A list of the other songs nominated by Bob within his post-doctorate book, which we have already covered, is given at the end. Each article has at least one recording of the song within it.
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By Tony Attwood
“Key to the Highway” was a song that initially emerged as an improvisation, and then was subsequently recorded with credits to Chas Segar and Big Bill Broonzy. Big Bill later says that both he and Chas were singing the song in their routines at the same time, implying that in fact, neither of them actually originated the song. Who actually wrote it we don’t know, but many people now cite this song as the origin of what we now know as the blues, and indeed also of rhythm and blues.
The version above is one of the best known and is performed by Little Walter and is the version Bob selected on his radio show, but I’ll include a few other versions in this piece as I am sure Bob would know them all. And besides I do think this one of those songs we all ought to know and celebrate as part of the origins of the blues, rock, and contemporary folk music.
Musically, it is a classic blues variation, with a chord sequence of I, V, IV, I, V, I, and that sequence just runs on as the verse in a standard strophic (ie verse, verse, verse) style. One might even call it an eight-bar blues. One certainly can call it the start of modern blues.
It being a blues song performed by multiple artists, there are multiple variations on the lyrics but in essence it is always the same 8 bar blues, celebrating the blues singer travelling around the United States having had a break-up with his lover, who invariably is to blame because she was two-timing him. (The blues is a very sexist form of music!)
I got the key to the highway, billed out and bound to go I'm gonna leave here runnin', because walkin' is much too slow ... Give me one more kiss mama, just before I go 'Cause when I'm leavin' here, I won't be back no more
The song over time has become an absolute standard of the blues genre, and is very appealing to blues bands because it offers a relief from the classic 12 bar blues that dominates the genre. The Little Walter version (above) from 1958 is in what has become known as the “Chicago blues.”
Bob performed the song in 1995.
But we can tell just how much the song mutated over time with the recorded version from Charlie Segar below. This is said to be the original, and it uses a completely different chord sequence, which sounds like a 12 bar blues, but which also has, quite extraordinarily for the blues, a modulation in the final line. Such variations were quickly removed from the blues so that the chords used were just I, IV and V. As such, this is a really rare, and musically very informative recording.
One of the most popular subsequent versions came from Jazz Gillum, who recorded with Broonzy on guitar, using the eight bar version without the modulation.
Wiki, in its review of the history of the song notes that “Gillum gave conflicting stories about who wrote the song: in one, he claimed sole authorship, in another, he identified Big Bill Broonzy as ‘the real author’.”
The Little Walter version above is often said to date from the late 1950s, being recorded as a tribute to Big Bill Broonzy who died in 1958. It was Little Walter’s only record to make it into the charts.
An (obviously) much later version came from Eric Clapton
I must admit I am not enough of an expert on the blues to give a proper fulsome review of the history of this song, but I think it should be said that “Key to the Highway” is known among those with much more insight into the history of the blues than I have, as one of the most influential blues songs of all time. It has been recorded over and over again, although not always with the original chord sequence, which made it so influential.
It is perhaps too much to say that the modern upbeat blues all came from this song, but it it is a story that is worth holding on to, for without this tale we don’t really have any indication that holds up of know how all this music actually came to be with us. And personally, I like to hold onto this song, because it gives an origin, even if in the end it is not the right origin.
Previously in this series
- Ball of confusion
- Blue Bayou
- Blue Suede Shoes
- Cheaper to Keep Her
- CIA Man – the Fugs
- Detroit City
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- Dirty Life and Times
- Detroit City
- Dirty Life and Times
- Don’t hurt anymore
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- El Paso
- I got a woman
- If you don’t know me by now
- I’ve always been crazy
- Jesse James and Po Boy
- Keep my Skillet Good and Greasy
- Key to the highway
- Little White Cloud that Cried
- London’s Calling
- Mac the Knife
- Midnight Rider
- Money Honey
- My Generation and Desolation Row
- My prayer
- Nellie was a Lady
- Old Violin by Johnny Paycheck
- On the road again (save a horse)
- On the street where you live
- Pancho and Lefty
- Please don’t let me be misunderstood
- Poor Little Fool
- Poison Love
- Pump it up
- Ruby are you mad
- Saturday night at the movies
- Strangers in the Night
- Truckin
- Take Me from This Garden of Evil
- The Pretender
- The Whiffenpoof Song
- There stands the glass
- Tutti Fruiti (A wap bop a … etc)
- Volare
- Waist Deep in the Big Muddy
- When
- Where or When
- Willy the Wandering Gypsy and Me
- Without a song
- Your cheating heart