By The Beachwood Blues Bureau
“It is with sadness that we relate the news that Stan Davis, the gregarious owner of Lee’s Unleaded Blues, a favorite haunt of the Chicago Blues Tour, has passed on,” WXRT reports.
“He fell to cardiac arrest Friday, November 12. We send our condolences to his family and many, many friends, and will always remember him fondly.
“Stanley Davis Going Home Services will be held –
“Visitation: 1 PM – 8PM, Wednesday Nov 17, 2010 at Taylor Funeral Home. 63 E. 79th St, Chicago, IL.
“Wake/Funeral: 11 AM/11:30 AM Thursday Nov 18, 2010, at Carter Temple Church CME, 7841 S. Wabash Ave, Chicago, IL.
Repast will follow and for those who can attend after the service, the band will play at Lee’s Unleaded Blues, 7401 S. South Chicago.
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Lee’s Unleaded Blues.
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“There was this one club on the South Side, Lee’s Unleaded Blues, that’s still doing business today,” Tom Paronis told the New York Times in May, recalling his early days with Buddy Scott and the Rib Tips, “that had mirrors on the ceiling and shag carpet on most of the walls and Christmas decorations up year-round. This was where the road bands of the Chi-Lites, Johnny Taylor, Otis Clay, and Tyrone Davis often played. When I worked that club, I knew, baby, I had arrived.”
For the record, though: When Stanley Davis bought the club and remodeled, he removed the shagged walls.
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“Lee’s Unleaded Blues has been a South Side hot spot for the blues since the 1970s, when it was known as Queen Bee’s Lounge,” Karen Hanson wrote in Today’s Chicago Blues in 2007.
“Now owned by Stanley Davis, a retired police officer, the corner club is as active as ever. Duke, the doorman, greets guests and makes them welcome. Stan sits at the far end of the bar, using a wireless microphone to announce the arrival of well-known guests. ‘It makes me feel good to see people coming in and having a good time,’ he explains.
“The club showcases local blues bands, but in Chicago that includes internationally known recording artists like Johnny Drummer. Musicians also drop by to hang out and sit in with the bands as musical guests.
“‘Guests get insulted if you don’t call them up,’ Stan says.
“Lee’s Unleaded Blues has been featured in National Geographic, and Men’s Journal magazine named it one of the six best juke joints in the country. Davis is proud to call his place a juke joint. The juke joint is an African-American creation, he says. In the rural South, black people had no clubs, so people would gather in houses or barns or wherever they could find space. Today places like Lee’s Unleaded Blues continue that tradition . . .
“Stan was no stranger to the entertainment business when he bought Lee’s Unleaded Blues. In addition to his full-time job as a police officer with the Illinois Secretary of State, Stan worked part-time for 20 years as a bodyguard for musicians at concerts. He worked with such legends as the Rolling Stones, Prince, the Grateful Dead, and Earth, Wind and Fire. As a result, he became interested in the entertainment business and when he retired in 2001, he looked around for the right establishment. He had good timing; the former owners of Lee’s Unleaded were also getting ready to retire and wanted to sell.”
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“It’s 11 o’clock on a Friday night at Lee’s Unleaded Blues, an oasis of light and music on a desolate strip of South Chicago Avenue near the South Shore neighborhood,” David Whiteis wrote in the Reader in 2002. “The featured band, Johnny Drummer & the Starlighters, has been onstage for more than an hour, but Drummer has sung only one or two songs. A singer and harmonica player called the Arkansas Belly Roller took the microphone shortly after the set began; he stormed through primal re-creations of ‘Driving Wheel’ and ‘Shake, Rattle & Roll,’ stopping occasionally in the middle of a verse to lift his shirt and perform a couple of his trademark midriff undulations.
“Leeroy Jones, aka the Junk Yard Dog, hobbled on his crutches to the center of the room, took the mike from the Belly Roller, and delivered Latimore’s ‘Let’s Straighten It Out’ and Sam Cooke’s ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’ in a sweet-sour croon. He writhed as he sang, the stump that was his right leg jutting out from his body at a 90-degree angle. Ladies hollered their approval, and several walked up and stuffed dollar bills into his fist.
“Meanwhile Calvin ‘Kadakie’ Tucker set up a djembe in front of the band. During the day Kadakie, who’s originally from Bermuda, works as an electrician; he’s currently helping rewire Lee’s to accommodate a mirror ball and a battery of multicolored lights. Another guest vocalist, Delores Scott, eases into a sultry ‘Dr. Feelgood,’ and Kadakie’s polyrhythmic punctuation adds an exotic Afro-Cuban texture to her rendition of Aretha’s soul-blues classic.
“No one seems to mind that the featured attraction has barely had a chance to do his own show. At Lee’s, a blues set is more a party than a formal gig.”
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“‘A lot of people say, Well, Stan, can you run a bar? On my last command I had 30 policemen – I can handle four barmaids, handle a few bands. That’s nothing! I know properly how to handle and talk to people. Do you know how to order whiskey? My father was a tavern owner, my grandfather was a tavern owner. My mother and stepfather, in 1976, at 922 E. 63rd, we opened up our first liquor store. I set that up for them and got them started. I had a back stock of $10,000 worth of liquor in the back room, so I know how to order whiskey. Matter of fact, my mother is part business owner with me in here – her name is Pauline Morrison. I owe a lot of my great entrepreneurship to her. I had my beautiful career in law enforcement, and I guess I’m going to do the same thing in entertainment.
“‘We have top bands here, they’re here every week. Remind you of The Rocky Horror Show – everybody know what they’re gonna sing, and the fans sing right along with ’em. You sit next to somebody, next thing you know they’re up singing. That’s what really made me like the club when I first came here. I’m talkin’ to somebody, they say, Excuse me, it’s time; they’re callin’ me up!'”
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Scenes From Lee’s
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Comments welcome.
Posted on November 17, 2010