Artist description At 82 years young, Pops Carter is performing with as much vigor and feeling as he ever has during a career spanning more than 65 years. Heıs not just singing the blues; heıs baring his soul of all the joy and pain of a life that not only continues to inspire him and his music, but also members of his band, The Funkmonsters, and legions of friends and followers. The release of his compact-disc recording "Rhythm Man" attests to that fact, proving that the veteran Louisiana-born, Texas-settled rhythm-and-blues singer still packs a punch. Pops’ first release in four years features longtime favorites ranging from "Breakfast Time" to "Baby come on home!" and, as an added bonus, several new compositions. Pops oozes a special brand of funk-laden soul thatıs rare in todayıs entertainment world. Pops has a unique gift that touches disc collectors and live music aficionados alike â€ı in a sense, he is always "live". Fans young and old have been clamoring for the new release, and as the millennium approaches, heıs hoping it will lead him to areas where people (unfortunately) havenıt had access to his music. Pops Carter likes to make friends. Pops indeed barbecues his blues and serves it smothered with spirit. Funkmonsters guitarist Chris Tracey and bassist Clarence Pitts sizzle as well, punctuating the inimitable phrasing and emotive style that set Pops apart as one of the truly great Texas bluesmen of the 1990s. BIO INFORMATION Pops Carterıs story is one of a modern day "Crossroads", only in real life instead of 70mm. He was born in Shreveport, La., a virtual breeding and training ground of blues and other prominent artists of the 20th Century (Huddie Ledbetter, Kenny Wayne Shepard, Elvis Presley). In 1930, 12-year-old Tom Carter left Northwest Louisiana just as he had started working the cotton fields. He packed everything he owned in a pillowcase and headed for Houston, where within a year he had hooked up with a 13-piece band. He spent his youth in the Houston area, and through his early adult life sang at picnics and churches and anywhere else he was called to please people using only a smile, a few dance steps and his honey-warm throat. Eventually though, dedication to his family and a day job limited Pops to spots as a guest in R&B revues, performing with numerous friends as well as new acquaintances. In 1969, a construction job landed Pops in the deceptively sleepy college town of Denton, Texas. He stayed there and retired with his wife Minnie Lee (who is Lightinı Hopkinsı cousin). The North Texas prairie community was perfect for Pops, offering fertile creative ground for the middle-aged songster. Drawing on the wellspring of aspiring musicians studying at the University of North Texası music school, Pops was inspired and energized. During the 1970s and ı80s, Pops honed his stage skills as a guest artist with innumerable rock, jazz, blues and country acts, and also fronted more than a few excellent (but short-lived) bands of his own. Finally, in 1990, with guitarist Christopher Tracey, he formed The Funkmonsters. The bandıs goal is simple: to provide a forum that allows Pops to touch as many lives as possible with his natural charisma and musical prowess. Although the roster of the band over the years has been filled with a literal Whoıs Who of Texas R&B and jazz musicians, it is the unmistakable sound of one of The Southıs original bluesmen that moves blues lovers and audiences of all musical genres. Pops has sung with many legends of the blues: B.B. King and Stevie Ray Vaughn, among others. New York City, Memphis, Fresno, Portland, Denver, Austin and of course the Dallas-Fort Worth area are just a few of the places he has honored with his presence. With a new recording under his belt, the coming year promises much, much more for Mr. Pops Carter, a funky blues master and living legend of North Texas. For more information, contact: UROK Records/ PO Box 1542 Denton, Texas 76201

