harvest coming up.
Soldiers at the base gonna be let
off on leave Saturday night.
Ain't enough hooch in this truck
to satisfy what we gonna sell!
You pay as you go, that's business.
Look, you come back Monday,
get paid and take back
every damn drop that I don't sell.
OK, we got Guitar Sam
lined up here...
What... What if I throw in 5
up front for you fellas?
ENGINE STARTS
Hey! Wait.
Come on, man!
Everybody gives credit!
It's the American way!
Maybe we could buy some Bushead
from Willie Pettigrew.
With that sheriff sniffing
'round me every night,
lay my black ass in jail for good.
Then what we gonna do?
# Move it on over,
move it on over... #
Got a load of liquor
for a Mr Lucien Toussaint.
That would be me.
I trust he got my cheque all right.
Don't suppose I'd be here
if they didn't.
Pull round to the back,
we'll help you unload.
This better be some Saturday night.
Arkansas. How about you?
We come here just after mama
met my stepdaddy.
Not much going on
in a little town like this.
They started up the training base
again. Is that right?
You been in the army?
Uh-huh.
You shoot people?
Fixed radios.
They say this new war
gonna be a short one.
Might be, might not.
I was in Japan.
Yeah?
What's the people like there?
Small. Yeah?
About...
that high.
Speak Japanese.
You been to California?
Los Angeles.
Where they make the movies?
You go to movies? I've been once.
A fine looking girl like you ought
to have been all kinds of places.
I'm going to 'em, I just...
First I'm going to beauty school.
When mama saves up the money.
Then I'll have a portable skill.
Like playing music?
My stepdaddy says that ain't a skill.
It's an affliction.
Come on, China Doll.
Business in town.
You gonna help wi' it.
And you young man, you wanna point
yourself west down that highway
about three miles
to the people working in the field.
It's harvest time.
If you can stoop and pull,
they got a job for you.
Wash up the dishes before you go.
What I need is for you
to go get friendly with Luther,
then I just happen in.
We can't just ask Mr Skinner?
Mr Skinner don't want nothing
from coloured folk,
but they buy his goods
and shine his shoes.
You go on ahead now.
GUITAR STRUMMING
# It was early
# Friday evening
# And the hound began to bark
# Staggolee and Billy Lyons
# Squabbling in the dark
# Staggolee told Billy Lyons
# "What do you think about that?
# "First you take all my money
# "Then you spits
in my Stetson hat"... #
I hate that damn song.
How you been keeping, Tyrone?
Well, just...
trying to hold it together.
You've got your beautiful young
daughter with you this morning.
Don't you be studying her.
I heard tell you gonna put
on a guitar man out at your place.
Where you hear that?
Oh... The breeze.
Well, this time the breeze know
what it's blowing about.
You'd better be careful, Tyrone.
Cos you know what them
guitar players are like.
You be careful yourself.
# He shot him in the shoulder
# Three times in the side
# That's the last time he shot him
# Poor Billy up and died
# Up and died. #
The time is ripe
and the bill is passed due.
You know Mr Roosevelt would've
done it already, only he died.
They don't listen to Miss Eleanor
no more but Mr Truman,
he's starting a band, especially now
that we got this war heated up.
Brother Randolph says...
Here it comes! The gospel
according to Randolph
Tyrone! How you doing?
Oh, got my nose above the waterline.
Here's my baby. What's up, Ty?
How your mama doing, China Doll?
She doing fine, Uncle Shack.
I'm just telling the boys here
about how Brother Randolph
pushing this deal how boys are gonna
be a full part of the service.
I carried a rifle in the Great War.
Boys get in the middle
of this Korea mess,
they ain't gonna thank you
for your efforts.
If we want our full due in this
country, we've got to go ho ho!
Black folk shooting yellow folk
to keep white folks happy?
We need to move on
from that kind of thinking.
Move right on, Shack. Then come back
and tell the rest of us how it is.
LAUGHTER
That's a hard headed man.
I'd have to ask Mr Skinner.
Of course you would.
While you're at it, remind him how one
of the reasons coloured folks come here
is to get the low-down
on what's happening.
China doll! You gonna let us put
I don't think that will be
any problem at all.
That's awful nice of you, Luther.
You're looking special today.
That's sweet of you to say.
Maceo, you go with the man here,
he'll show you where
to put these up.
Darling, we've got a lot
of more places to go.
Nice to see you, Luther!
You've got that boy
eating out of your hand!
Luther is the only one
didn't pull my hair,
he sat behind me in Sunday school.
I hope you got a little
of that sugar left, cos
we got to spare some on
Miss Bertha Mae Spivey.
You gonna ask her to come sing
I'm gonna ask her for money.
Word is, she got a whole pile
of it squirrelled away.
Daddy... Hey, come on, girl,
I got to rest.
Oh, I'm sorry, honey.
You catch your breath, OK.
