New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD

Subject: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From:
Date: 14 Jan 00 - 11:07 PM

Hi folks... I came here awhile back looking for help finding some rare Bob Gibson albums, and many of you were very helpful. Well, I wanted to let all of you know that my good friend Carole Bender, whom my tireless album search was on behalf of, has now published her new book "Bob Gibson: I Come For To Sing". I know I am biased but I have to say it is EXCELLENT. Bob himself co-wrote this with Carole before he passed away, and it has quite a few contributions from other artists...Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Paul Stookey, the list goes on and on. More than a biography, it is also a very accurate catalogue of Bob's work. Included with the book is a copy of his CD "Stops Along the Way". It is now for sale on Amazon.com, and since I cant seem to put a link in here, I'll give you the address: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0961459417/qid%3D947790397/sr%3D1-2/002-0223721-3459457 Or of course you can find it by searching for "bob gibson". Following is an excerpt from the description of the book on Amazon.com - Please forgive this shameless plug for a very dear friend, but I really think many of you might enjoy it. Thanks! :) ******************* The life of Bob Gibson, the unsung father of commercially popular folk music, whose influence is still being felt in today's music, is celebrated in "Bob Gibson: I Come For To Sing", by Carole Bender and Bob Gibson. Included with the book is Bob Gibson's CD "Stops Along the Way".

The book is autobiographical as much as possible, but his importance to his contemporaries is emphasized by original contributions by such legends as Shel Silverstein, Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Peter Yarrow, Tom Paxton, Hamilton Camp, Gordon Lightfoot, Glenn Yarbrough, George Carlin and many others.

This book is a tribute to Gibson's contribution to music, as well as a heartfelt tribute to the man himself, exploring his life and his career, the triumphs as well as the trials, including a dark look into his battle with drug addiction. Additional features include the most comprehensive Bob Gibson discography ever compiled, Gibson's complete song-writing textbook, the script of his play, "The Courtship of Carl Sandburg", numerous photos and illustrations, and of course, the CD "Stops Along the Way." *******************************

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Art Thieme
Date: 15 Jan 00 - 06:32 PM

I'm lookin' forward to this---truly am. In your opinion, was it true to the dark as well as the light sides of Mr. Gibson? (If so, it will need to be at least 500 pages long. He sure did inspire me when I was hanging at the Gate Of Horn back in '59. Later, it was fascinating to work with Bob a bit. A great artist, an innovator. Never was a 12-string strummer like him.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: bob schwarer
Date: 15 Jan 00 - 06:36 PM

This is one I need to get ASAP.

Bob S.

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Jan 00 - 06:42 PM

Here are links to the book at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Now, if I did it right, it should also be set so it gives a little profit to Mudcat if you follow the link and then buy the book.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: GUEST,MAG
Date: 12 Aug 00 - 08:52 PM

Sorry, I picked up the book at OTSFM in Chicago during their 20% off books sale, in early July. I am just now, on vacation, dipping in to it, and enjoying it a lot; the waltz down memory lane alone is worth the read.

Max reminded us that everything we say on the forum is with us forever. It was a good reminder. I am very glad to have heard a lot of Bob Gibson while he was still around.

MAG, anxiously waiting for my password so I can get back on. I was SO sure I remembered it this time ...

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 12 Aug 00 - 09:22 PM

Holy cow! Bill Monroe AND Bob Gibson! Gotta have 'em both.

Looks like Heather and the cats don't get fed this week!

Rick

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 13 Aug 00 - 12:08 PM

refresh...fer god's sake.

Oh well, since I'm here....

Art, I know you've told some wonderful stories about Chicago's folk scene in the fifties and sixties, but I don't remember if you had any personal ruminations on Bob (Hamid)(Hamilton) Camp. Love to her 'em if you do.

Rick

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Art Thieme
Date: 13 Aug 00 - 12:57 PM

Rick,

I just sent a personal note to MAG about this volume. First, I loved the CD. Every time I found tapes of Bob I'd pick 'em up and I was present when much of the live stuff was recorded at Mother Blues--a great Chicago club. There was a tape out called "Bootleg Gibson" that was a very limited edition that was sold at a Chicago benefit done for Bob when he became so ill with Progressive Supranuclear Palsy. Some of the songs on the CD with the book were from those bootleg tapes. Some great stuff like "No More Cane On The Brazos" and "Goin' Down To Brownsville" with Paul Butterfield. Bob was heavily on drugs etc. in those days and it showed on the tape, but it was a fine musical moment that was thankfully captured. And it was a heady scene in Chicago about 1965. I am glad I was part of it. Also, I'm glad I lived through it. Many did not.