Music Style Texas Blues

Artist History lf he hasn't sat in with your band, consider yourself ill-fated. He's the man that people walk across streets and crowded rooms just to shake hands with; the only man that can claim to be the living definition of the city he so appropriately inhabits. Any dictionary so bold as to venture a definition of Denton without crediting it "the twenty-five year home of Pops Carter" would be grounds for book burning. Pops Carter is Denton and on June 6, he will celebrate his 83rd birthday with a party hosted by his friends at aTJs. The month of June also brings the release of Pops Carter and The Funkmonsters' long awaited follow up to their 1993 self-titled debut CD. The Grind spent an hour with Pops Carter to talk about the album of all new material and his more than three quarters of a century living and singing the blues. The Grind: You were born on June 6, 1919 in Shreveport, What's your biggest memory of your childhood there? Pops Carter: My biggest memoryy growing up in Shreveport is cotton. I picked so much cotton I ran away from home. My daddy had me out there picking cotton. Hell., I couldn't pick no cotton no how, I was too sleepyheaded, I'd be draggin' a big cotton sack and I'd make it about middleways to the field, and them rows looked like they'd go from here to Houston....I'd be laying up in the middle of the field, you know, laying up there on my cotton sack sleeping. My Daddy used to come down and whoop my butt. G: How many times did he have to do that? PC: Not many times. I got enough of that and run off' on my own, shit. I left. I ran off from home, I wasn't ready for that. G: What age were you? PC: I guess I was a little over fourteen years old. I had an Auntie and an Uncle that lived in Houston. I was crazy about them anyway. She seemed more like my mother than my mother did because she always let me get away with things. G: What was your mother like? PC: Well, she was beautiful. A beautiful mother -- as much as I can remember [from] when I was there because she died after I left, you know. Her and my father both died. G: How old were you when she passed away? PC: About fourteen years old. That's when I started my first band. I went to Houston, I was a little over fourteen years old and my Auntie and Uncle put me in a school. I went to school and I'd throw papers everyday after school. In Fairport. Everybody knows Fairport. That's the roughest town in Houston -- back then. Idon't know how it is now, its been years since I've been back. Fourteen years old, I had a twelve piece band ....me andanother kid were playing together, us two. His name was Robert Albertson. I played lead and sung and he played drums. G: What first attracted you to music? PC: My whole family were musicians. My Dad and my Mother, all my inlaws were musicians, my brothers .... They played country stuff. My daddy made his firstguitar out of a cigar box and he used this nylon thread, that's what he used for strings. And back then they didn't know what drums were, they used these number four and number two tubs for drums and a big gallon bucket -- that was the cymbals and stuff. They didn't know about drums like they know now. They didn't have nothing electric back then, didn't know nothing about electric back then. G: And your father lived in Shreveport his whole life? PC: My mother and father lived there. He had a little cotton farm. G: He was a sharecropper, right? PC: No, he had his own farm. He did sharecrop when all his cotton was out, he'd go and help other people, you know. But he made sure his was out first. When he got all his cotton together and carried it to the gin and got it all sold, he'd go help other people. Cause sometimes their cotton was a little later than others. And they'd be late getting it out and he'd go hire us out to help pick their cotton. That wasn't for me. That wasn't for me, cause I figured my hand was for something else instead of cotton picking. G: When did your father start you into it? PC: Oh I guess I was about ten. Ten years old. G: So you ran away from home and went to Houston to stay with your Aunt and Uncle, What happened in Houston? PC: I ran up on this kid, he was throwing papers too He could play drums. And I know I could play gintar and sing. We got to talking~ "Yeah, man, we could get on the streets" We'd get on the streets like on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday night in front of these clubs, man. We'd have more people outside than inside. The man got jealous of us. G: Do you remember your first big show? PC: My first big show was at the Longhorn Bar Room with a ten piece band. G: You were a teenager during the depression .... PC: Yeah (long silence) I tell you, it was a good life. Exerythmg was cheap, you didn't have to worry about -- you could get food, whatever you w::nt you could get for little or nothtng back then. It ain't like now. There wasn't no taxes on nothing. They didn't know about taxes and all that shit, you know. You could go buy as much as you want of anything, didn't cost. If it cost you a dollar or something now to get a sandwich, a hamburger was ten cents back then. Fifteen cents, the most, back then. G: When was the first time you made money from playing music? PC: The first time I made money was when me and this kid got together and we played for a school play. I think we made about a hundred dollars a piece. G: Did you freak out when you realized you could make money off of it? PC: No I didn't freak out about it, I just, I guess I was too busy enjoying myself. I've been doing this for a long time. I'm not so worried about money now. If people want to pay me, fine, if they don't, you know. If I can do them a favor, I'll do it. That's like TJs -- I don't get paid over there but anytime he needs a band, I'll go in there and he'll say, "Pops, I need you to play, can you play for me?" I say, "Yeah," and I go and play for him. G: What do you remember from being a young man during WWlI? When you were twenty years old in 1939 .... PC: Twenty years old, I was playing down in Sugarland. I played for the prison down in Sugarland. That was. boy, that was real crazy! Cause them people are