Like many, our first real exposure to The Fabulous Thunderbirds came through such tough mid- to late-80s hits like “Tuff Enuff”, “Wrap It Up”, “Powerful Stuff” and “Stand Back”. And anyone who gave the band more of a listen at the time would’ve also heard some pretty good stuff off those same albums in such tracks as the driving “Now Loosen Up Baby”, slow, biting “Mistake Number One”, soulful, horn-soaked “Streets of Gold” and greasy, jiving instrumental “Down at Antone’s”.
A new box set from The Last Music Company collects not only those three full albums, but also the four others that were released leading up to the band’s hits years, in addition to a long forgotten Doc Pomus-produced album that was recorded prior to the band’s debut album but never released, and that just may be the best of the group!
Titled The Jimmie Vaughan Years: Complete Studio Recordings 1978-1989, the five-hour, four-CD set focuses on the band’s studio output from its 1974 founding by singer and harmonica player Kim Wilson and guitarist Jimmie Vaughan to Vaughan’s departure from the band in 1990.
Featuring a baker’s dozen of tracks restored from the water-damaged only surviving tapes of the 28 songs recorded by Pomus and colleague Joel Dorn, The Doc Pomus Sessions 1978 finds Thunderbirds Vaughan, Wilson, Mike Buck (drums), and Keith Ferguson (bass) joined by the Roomful of Blues horns and pianist Al Copley for a gritty, smoking set that spans from fantastic covers of Otis Rush’s “I Can’t Quit You Baby”, Slim Harpo’s “Scratch My Back” and the swinging closer “Love at First Sight” (Little Milton) — on which Wilson’s vocals range from falsetto to growling and barking — to the similar high-power Chicago-style shuffle “Baby Please Don’t Lie to Me” and soulful, grooving “I Searched All Over”.
The slow, staggering “Dirty Work is Going On” that opens the album sees both Wilson’s vocals and Vaughan’s guitar commanding attention from the very start (with plenty more of that to come over the rest of this recording and the seven others captured here), with the swaying, harmonica- and horns-laced “She’s My Baby” serving as another great example of the band’s mellower side, while the gritty, shuffling “Snake Hips” and swinging “Pecker Wrecker” demonstrate their collective prowess even without Wilson’s strong vocals, instead spotlighting the Detroit native’s low-down harmonica playing and helping the listener to understand just what Vaughan meant when he said “See, when I heard Kim, I knew I wanted to be in a band with him. He played and sang great.”
Several of these same tracks (such as “Dirty Work”,”Scratch My Back” and “She’s Tuff”) are revisited on later albums also included in this set, but, as good as each of those more recent versions sounds, our ears tend to prefer the earlier recordings of them, giving another good reason to add this set to your collection even if you have all of the band’s previously released albums. And, of course, there’s lots more to like about the other albums here, including such highlights as the simmering opening track “Wait on Time”, the stinging slow blues of “Full-Time Lover”, a shuffling, gritty-vocaled “Marked Deck” and the greasy, creeping instrumental “C-Boy’s Blues” off the band’s eponymous debut (often referred to as Girls Go Wild), on which you can clearly hear the band’s natural progression since the earlier Doc Pomus session, including, it seems, a bit more pronounced playing from Vaughan, which of course only makes the band more captivating.
Beyond that come other gems that include the steady uptempo soul of “I’m a Good Man (If You Give Me a Chance)”, the swaggering blues of “Low-Down Woman”, and instrumentals such as the, well, jumping “Jumpin’ Bad” and crosscutting grooves of “Last Call for Alcohol” off What’s the Word?; the fast-swaying “I’m Sorry”, shuffling “I Hear You Knocking”, funky rocking “One’s Too Many” and rollicking “Give Me All Your Lovin'” off 1981’s Butt Rockin’; and a slow-burning “Lover’s Crime” off 1982’s T-Bird Rhythm that has all the sound of a less rocking T-Birds hit accompanied by a Paul Pena-ish groove.
Together, the set provides a great listen to the early back-alley sound that helped define and garner attention for the Austin blues scene and influence the playing of future bluesmen such as Doyle Bramhall II and Gary Clark Jr, among many others. Along with having all eight of the band’s earliest recordings together in one place, The Jimmie Vaughan Years comes in an attractive and intriguing hardback book format that’s filled with photos and looks back from members of the band as well as others, so go ahead and grab yourself a copy of this great piece of Texas-built blues history!