Yeah.
So why Miss Spivey
gonna give you money,
if you won't let her sing
at the club no more?
I'm gonna make her partner.
Partner in what?
The Honeydripper.
But all you ever say, it's just
a hole you pour good money into.
It don't matter.
I'm gonna make her proprietor.
Tress. Like waiter and waitress.
Proprietress.
She got to like the sound of that.
Lovely ladies out to make a purchase.
Is that the same Guitar Sam is
The very one.
What does he look like?
A fine looking man,
a real lady killer from what I hear.
Got that New Orleans style to him.
Well, you ought to have
a picture up there.
We'll be getting some of those
when he come in on the train.
Main thing is,
the man is electrifying
and you know what that means.
OK.
Make like we just come by
to see how how she keeping.
Then I'll kind of mention I'd been
thinking of bringing her on as a partner.
Left the door open.
She gone.
Oh. When she going to be back?
She just gone.
Woke up beside her.
Oh, damn.
24 years.
China doll, go find your mama.
She'll know how to fix up the body.
Laugh and all but...
...I've been with that woman
24 years.
She gave me the only home
I ever had.
What am I gonna do now?
What's your hurry, boy?
No hurry.
Take your hat off.
Where you headed?
I'm looking for work.
You're not from around here?
No, sir.
Stranger wandering around, no job,
that would make you a vagrant.
But I'm looking.
I got a job for you.
Get in the back.
I can always use another hand.
Well, I caught this young fella in
flagrant violation of the statutes -
gawkery, with intent to mope.
What's he going to run me?
3 a day, plus you feed him lunch.
The sentence, that all depends on how
long you're gonna need the help?
I don't get any trial?
Sure you do, boy, and a speedy
one at that. Meet the judge.
Judge Gatlin.
Grab a sack.
Oh dear, I believe
it's about that time.
Would you care to join me?
No, thank you.
Of course you won't join me,
you don't partake.
That was thoughtless of me.
No, that's all right.
So, you don't take spirits
and what else in your church?
I'm sort of between churches Oh.
I've been thinking about
changing over to the Holiness,
but I haven't been sanctified yet.
Oh.
There's been a minister
in this week.
The tent over by the fairgrounds?
The church I was raised in,
we were Pentecostals.
They wouldn't have anything but
the human voice inside the church.
Dancing, any kind of dancing,
music, card-playing.
It was very strict.
They took up serpents.
I heard of that.
I tell Floyd these stories,
and he's... He's horrified.
They have always been Methodists,
Floyd's family.
It can be a trial, married folks
differ in their religion.
And your husband is a...?
Unaffiliated.
Unaffiliated, I see.
But he has his social club.
The Honeydripper? That is such
a colourful name.
Yes.
He must have a great deal
of his energy to it.
It's just him
and Maceo Green runs it,
I go over and cook some
after I get off here.
Well, that's very supportive of you,
considering the sort of environment.
I've been in those bar rooms
most of my life, Miss Amanda.
I see.
I was a singer.
I met Tyrone in the Paradise,
down in Treefork.
China doll was only two.
And I was just...
living alone, you know,
drinking more than I ought,
and then Tyrone...
...Like a light, come into my life.
People think things
cos he owns the lounge,
but they don't know him.
Small minds are never
in short supply.
People in this town...
I suppose they expected that Floyd,
being from a prominent family,
as prominent as is possible
here in Harmony,
would have chosen somebody more...
In school,
if you didn't have shoes...
Oh, I forgot!
I was going through some of Emily's
old things the other day.
I thought this would look
just darling on your China Doll.
Oh, I don't think that would
near fit her, Miss Amanda.
Why, how old is she, now?
Oh, my...
I must have lost track
somewhere along the line.
17?
It was a very nice thought.
Mama, mama, they need you...
Oh, I'm sorry.
Miss Amanda, I didn't know China Doll!
We were just recalling
how you used to play right here,
under this table.
There's not any cash money
that I know of.
She sold a good deal
of the furniture,
but there's still a nice looking
couch in the parlour.
Didn't care about too much,
other than singing
at the Pine Top's place.
You're welcome to look
around the house,
if there's anything
your missus might like.
As long as it's not something
personal to me and Bertha Mae.
It's just...
She's got to go out in style.
You ain't never done this job before?
Can't say I have.
You want to set your pins out wide,
bend over at the hip.
Don't be bobbing up and down
all the time.
When you're up, be up.
When you're on the roll, stay down.
But most important,
you got to get a rhythm.
Everything in life got a rhythm,
even pulling cotton off the plant.
Lay it out for me. Not my rhythm,
your rhythm.
That's between you and the day
and the work you got before you.
Once you get it, don't let nothing
or nobody push you off it.
I'm going so slow.
Are you getting paid
by the pound or by the hour?
I ain't getting paid at all,
none of us are.
