Stagger Lee

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Lee Shelton (also known as Stagger Lee, Stagolee, Stackerlee, Stack O'Lee, Stack-a-Lee and by several other spelling variants) was a black cab driver and a pimp[1] convicted of murdering William Lyons on Christmas Eve, 1895 in St. Louis, Missouri. The crime was immortalized in a blues folk song that has been recorded in hundreds of different versions.

Lee Shelton was not just a common pimp, but as described by Cecil Brown,[2] "Lee Shelton belonged to a group of pimps known in St. Louis as the 'Macks'. The macks were not just 'urban strollers'; they presented themselves as objects to be observed."

Shelton died in prison in 1912, of tuberculosis.

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[edit] The crime

A story appearing in the St. Louis, Missouri Globe-Democrat in 1895 says:

William Lyons, 25, a levee hand, was shot in the abdomen yesterday evening at 10 o'clock in the saloon of Bill Curtis, at Eleventh and Morgan Streets, by Lee Sheldon, a carriage driver. Lyons and Sheldon were friends and were talking together. Both parties, it seems, had been drinking and were feeling in exuberant spirits. The discussion drifted to politics, and an argument was started, the conclusion of which was that Lyons snatched Sheldon's hat from his head. The latter indignantly demanded its return. Lyons refused, and Sheldon withdrew his revolver and shot Lyons in the abdomen. When his victim fell to the floor Sheldon took his hat from the hand of the wounded man and coolly walked away. He was subsequently arrested and locked up at the Chestnut Street Station. Lyons was taken to the Dispensary, where his wounds were pronounced serious. Lee Sheldon is also known as 'Stag' Lee.[1]

Lyons eventually died of his injuries. Sheldon was tried, convicted, and served prison time for this crime. This otherwise unmemorable crime is remembered in a song. In some older versions of the song, the name of the other party is given as "Billy Deslile" or "De Lion".

[edit] Stagger Lee as archetype

Immortalized in song, Stagger Lee has become an archetype, the embodiment of a tough-guy black man -- one who is sly, streetwise, cool, lawless, amoral, potentially violent, and who often defies white authority.[3]

Author and music critic Greil Marcus explicitly ties the Stagger Lee archetype to Sly Stone and his album There's a Riot Goin' On in his book Mystery Train: Images of America in Rock 'n' Roll Music.

[edit] The songs

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The song has been recorded hundreds of times by a great variety of performers. The version recorded by Mississippi John Hurt is considered by some commentators to be definitive, containing all of the elements that appear in other versions. A cover with different lyrics was a chart hit for Lloyd Price in 1959; Dick Clark felt that the original tale of murder was too morbid for his American Bandstand audience, and insisted that they be changed (with no murder taking place).[4] Despite the changes, it was the original version of the song that made #1 and was ranked #456 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

There is speculation that "Stag O Lee" songs predated even the 1895 incident, and Lee Sheldon may have gotten his nickname from earlier folk songs. Other sources say that black roustabouts on Mississippi River docks were called "stack o lees" as they would stack cargo on the lee side of the docks. The first published version of the song was done by folklorist John Lomax in 1910. The song was well known in African American communities along the lower Mississippi River by the 1910s.

Before World War II, it was almost always known as "Stack O'Lee". W.C. Handy wrote that this probably was a nickname for a tall person, comparing him to the tall smoke-stack of the large steamboat Robert E. Lee. By the time that W.C. Handy wrote the explanation in the 1920s, "Stack O' Lee" was already familiar in United States popular culture, with recordings of the song made by such pop singers of the day as Cliff Edwards.

An early Blues recording of the song from 1928 was made by Mississippi John Hurt, a blues musician. His lyrics:

Po-lice officer, how can it be?
You can 'rest everybody but cruel Stagolee
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee
Billy DeLyon told Stagolee, "Please don't take my life
I got two little babes and a darling, loving wife"
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee
"What'd I care about your two little babes and darling, loving wife?
You done stole my Stetson hat, I'm bound to take your life."
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee
Boom boom, boom boom,
Went the forty-four.
Well when I spied Billy DeLyon
He's lyin' down on the floor.
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee
Gentlemens of the Jury,
What you think of that?
Stagolee killed Billy DeLyon
'bout a five-dollar Stetson hat.
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee
Standin' on the gallows, head way up high
At twelve o'clock, they killed him, they's all glad to see him die
That bad man, oh cruel Stagolee

As in all such pieces, there are many (sometimes anachronistic) variants on the lyrics. Several older versions give Billy's last name as "De Lyons" or "Deslile".

A 1959 variation, credited as "traditional", as originally recorded and performed by Lloyd Price, goes:

(intro) The night was clear, and the moon was yellow
And the leaves came tumblin' down. . .
I was standing on a corner
When I heard my bull dog bark
He was barking at the two men
Who were gambling in the dark
It was Stagger Lee and Billy
Two men who gambled late
Stagger Lee threw a seven
Billy swore that he threw eight
Stagger Lee told Billy
"I can't let you go with that
You won all o' my money
And my brand new Stetson hat."
Stagger Lee started off goin'
Down that railroad track
He said "I can't get you Billy but
Don't be here when I come back"

(bridge)

Stagger Lee, he went home
And he got his forty-four
Said "I'm going down to the barroom
Just to pay that debt I owe"
Stagger Lee went to the barroom
And he stood across the barroom door
He said "Nobody move"
And he pulled his forty-four
Then Billy he cried "Stag, oh Stag,
Please don't take my life
I got three little children
And a very sickly wife"
Stagger Lee... shot Billy
Oh, he shot that poor boy so bad
Till the bullet came through Billy
And it broke the bartender's glass.