crazy. We got down there [and] the first time we played there for them, we couldn't see nobody. There wasn't nobody nowhere. This place we were playing' was kind of in the woods, you know. My guitar player was tuning up the guitar and man we looked out there and those sumbitches! They were a bunch of cows! You know how you throw out hay and a bunch of cows start to come around -- that's what they were...And before we ever got started playing, that place was running over with people waiting on us to play for them. And the lead guitar player was just tuning up his fuckin' gintar, man! Boy, that was funny, man, you know! G: What was your band called then? PC: It was called Little Milton and The Rockets, I think. G: What about 1945, when the war ended, where were you? PC: I think I was still in Houston at that time, but, I don't know if it was that date or not -- we went on tour. That was my first tour. I think it was somewhere along in there. We went to Austin, we went to California, and we went to Mexico, we went all around, man. G: What was California like in the 1940s for a blues band from Texas? PC: Just like it is now. I couldn't hardly sing when I was down there cause I thought the world was gonna sink. They had a lot of earthquakes down there around that time. But we had a real good time down there. Then we went to New York. Now that was beautiful. I can't recall the name of the clubs, we went to a whole bunch of places. We played at some parties, we played house parties. Boy, we played everywhere down there. We had a real good time, everybody was nice, man. I thought they were gonna be kind of rough cause I was a stranger. G: What differences did you notice about the people up north and the people down south? PC: There was a lot of skinheads and hippies there...but they partied like they were Americans, boy. They'd get up there and party, dance, hoppin' and skippin' and wrestling....But it didn't bother me -- I was up on the high stage -- they could fall around .all night as long as they didn't come up there and start fuckin' around. you know. We also went to Memphis too. That was good cause the first night I was out playing in B.B. King's club down there. He's got a two block long club....and I was so surprised when I went there, man. You don't see that in Texas. You got bars upstairs, you got bars downstairs....[BB. King] had bars on the sidewalk. The damn police sitting there drinking as much whiskey as me and you. Having fun, man! They'd be sitting out there drinking that beer and whiskey with everybody else. Enjoying themselves. 1 mean, the police! And that was on duty. G: Did you see B.B. King? PC: Sure. I sung with him. Yeah, at his place, I sung with him. G: What was that like? PC: Oh that was the happmst thing to me. that's the most thrilling thing that ever happened to me. G: You were about thirty years old? PC: Oh no, pretty close. Twenty five maybe. G: What did B.B. King say to you? PC: Oh, he told me to keep it up. He said you got a good voice, don't waste it for nothing. Which I do. He said, "Don't waste it for nothing -- Get paid for it. That time I sat in with him he paid me forty dollars, that was a whole lot of money back then. For me being twenty five years old. G: What'd you do with the money? PC: I took it and paid for my paper route because when I was on my route I'd take the money I'd be making and be [buying and] drinking soda water and shit. I'd take that money and put it back .... so they wouldn't think I was trying to rob them!~ you know....[That way] when it was kind of hot I could get me a big drink. Sometimes I could get me two of them and back then a big drink was a dollar. And I'd get two of them sumbitches. That's why them old boys in the company - sometimes fifteen, twenty, thirty dollars -- they ain't payin no attention when you're doing that shit. And I had to hurry, and place that money back before they started wanting to put me in jail. you know. I'd go out and play and make a little extra money and put that money back into the business, you know. But I had a lot of fun, though. G: After all 'that touring you came back to Houston? PC: Yeah, I ,started playing in these little all-night clubs here and yonder. Then later I startted doing mattinees. Sunday matinees. I'd go out and play two shows. I'd play a Sunday matinee and a Friday matinee. At about three o'clock I'd play the big gig and all the older people would be there. All the kids would be sent home. I played all over Houston. G: I guess that lasted throughout the fifties? PC: That lasted until I left. I left Houston in .... Let me see if I can remember. Oh, shit. I think it" was....seventy, seventy one, when I came to Denton. After we broke up, I got that job working construction with Holloway Construction. We'd be doing this dirt work out here in Grapevine. G: What do you remember mostly about the sixties? Was it as crazy as we're always told? PC: Yeah. It was crazy, man. There wasn't to much killing like it is now but it was crazy. A lot of people seemed like they were off their rocker, man, you know. They'd fight a lot, you know. But there wasn't a whole lot of killing while they were fighting. G: Do you remember where you were when JFK and Martin Luther King Jr. were killed? PC: I remember where I was when President Kennedy got killed. I was playing in the Third Ward. I can't think of the name of the street, its kind of like the street I'm living on here now' in Denton. G: Ruth Street? PC: Yeah, it had a Ruth something-or-other in it. That's when I met my wife, the same year Kennedy got killed. It might had been a day after. But it was close to the time he got killed. We got married in the courthouse down there. The big courthouse downtown ..... I moved back to the Fifth Ward after I got married. I didn't go hack to Louisiana until after my father died. I don't even remember what date that was. I wasn't there but five minutes. They buried him, everybody had to leave, I didn't stop until I got to the first exit back to Houston. My son lives down there in Louisiana. He's been trying to get me down there..He tells people his daddy's a musican. He wants me to get to play down there.