I suggest you work that
into your rhythm too.
Let's see more picking and
less talking over there.
Getting right to it, boss.
Them boys frying over there.
That's just Gatlin's gang.
He works them people from can
into cane, every damn day.
When the fields get picked,
he bid 'em out to the neighbours.
Harvest time come around here,
you'd better sign with somebody
fast, or get out of sight.
I ate a pick of dust today.
Why don't you get some water?
The only thing that wash out
the dust is whisky.
Ain't enough whisky in this world to
wash out what I swallowed in my life.
What are we playing for?
Two bits of ham.
Woo! That's awful steep, ain't it?
Well... I remember playing
this game one night,
Memphis's boss Crumpstown folks
is gambling before they can walk,
caught me a winning streak
that cleaned out half
the sporting men on Beale Street.
I got up from that table,
my money was long as train smoke.
What happened to it?
I spent it all on fine-looking women.
Yo, Mississippi!
His name is Hamilton. Hambo!
You want in on this?
Settle up on pay day.
That your deck of cards?
What if it is?
I'll stay clear of it then.
Are you insinuating? I'm just saying,
Looks like dinner.
A rabbit is a rodent.
A man eat a rabbit,
might as well eat a rat.
Simple country nigger,
afraid to sit down and lose
a little handful of change.
He awful big to mess with.
Don't scare me none.
I'm a stepping razor, man.
I'm trouble on two legs.
Your draw, Junebug. Don't be
dripping no sweat on my cards.
HONKING
Excuse me folks!
Look here!
Y'all heard about the show
we puttin' on at the Honeydripper.
Saturday night.
We got Guitar Sam!
I expect there'll be a nice turnout
for Bertha Mae tomorrow.
Yes, folks who wouldn't have nothing
to do with her when she was alive.
Some of them, maybe.
Still got to pay your respects.
That Slick is gonna have
to find him a new ride.
That's a terrible thing to say.
That's how the man gets over,
is all.
Always sugaring up to some woman
who's got a job or a bankroll.
That's no way to live.
Society is in whirl, baby.
A man's gotta walk through the gates
of hell to get a piece of cheese.
Not so young any more...
...Lose hold of what little he's got.
If you lose the club,
I'm sure you'll find something else.
In this town, like what?
You know, any time you want,
I could get Miss Amanda to ask...
Watch your feet, Mr Mayor!
I just done mopped the floor.
Ty, you work so hard at the lodge,
but what you bring in is...
Not even as much as you make
polishing that white lady's silver.
I didn't say that.
You didn't have to.
It'll just have to work out, then.
Meeting gonna start
and I'm not there.
Your soul's not the one
needs saving, baby.
It's all gonna be fine, Daddy.
Everybody in town talking about
Guitar Sam coming to Harmony.
# As I walked
all along this highway
# I was seeking
# My Lord each day
# She left me standing
# Out on this highway
# Oh, just wondering
which way I must go
# She left me standing
# Out on this highway
# Oh, just wondering
which way I must go. #
Amen! Amen! Sing on, choir!
Amen! Let the church say Amen.
Amen!
Let the church say Amen! Amen!
Amen!
Amen!
She left him standing
out on the highway,
wondering which way to go.
Yeah.
The highway of life.
Sisters and brothers, it will twist
you and it will turn ya.
It will run you this-a-way,
and it will run you that-a-way.
Yeah.
Tempt you with many a detour.
Yeah.
Because the highway of life
is designed to lead us astray.
Yeah.
That's not the road that we want
to be on, brothers and sisters.
That's not the path
that we need to follow.
We need to be on that other road.
We need to be on that road
that leads to glory.
We need to be on that road
that leads to the right hand of God.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
# That thoroughfare
I'm talking about
# That righteous road
we need to travel
# It's called the highway to heaven
# It is called
the highway to heaven
# But we need to know,
sisters and brothers
# We need to know
Who is walking beside ya.
# You got to be wary of who
is tryin'
# To hold you back
from your journey
# Cos many a loved ones
got to be left behind
# Cos even on the road,
you're lost in the wilderness
# You're either headin' for glory
or you're doomed for damnation
# You're either with the Lord
or you're with the devil.
# And there ain't no in-between.
# No, no,
there ain't no in-between. #
Praise the Lord!
APPLAUSE
Charleston. Yeah.
Tulsa. Tulsa ain't so bad.
But for the spit.
Got them stockyards near the jail.
Them flies.
Course, I had me in a cell
in Georgia once.
Six other men,
didn't have a one doing tall.
Must've got caught hoppin' Yeah.
Ain't no free ride
allowed through Georgia.
And the food there? Paltry.
Paltry ain't the word for it.
Breakfast is a joke.
And lunch is a rumour...
And dinner was a anecdote!
Do it the hard way, brother!
You got locked in that box.
Or one just like it.
