I GOT A (LEGENDARY) STORY TO TELL
Swayze
14,705 Posts
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of diggin' in the house of DC icon Maxx Kidd. If you love, like, or even appreciate go-go music, it's owed do to the efforts of Maxx Kidd. Any GOGO record you can think of from the DETT, TTED and some other obscure labels has Maxx all over it. I had met him twice before when he visited Memory Lane, and we spoke briefly. When he called the store and asked if I along w/store owner Mike wanted to go come through to get some treasures for the shop, the both of us were high.Over the years we knew that he'd sold off some of his collection to deal with medical bills (he had a stroke some years ago that left him a shell of his former self), but we were still able to find plenty of gems. The hightlight for me, and the basis for this post, was the fact that sitting on two shelves in a back room were the masters to almost every GOGO record I grew up listening to (on vinyl that is). It's crazy to have records you cherish in your crates, but to hold the original masters in your hands is something else. Even though his stroke has slurred his speech, the man could recall all the sessions, and still sharp enough to realize and say emphatically "If you don't own you're masters, you ain't worth shit. You might as well sell your own ass, because the music industry will turn you into a whore. I had a lot of whores". Too many crazy ass stories about 70's soul acts (O'Jays, Sister Sledge, Jones Girls, Billy Paul, Gamble and Huff, Jackson 5, The Gap Band, Marvin Gaye.) I'll just say SEX, DRUGS, AND SOUL MUSIC all around. Insane stories of what he had to do to get GOGO on the radio. Suge Knight ain't go shit on Maxx. He spoke about setting up Chuck Brown to go to California to cut his albums on Sussex and Source, discussing EU(before Black Fire and after TTED) and how they should have been alot bigger if they had found better management, namely him. He also seemed kind of sad in that after he went down(having his stroke), there weren't alot of managers, promoters who loved the music enough to push it out to the next level he was trying to get it to. I wanted to go get a camera and get some snapshots of everything. Maxx was straight up "No pictures man! See those pictures on the wall, that's the real Maxx Kidd. The briefcase in one hand, pitbull in the other Maxx Kidd."DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMMNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!If anyone has a simular stories about digging in the presence of their favorite artists, producers etc, please share!
Comments
I used to see Dr. Dre a bunch of times in LA when I lived there.
Does he still have the pitbull?
If I remeber it right the story of this dude who painted his own record covers without making any music that was the Waxpoetics cover story 2-3 issues ago started here on this board.
Peace
Hawkeye
Way ahead of you. Though slurred and measured, he did seem to speak freely with Mike and myself. Now whether he'll want to take the time to be interviewed for print media, I can't say. He spoke of bad experience with the "Good to Go" movie(lead character Maxx, based on himself). I'll admit it was something running through my mind while driving home. I'll let ya'll know if it's a go.
I've got a few stories, but nothing like what you heard yesterday. Go ahead and share more. All of Go Go should have been a lot bigger, that was good music with good players.
Dan
Good players[/b] is the key, 'cause in the 80's it was very seldom you saw any genuine soul/funk BANDS that didn't rely on synths and computers so much. I think go-go was the last time I saw young black musicians with guitars (jazz, reggae, etc. doesn't count). I sure wish go-go had made it - to me, that was funk's last stand.
i agree about the masters thing, a few years ago i got to tour the masters room of fantasy studios, which houses much of the stax catalog as well as just about everything from doug e. fresh to ccr and everything in between. it was mindblowing.
I feel you. I hit up his spot years ago and came away with some incredible records. And like you said he had ALL the go go joints, reels, acetates, dubs..etc..etc... I got all the white labels/test presses of the dett/tted stuff. Max is extremely good peoples!!!
thanks,
m