Instruments Large Electric Blues Band

Albums Rhythm Man EP 2000

Press Reviews Pops Carter is Denton’s Rhythm Man, baby. However, most of the anecdotes take place in the dimly lit bars near the intersection of Fry and Hickory streets-in meat markets such as Cool Beans or Lucky Lou's, where Pops sightings are as frequent as bad pickup lines. Since the charismatic Carter and his wife Minnie Lee (a cousin of the legendary Lightnin' Hopkins) moved to Denton in 1969, after a construction job led Pops north from Houston, he has found a second home in the area's clubs. Almost every night, he can be found prowling about, sitting in with other bands and leading his own. Most notable of the bands Pops has been associated with is the outfit he's played in for almost a decade, the Funkmonsters, rounded out by guitarist Chris Tracey, bassist Clarence Pitts, and drummers Jesse Hall and Jeremy Bruch. Late last year, U.R.O.K. Records released the Funkmonsters' Rhythm Man, a six-track EP designed as a taster for an album due later this year. Rhythm Man is a fair introduction to Carter's music, mixing into the stew everything from jump blues to hip-hop drumbeats, aided and abetted by guest musicians such as guitarist Texas Slim and Brave Combo's Jeffrey Barnes on harmonica and saxophone. But it misses the point a bit -- Pops is best heard onstage, not on a record. Carter says the new album, his first-ever full-length, will come out when the rest of the band comes back to Denton "and settles down." (Tracey is currently in Sweden, working on cancer research. Not exactly what we'd call wild times.) In the meantime, Carter soldiers on, continuing to play shows, including his recent annual birthday celebration gig at Dan's Bar on June 6. The band is also scheduled to perform a free concert on June 19 at Denton's Fred Moore Park. The years of secondhand smoke and firsthand experience with everything else have played hell on Carter's pipes; his gravel growl makes any conversation with him a strictly one-way affair. But it must keep him young: Pops has been singing the blues for 65 years. God, you think they'd have cleared up by now. Zac Crain – Dallas Observer

Location Denton, Texas - USA

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