# Wake up in the morning
# Hear the bing bong ring
# Walk up to the table
# See the same damn thing
# What am I gonna tell you
# Fork, a knife, and a pan
# If you say a thing about it
# You in trouble with the man.
# Let the Midnight Special
# Shine its light on me
# Well, let the Midnight Special
# Shine its ever-loving light
on me. #
You a singer, young man?
Yeah, I'm a singer.
I'm a guitar player.
I'm gonna be on the radio someday,
people are gonna know my name.
You keep on thinking
that way, young man.
If Judge Gatlin don't choose
to work you into your grave,
you just might do it.
# If you ever go to Houston
# Don't you stagger
Don't you fight
# Cos the sheriff will arrest you
# You're in the cooler
for the night
# He'll tie your hands together
# And he'll bring you down
# Throw you in the black river
# Penitentiary bound. #
# Early this morning
# I heard the lonesome
church bell toll
# Early this morning
# I heard the low down
church bell toll
# It brought me the sad news
# My Bertha Mae was dead and gone
# Never miss my baby
# I never missed her
till she left my door... #
First, he passed away,
and the seed was no more...
# I never missed my baby
# Until she left my door
# It breaks my heart
# Think I never see her face
no more. #
He will dwell within, he will
wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death shall be no more, mourning
and dying and pain shall be no more.
To the first things
that passed away,
I am the Alpha and the Omega,
the beginning and the end...
I hear tell Miss Bertha Mae passed.
That's right.
Yeah, she lived it.
Just like she sang it.
You waiting on somebody?
Ain't nobody on that train
gonna change your luck, Tyrone.
You're gonna have to save
your own self.
What do you know about anything?
Oh, nothing much.
But I know you.
From way back.
GUITAR STRUMS
# Mm...
# Oh...
# Oh
TRAIN HORN BLOWS
TRAIN HORN CONTINUES
Mournful end for a wayward sinner.
She always seemed
at peace with herself.
The company she kept?
The life she lived?
I never know Bertha Mae
to do hurt to a living soul.
We're all hoping to see you get over
and accept the Lord tonight,
Delilah.
I'm hoping so too.
You've been lingering at
the threshold long enough, sister.
Time to step ahead.
Tyrone! You got somebody
getting off here?
Supposed to be. Well,
what's the party's name?
Sam? Guitar Sam.
Don't know his birth name.
He's coming here? Uh-huh.
Yo, Matt!
Guitar Sam get on this train?
Nah, man, he's in the hospital
back in Little Rock.
Hospital? You know music folks.
Whatever he was doing, he must
have been doing too much of it.
Brother, maybe... Maybe he
come on in tomorrow, huh?
Matt!
All aboard!
Somebody didn't show up!
We should have made you dumb
instead of blind.
# I done had my fun
# If I don't get well no more
# I said, I done had my fun
# If I don't get well no more
# My head is spinning
# And I's going down real slow. #
A man don't take care of himself...
...With drinking and jazz and women
every night.
Don't make no difference now.
It got so bad,
I heard there was this old boy goes
round pretending to be Guitar Sam.
Fill out the gigs he misses.
He does pretty well for himself,
what I hearing.
Somebody we could find?
Hell, I don't know,
just some story I heard.
Must have been the first one.
First what?
Back in slavery days, them's the
one that work in the big house.
Might not have had shoes always,
the pants didn't have no holes in
them, they didn't pick no cotton.
House niggers. Yeah, that's
how they call them.
They had all their
African kinds of instruments.
Drums, shakers,
some kind of banjo thing.
But the piano...
They didn't bring no piano
over on those ships from Africa.
The piano was just sitting there,
in the white folks' big room,
all polished up.
I'd figure this...
first one...
He must have passed by
15, 20 times a day.
Run the corner of his eyes over it.
You see,
he was there when they'd play.
The masters.
Their minuets.
PLAYS A MINUE Him standing there,
with a tray of white people's food.
Pretending not to have
a thought in his head.
But he...
He's watching them fingers.
He's watching where them keys were.
See, this old boy, the first one,
he knows how to play all
them kinds of African instruments.
He could play mud if you
gave him a key and a tempo.
Yeah, he got music in his head
and his heart.
In every damn piece of him
there's music.
Then one day...
...The master's away.
And he alone in that room,
with that piano.
Watch out now.
And he goes over
and he sits down on the bench.
And he spreads his fingers over it,
the way he's seen
that minuet player do.
And he thinks...
PLAYS CHORD
And he thinks...
..."Lord help me."
"I could do some damage
with this thing."
I would have liked
to have been there.
I mean...
Just to hear the cat play.
Mace...
I'm gonna lose my club.
If old man Toussaint find out
you stole his liquor,
you're likely to lose
more than that.
I got no more cards to play.
If you was to go down
to see Lucky Hardaway in person...
I ain't kissing up to no cokey-nose,
coke-headed asshole!
