FILTHY FRIDAYS: Buddy Lucas "Shake Rock Rattle And Roll"

Judging by this incredible album, punk rock was invented in New York 20 years before the Ramones debut, by a black saxophonist playing instrumentals. You doubt me? Ladies and gentlemen, behold! the one album I've been dying to post here on our series of wild, post-war weekend-starters.

Buddy Lucas "Shake Rock Rattle And Roll" (18 songs)

If "lowbrow" music of the pre-rock crit era ever gets the respect it deserves, this album would be a Holy Grail collectible. I mean, just look at that artwork! 

Your momma was wrong: sometimes you can judge a book by it's cover, and the pulp-paperback, late-night, lurid cover of this 195? album perfectly suits the music, which ranges from mid-tempo striptease grind, to all-out proto-hardcore rockers like "Stand Up" and especially "Stampede" that must have seemed fairly incomprehensible to a Fifties audience. Perhaps that's why Buddy "Big Luke" Lucas had to pay the bills with session work.  That's him blowin' on Dion's "The Wanderer" and Frankie Lymons' "Why Do Fools Fall In Love," amongst many others. 

Oh, and how do you know that a '50s recording artist is black? They're not pictured on the album cover! The pic of Mr. Lukas below was collected elsewhere off the inter-webs. The actual back cover of this album contains no info, just a black-and-white rendering of that Bukowski-drumming-with-Jayne Mansfield front cover drawing.