Lloyd Price also recorded another version of the song in 1958 at the request of Dick Clark, who felt the original lyrics were not appropriate for his American Bandstand audience. The subject was changed from gambling to fighting over a woman, and instead of a murder, the two yelled at each other, and made up the next day.

Other well known artists who have recorded it include Ma Rainey, Sidney Bechet, Johnny Dodds, Bob Dylan, Taj Mahal, Duke Ellington, Woody Guthrie, Bill Haley & His Comets, Neil Diamond, Wilson Pickett, Ike and Tina Turner, Fats Domino, Doc Watson, Dr. John, Tom Rush, Travis MacRae, Professor Longhair, Huey Lewis and The News, and The Isley Brothers. A version by The Fabulous Thunderbirds can be found on the Porky's Revenge soundtrack.

The Grateful Dead recorded a version of the tale which focuses on the fictionalized hours after the death of "Billy DeLion", when Billy's wife Delia tracks down Stagger Lee in a local saloon and "she shot him in the balls" [1] in revenge for Billy's death.

Elton John's 1976 "Blue Moves" album included the song "Shoulder Holster", about a vengeful woman out to kill her cheating ex. The song begins with the lyrics "It was just like Frankie and Johnny, And it was just like Stagger Lee".

The 1979 album London Calling by The Clash includes a ska version (a cover of a song by the Jamaican rocksteady group The Rulers) titled "Wrong 'Em Boyo", in which Stagger Lee is explicitly the hero and Billy the villain.[5] Another variant by Austin blues artist Steve James retells the story from Stagger Lee's perspective, as the underprivileged child of a prostitute and a steamboat worker, and as with the Clash's version, Billy is not innocent.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, by contrast, present an even more violent and profane version of the song "Stagger Lee" on their 1996 album Murder Ballads. This version retakes a street "toast poem" on Stagolee [6]. Toasts were 'pre-rap' poems and stories especially popular among those in the "life" and among prisoners.

More recently, the Black Keys recorded a song entitled "Stack Shot Billy" on their 2004 album Rubber Factory. In 2005, Chris Whitley and Jeff Lang recorded their own arrangement of the song, called "Stagger Lee", ultimately released on their 2006 CD Dislocation Blues.

A version of Staggolee performed by Pacific Gas & Electric was included on the soundtrack for Quentin Tarantino's film Death Proof, the second portion of the 2007 double-feature Grindhouse.

In the 2007 film Black Snake Moan, Samuel L. Jackson's character sings a boastful version of the song from Stagger Lee's perspective, titled "Stackolee". This version is based on R. L. Burnside's rendition which can be heard on the album Well, Well, Well.

In Modern Life is War´s 2007 record Midnight in America the song Stagger Lee recounts a version of the tale, in which Stagger Lee looks for a fight, with nothing to lose after his girlfriend left him. He notices a man staring at him, turns around, and puts his colt .45 to the man's head. The man pleads Stagger for his life, because he has a wife and child back home. He then tells Stagger he's a friend, not a foe, and that his girlfriend is at a club with Billy called the Flamingo. Stagger pistol-whips him in the teeth, steals a fast car, and heads to the Flamingo. The song ends with him kicking open the door, and seeing the terror in the eyes of his girlfriend and her lover, draws his pistol to deal punishment to the two and then the refrain "Oh Stagger Lee, you're a bad, bad man/Oh Stagger Lee, you're going straight to hell".

[edit] Contemporary interpretations and notable allusions

In the 1980s, pro wrestler Junkyard Dog used the name (and theme song) Stagger Lee to surprise his rival Ted DiBiase, returning from a "Loser Leaves Town" match under a mask during an infamous feud in Mid-South Wrestling.[7]

Stagg R. Leigh is the assumed name under which Thelonious Ellison, the protagonist of Percival Everett's novel Erasure (2001) writes his parody of blaxploitation literature My Pafology (later changed to Fuck).[8]

Contemporary artist Beck covered Mississippi John Hurt's interpretation, "Stagolee," on Hurt's tribute album "Avalon Blues," released by Vanguard Records in 2001.

Stagger Lee, a graphic novel both telling the history of the story and a fictionalized version of it with political themes, was published by Image Comics in May 2006, written by Derek McCulloch and drawn by Shepherd Hendrix (ISBN 1582406073). [9]

[edit] References

  1. ^ The Story of Stagger Lee in the Riverfront Times of St. Louis
  2. ^ Brown, Cecil, Stagolee Shot Billy, Harvard University Press, 2003
  3. ^ Brown, Cecil (9 May 2003). Godfather of Gangsta. The Guardian. Retrieved on 2007-12-17.
  4. ^ Bob Shannon's Behind The Hits: Stagger Lee. Retrieved on 2008-03-09.
  5. ^ The Clash. Artist History. Aversion.com. Retrieved on 2007-11-20.
  6. ^ Largehearted Boy: Book Notes - Derek McCulloch ("Stagger Lee")
  7. ^ Mid-South Wrestling
  8. ^ BOOKFORUM | winter 2002
  9. ^ Home - Santa Cruz Sentinel

[edit] External links

Preceded by
"Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" by The Platters		 Billboard Hot 100 number-one single (Lloyd Price version)
February 9, 1959 - March 8, 1959 (4 weeks)		 Succeeded by
"Venus" by Frankie Avalon
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