What the hell that supposed to be?
Some kind of guitar.
A guitar got a hole in it.
That's how the sound come out.
That boy must be three bricks shy
of a load upstairs.
Daddy! They've gone and
arrested him! Arrest who?
Sonny! The High Sheriff arrested him
and sold him to Judge Gatlin!
Sonny who?! Sonny that was
here yesterday morning!
Sonny that got a screw loose?
That's why they arrested him!
Mace? Play something on that,
make some noise there.
GUITAR STRUMS
It's electric.
I could plug a chunk of stovewood
in a wall and it'd get more music
than you'd get out of that mess!
Nah, man.
No, man, it don't work
unless it's hooked up to the juice!
See, you got the juice, you don't
need the hollow inside that box.
The music just runs straight from
the strings, through the wire...
...And out of your amplifier...
...Which is what this thing must be.
Sonny said he fixed radios
in the army.
Sonny didn't do nothing
but feed bed bugs in anybody's army.
And some of them caught in his head.
I'm surprised he's even got
the wit to pick cotton.
Judge Gatlin done bought himself
a drooling idiot.
What you gonna amplify Daddy?
Unless you're gonna sit
over in your chair
and play those little Aside, man.
Sitting over there,
looking all clean and polite.
The guitar ain't been up front,
since those old pissing
moan blue shouters
sit their blind asses on the corner
hollering for pennies!
Old-time music. Daddy?
Sonny didn't do nothing
to get arrested for.
He was just looking for work.
They've hung coloured boys
for less than that, darling.
Least on the work gang they feed
them, keep their strength up.
But he doesn't belong there.
You know, Guitar Sam plays him
an electric.
But I don't think it's
this no-hole kind of deal.
Hope he plugs it into
the wrong socket some night
and electrocutes
his sorry, no-show ass.
Mace?
Now, if he showed up here
and our power went out again,
while he was playing...
Nah, I fixed it good this time, Ty.
Eh...
So he comes out, and he plugs
his axe into the wall...
He'd come out looking good,
from what I hear!
All kinds of spangly pants
and jacket!
Got his name spelt out on the back!
The clothes, right?!
All slick and shiny!
Flash them gold teeth at them gals!
Got his sax man behind him.
Maybe a piano, harmonica and drums.
Hey, you remember that night
at the Esquire Club,
when the lights went out in Mobile?
Yeah, and they took off
with the gate.
Just stole the damn register
right off the counter!
They didn't hold Reggie Porter
for it, did they?!
Nah! They knew it was
this place got robbed!
Did nobody hold it to Reggie Porter?
And nobody expected
their money to come back.
No, cos they was too busy
diving for the pot
and that trump game got interrupted.
And nobody suspected that it might
have been Reggie Porter hisself!
Hisself that pulled the lights!
No.
No, Ty. No.
No. No. No.
China Doll! You mind the place till
we get back. Hey, come on, Mace.
Where you going, Daddy?!
I promised the people Guitar Sam,
and they're going to get Guitar Sam!
Come on, Mace,
let's get out of here!
We've got work to do.
Why are you so interested
in this boy?
Got a job for him.
You must be doing pretty well
for yourself out there, Tyrone.
You're hiring new people on.
Passing well, yeah.
But this boy... Name is Sonny.
Uh-huh.
Well, he's paying off his debt
to society right now.
If I was to pull him
out of the field...
Judge Gatlin paid for your day
of prison labour.
You willing to pay for him
for the duration of his sentence?
Which might be? As long as
I care to make it.
Well, I was counting on...
more of a one-time deal.
If I can rent him out50.
It's not just the money.
There's legalistic principles
involved here. Public safety issues.
I'll pay you Sunday morning.
You going to pay me now,
or you can forget about it.
I don't have it now.
Hm.
You think you're too smart for
the rest of us, don't you, Tyrone?
Think you can go it all by yourself.
You'd rather eat roofing nails
than come to me for a favour now,
wouldn't you?
It's not a favour
if I'm gonna pay for it.
Oh, you're gonna pay all right.
If you don't hand over that money
to me by Sunday morning,
you've got yourself a new partner.
Same deal as I got with Toussaint.
What'll that be?
You'll get the 50.
And that wife of yours.
Delilah? Mm-hm.
Them fried chicken sandwiches.
If I was to come by now and then
and check in on my interests?
She be happy to fix you
whatever you want.
Good. Cos my wife's cooking
would gag a maggot.
Different people got different kinds
Yeah.
Well Lurleen ain't discovered
what hers is yet.
Let's go fetch that boy.
Is this the one you want? Mm.
You got any ideas about running
rabbit on me, best get rid of them now.
Are you paying my way out?
Till Monday.
How come?
You like dragging that cotton sack?
No. Then don't ask questions.
# Why don't you do right
# Like some other men do... #
This size, right?
But it's got to shine.