The book is a good one with great reminiscences from so very many people. The facts are not always as I remember them. And some are just not correct. But the author, Carole Bender, did a fine job saluting an important and exciting musician. When my own health went south, Bob Gibson was right there, with so many others, who did a grand benefit for us at the Blackstone theater in Chicago (1990) and I'll never forget Bob's performance that night. He was always a good person to me, even though that was not the experience of others during his hard addictive years. That was probably because, being gun shy after listening to my good friend's horror tales about Bob, I stayed at arms length from him and avoided business dealings that he did try to set up for us. Maybe that's how I did survive those temptations that others succumbed to during those noir neon-on-the-wet-streets jazzy pheromonic (pheromantic) Kerouacian days of stampeding harmony fom Gibson and Camp at the Gate Of Horn in the basement of the old Rice Hotel at Chicago and Dearborn with Lenny and Josh White and Shel and, Lord Buckley and Sydni and Toni and Cornelia and Dale and Rita and Connie and Mike and Brigid-The Blue Fairy.

Were we ever that young?

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Art Thieme
Date: 13 Aug 00 - 01:09 PM

In another thread a few years ago I recounted the tale of how Bob Gibson literally held his own wake a week before he died when he tossed a "FAREWELL PARTY" in Chicago. That is also in the notes for my CD--for those of you who have that booklet. It was an amazing night----one I'll not forget.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 13 Aug 00 - 08:28 PM

Thanks Art. I think the anguish and difficulties we have in dealing with friends who've gone past the point of no return is perhaps the saddest thing we have to deal with. My mentor (who introduced me to so many great musicians 33 years ago) started on the long road to booze/drug insanity only 6 or 7 years after I met him. Watching him slowly kill himself, and become a (very bad) hustler was painful.

Do you have any thoughts on Mr. Camp?

Rick

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Art Thieme
Date: 14 Aug 00 - 02:41 PM

Rick,

Bob (Hamid/Hamilton) Camp shows up in many films and TV shows over the years. He's a good actor. Check out Clint Eastwood's film BIRD. It's the life of Charlie Parker and Ham Camp plays "the mayor of 52nd street/New York City". I've seen him on re-runs of Hill Street Blues and many other smaller roles that don't spring to mind at the moment. Bob Camp was a good partner for Gibson. His soaring harmonies wound just about perfectly around Gibson's own. The old LP of them at the Gate Of Horn (amazing liner notes by Shel Silverstein) was simply a classic. I do wish it had been recorded with better fidelity though. I'm glad I've got one of the originals that had a version of "Butternut Hill" on it that got the LP recalled and reissued without that song. Francis Faye, a lounge singer around Chicago (and sister of Marty Faye--a local TV pitch man) sued Gibson & Camp over the song. One "funny?" verse in their version went as follows:

Me oh my, oh, well-a-day,
Johnny's gone the other way,
Now he's just like Francis Faye,
Johnny has gone for a soldier.

That was 1961 when those kinds of gay jokes were often tolerated even though they were inappropriate.

But Camp was the partner that Gibson needed then. He did some good LPs by himself and with his band, The Skymonters. He never did, on his own, achieve the fame he had in the duo with Gibson. All through the 80s and into the 90s they continued to perform together on occasion. They appeared on my old 80s radio show--The Flea Market on NPR. They even re-created the Live At The Gate Of Horn album just about word for word because the old LP on Elektra was out of print. That was recorded at Holsteins folk club/bar in Chicago--a great place to hang out. It did have a few extra tracks. Titled GIBSON AND CAMP---REVISITED, it is available from FOLK ERA Records as a CD. --- 705 S. Washington St.---Naperville, IL 60540-6654-------630-637-2303 There is a website--but I don't have the URL.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 14 Aug 00 - 10:29 PM

Thanks Art. Much appreciated. Sorry a few more catters weren't interested.

Rick

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Bud Savoie
Date: 15 Aug 00 - 07:22 AM

I am VERY interested in the Gibson-Camp album, but I found the Folk Era site and it has the Brothers Four and a whole lot more, but no Gibson-Camp. Maybe I'll try the phone.

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: Art Thieme
Date: 15 Aug 00 - 11:06 AM

Folk Era Records is mainly a Kingston Trio (and similar homoginized white bread folk groups) like the Brothers Four and the Highwaymen. But they DO have that Gibson/Camp Revisited CD. I suspect it's not a huge seller for them right now. But do try the phone number. I'd bet Ian or Alan Shaw could definitely help you to secure it.

I just posted a great song that Bob Gibson wrote at the thread looking for "Songs For Alcoholics". Where the other songs noted at that thread were about alcohol itself, the song Bob wrote is about recovering from alcohol and other addictions. He was heavily involved in drug and alcohol recovery when he wrote the song.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: catspaw49
Date: 15 Aug 00 - 11:42 AM

Great thread Art......Thanks for the stories.

Spaw

Subject: RE: New Bob Gibson Biography w/CD
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 24 May 11 - 03:55 PM

Just reading this bio now. What an interesting life. I find the glimpse into the business of folk music in the 50's and 60's as fascinating as Bob Gibson.

I can strongly recommend the first 1,2 of the book.

Don