And when you need this? Tonight.
That's a tall order.
It's got to happen.
You know, I do my best work,
my fastest work,
when I'm happy.
Yeah, I suppose you do.
You gonna make me happy, baby?
Uh...
You come down by the club tonight.
We having a special show.
Tell 'em at the door, you my guest.
Food ain't the only thing
a woman needs three times a day.
What's that, baby?
Um, that boy gonna need time, try
this jacket on, see how he feels.
Later, Nadine.
You got to do something
to the boy's hair, darling.
They may not know what the real Sam
looked like, but it ain't this.
I can try.
What exactly am I supposed to do?
You're gonna stand up there
with that contraption you got,
and play Guitar Sam's numbers.
I can do that with my eyes closed.
If we can get the audience to
close theirs, we'll be better off.
Ty! I tracked Mr Trenier down.
Let's hit it.
Bye, Daddy.
You know what you're doing?
I fix Mama's hair all the time.
But you ain't been
to that school yet.
You go to school
to learn your guitar?
No.
I might pick up
some things at beauty school,
but mostly it's for my certificate.
"And that is a ticket to adventure."
That's what it says in the brochure.
People looking for beauty
all over the world.
You ought to watch out for
them wires sticking down.
That don't look safe.
Yeah, power's always going out.
People getting shocks and whatnot.
Somebody ought to fix it.
"Career and beauty
is like money in the bank."
Says that in the brochure too.
Plus it isn't physically taxing.
Yeah, can't see no pretty thing
like you behind a plough.
I had the rheumatic fever
when I was little.
It left me with a weak heart.
Oh.
Mine been acting kind of funny too.
About since I laid eyes on you.
What's that? Just some old
moonshine they keep around.
What are you gonna do with it?
They joke about how this stuff
will straighten your hair right out.
I'll just make yours relax a little.
Mr Time Trenier.
Has a name to be reckoned with.
The story goes you used
to play with Buddy Bolan.
I played with them all.
And King Oliver. One band falls
apart, you find yourself another.
There's never a shortage of bands
down in New Orleans.
I didn't know
you were giving lessons.
It pays the rent, almost.
You interested in a playing job?
If you can pay, I can play.
You've got to dress sharp.
It ain't like an all-night thing.
You just got to start out, and
then there's gonna be an accident.
An accident?
Yeah, a sudden loss of power.
Lights out.
It's your gig, man.
8 o'clock.
This ain't no coloured people's
time.
And sure ain't New Orleans time.
I mean, 8 o'clock on the money.
If you got the green,
I'm on the scene.
Then that's the deal.
You know any drummers?
I bring you one. And nothing fancy.
Just as long as he keep time.
Time is my name.
21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28.
Make your mark here, please.
You owe me 30.
The book says 28.
1.50 every 100lb, and I picked...
2 deducted for stones.
But I've got no stones in the sack.
We mill the cotton, son.
There's always stones.
But there weren't none in my sack.
We take off 2 a week for stones.
That's the way it's always been.
Ain't that right, Junebug?
Yes, sir.
Been that way my whole life.
You gonna take your pay, son,
or you gonna give it up to charity?
Wouldn't let nobody mess
with my money like that.
He took the same 2 off yours.
Yeah, but you could pave a highway
with the rocks I threw in that mess.
You country negroes
let the crackers run you like dogs.
If the sheriff wasn't here
I'd snap your neck, boy.
Don't let me stop you.
But first, you're gonna sign
that ledger like you're supposed to.
Don't want nobody crying
they didn't get their due.
DELILAH HUMS
How could you do that?
I'm gonna put it back.
You don't go gambling
with my baby's money.
I ain't got no man playing.
I don't care what you took it for.
I save for China Doll
and you ain't got not business
putting your fingers on it.
China don't need any school, baby.
She could walk into any of those
places right now and get a job.
There's got to be some line
you won't cross, Ty.
There's got to be something
you won't do.
The world start throwing me
a break woman,
maybe I'll catch religion
and walk the straight and narrow
like those Bible toppers you
set up with. But until that day...
Reverend Cutlip was right about you.
Oh, shit.
Damn!
Mr Purvis?
People call me Ty or they call me
Pine Top, it's Mr Pine Top to you.
I just want to tell you how
I appreciate the opportunity.
Right.
I know every one
of Guitar Sam's songs.
I know the chords, I know the words.
China Doll was saying
how you was famous once.
I was known,
but never what you call famous.
How do you get your start?
Down in Mobile.
An old professional.
The name of Joe Dudlow.
He'd had a stroke on one side.
Curled him all up.
Kept on plugging.
I used to come out and
play his left hand for him.
This one night,
he was going hot and heavy.
His show's just past,
right at the piano,
middle of Black Bottom Stomp.
They'd propped him up at the bar,
stuck a drink in his hand...
Told me to keep pounding
those ivories.
There was a meanness
hanging over them two johns.
There was murder in the air.
Stopped playing for the minute,
come down on you
like a flock of girls.
Hey.
This is you.
Big band days on the road.
Reginald Erskine.
I don't believe I've heard of him.
Big, tall, light skin fella
out in Carolina.
Said he was part Cherokee.
Couldn't play nothing,
but he'd raise a little stink
and he had just long greasy hair
he'd through around
like Cab Calloway.
And you were the piano man?
Piano man, arranger, you name it.
That must have been something,
travelling the country first class.
I don't know about first class,
but I seen the country.
How come you stopped?
I got tired of carrying
another man's water.
Didn't want to die in no
coloured hotel some night
in who knows where Arkansas.
Met Delilah.
Wanted something of my own.
You don't have nothing
to worry about, Mr Pine Top.
I won't let you down tonight.
No, I... I don't suppose you will.
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the fire and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the fire and the Lord
# You got to choose between
the fire and the Lord
# You're gonna make it all right
# You got to choose
# You got to choose between
the world and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose between
the world and the Lord
# You better jump on board
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the word and the Lord
# You got to choose
# You got to choose
between the word and the Lord
# You got to choose between
the word and the Lord
# You better jump on board
# When that sun no longer shines
# God will send his final sign
# Get down sinner
You got to kneel
# You got to kneel for the saviour
and pray
# You got to kneel for the saviour
and pray
# You got to kneel
for the saviour and pray
There ain't no hiding
from the judgement day
# There ain't no hiding
# From the judgement day
# No, there ain't no hiding
# From the judgement day. #
Have a good time.
Hi there, young lady.
Good evening, welcome to the
Honeydripper. Have a good time.
Everybody's getting restless.
How we doing? We're gonna be
full up, but the food...
Is Delilah coming in?
What if I've lost her?
She won't let you down, Ty.
This ain't going to work, is it?
You just got to play it out and see.
Guitar Sam!
See if you can push another round
of drinks while I stall them.
Then you going to bring him out?
Sam!
We coming here to hear
the guitar man play!
Be on the wires.
Give them three bars Guitar Sam!
I got a baseball bat under the
counter but you out here all alone.
Just get the liquor moving, Mace.
And keep the money
where you can run with it.
Guitar Sam!
The Lord don't want nobody
to sit back and suffer.
He want you to stand up.
He want you to rise up.
He want you to step forward
and come down to the merciful arms
of his eternal salvation.
A fire is heating up,
brothers and sisters,
and judgement day is nigh.
Anybody out there tonight
want to answer his call?
Anybody out there tonight, is gonna
step forward and be saved?
Ain't no time to hesitate.
Got to come on down
and offer yourself to the Lord.
Come on. Come on, come on, sister.
I believe you hear the
Lord's voice talking to you sister.
That's the Lord's voice
and I believe you hear it.
I do believe you hear it.
Come on down.
Bring it on down to his salvation.
Feel the Lord at your back.
You got to leave them sinners behind.
Come on down.
Come on down.
I see you sister, coming.
I see the Lord is talking to you.
I hear the Lord is talking to you.
I believe you hear him, sister.
Come on down,
you hear the voice of the Lord?
You hear the voice of the Lord.
That voice is trying to tell you
where you need to be right now,
sister.
All you've got to do,
all you've got to do
is move your feet and get there.
Move your feet and get there.
You look good.
Damn.
He look good, don't he, Daddy? Yeah.
Honey, I need you to get right
by that front door
and take over collecting
the cover charge.
Anything happens,
go wrong or something,
you just step out and walk away
from the club, you hear?
What's going to go wrong?
Guitar Sam here,
gets them soldier boys jumping,
get a little rough in here.
Just stay on your toes, that's all.
OK.
China Doll?
You know there ain't a thing in
this world I wouldn't do for you?
Even if I mess up sometimes.
You know that, right?
I know that, Daddy.
You go on, now.
Well, you look like something
that would come out of New Orleans.
I forget to tell you,
I fixed your hook-up.
My what?
Your hook-up, where your
electricity comes in. It was...
Ty, we've got a situation out there.
You don't think I know that?
Got the law in the house.
Didn't think
we'd be seeing you so soon.
You got a real nice crowd
here tonight, Tyrone.
I see them army uniforms.
We got ourselves
this special attraction. See...
Chicken. Huh?
Them ribs outside smell real good,
but I'm afraid my heart's set
on some of your wife Delilah's
fried chicken.
Right.
She made it last Saturday
at the mayor's,
but old Clayford Gentry came up
and he ate all the drumsticks.
I'm partial to dark meat.
The situation
regarding... sherriff...
She is in the back there cooking,
isn't she?
Maybe, if you would come back here
a little bit later.
Regular or spicy?
They both take the same time to
fix up. I just got to know which.
I have to make mine regular,
I'm afraid, ma'am.
Spicy is just fine,
but it always comes back
to nip at me later.
It's important not to bite off
more than you can chew.
You just make yourself at home.
Good luck tonight, baby.
Slap some mayonnaise on it.
You want to wait over there,
Sherriff?
Don't want to scare off
the customers.
Here he comes!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So, here is what you all
been waiting for.
Noted performer and recording star,
direct from New Orleans, Louisiana,
here's Guitar Sam.
FEEDBACK
Sorry about that, folks.
Must have got kicked on the train.
FEEDBACK STOPS
Thank you, Jesus.
# Well, I'm gonna hold my baby
as tight as I can
# Tonight she'll know
I'm a mighty, mighty man
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Sweet Lorraine, Sioux City Sue
# Georgia Brown, California too
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight
# Meet me in a hurry behind the barn
# Don't be afraid
I'll do you no harm
# I want you to bring
my rockin' shoes
# Cos tonight I'm gonna
rock away all my blues
# Have you heard the news
There's good rockin' tonight... #
Got to check that out.
Let's go. Come on!
# Have you heard the news?
There's good rockin' tonight
# They'll all be there
Just wait and see
# Rockin' and a-rollin'
At the jamboree
# Have you heard the news?
There's good rockin' tonight
# Have you heard the news?
# There's good rockin' tonight. #
CHEERING
Oh, my soul!
Don't tire yourself out, poppa.
Me and you got business together.
I believe we do.
All right.
All you men, grab a hold of a woman.
If you ain't got a woman,
just grab a hold of yourselves.
We're gonna play this one for you,
slow and tight.
# They did the boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# They did the boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# I went to a party
# With the bobby socks
# At the party
# Man, I really got a shock... #
42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 150.
And there's another 50 in here.
Lucky Hardaware don't mind
some change, does he?
What if Mr Hardaware were to say
let the chumps keep their change?
He wants the club back,
one way or the other.
How that be?
Well, he better take that up
with my business partner.
The sheriff your business partner?
Yeah. And he's twice as mean
as he is ugly.
You must want this club
awful bad, brother.
Maybe y'all didn't notice,
but that ain't no Guitar Sam.
# At the party
# Oh, I was like a chaperone
# I couldn't boogie real slow
# With the blue lights way down low
# I like to boogie real slow
# With the blue lights
way down low. #
CHEERING
Sam!
You is a liar, boy.
I know Sammy since he was
drinking his mama's milk.
Hell, I know his mama,
she's lives up near mine.
And you ain't him.
That's Creole Sammy you're talking
about, pops. I'm Delta Guitar Sam.
As long as we straight on that.
Get on out of here
and let the man play.
Yeah.
I'm gonna play one for you right
now that I come up with today
while I was having my hair cut.
# Ch-Ch-Ch-China Doll
# Can't get you off of my mind
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# Can't get you off of my mind
# But if you're gonna be my baby,
leave all them others behind
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I think about you day and night
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I think about you day and night
# Oh, baby
When you gonna treat me right? #
INAUDIBLE CONVERSATION
KEYS THUMP
SAXOPHONE PLAYS
INAUDIBLE EXCHANGE
Y'all are in my house here,
gentlemen!
Don't have no fighting,
don't have no killing.
Don't have none of that
dismal nonsense in my house!
You understand?!
What's your name, son?
Dex.
Dexter Moncrieff. And you?
H- H-Hamilton Drinkwater.
Well, gentlemen, this is a night
there won't be no pitiful song
written about you two
killing each other.
Don't nothing rhyme with Moncrieff
anyhow! We got a problem here?
Yeah, these two gentlemen seem to have
brought something in for our collection.
Yeah? You first.
Now yours.
Y'all still wanna mess with each
other, you go outside and do it.
This world is full of people
who got no use for us,
like to see us in the grave.
We don't need to give them any help.
# Oh, China Doll
# I gotta let you into my heart
# Oh, oh, China Doll
# I gotta let you into my heart
# Oh now, baby
You had me from the start... #
MUSIC CONTINUES IN DISTANCE
Sound like the music moving on
again, don't it?
It always do.
Time to make room
for whoever coming next.
That boy can play some.
Leaving?
I ain't needed around here no more.
Where you headed?
Oh...
Down the road.
Tyrone.
Who you talking to out here?
Just myself.
# It started with a 12-bar
country moan
# Then the guitar bass
dropped the saxophone
# Up the Mississippi River
came the song
# Music keeps rolling, rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Use the fender
To make the notes spark
# Then the bass guitar
got electrified
# Blues are rocking
Like a good ole stomp
# And the music keeps rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Whoo-hoo!
# Whoo!
# The music keeps
# The music keeps
# Yes, I said
The music keeps rolling on
# The music keeps rolling on
# The music
# Keeps rolling on
# Ye-e-es! Huh! #