ESKEW REEDER (ESQUERITA) - THE MAGNIFICENT ESQUERITA! - VINYL LP

This album represents an entry point into that world, covering an incredibly short period in the singer's 30-year-plus musical journey, sporadic - and always exciting. What a period, hunkered down in New Orleans and trying to escape from his legend as the man who taught Little Richard how to play piano and who, for a short while, was destined to become a substitute Richard, when the original abandoned rock and roll for the church. If truth be told, Eskew Reeder, aka Esquerita, was always more interesting than that - even on his earliest rock and roll sides. His look was outrageous, a gay icon who blazed a sartorial trail and a keyboard player lauded by not just Little Richard but also Allen Toussaint. Reeder cut his last disc in 1967, but remained adjacent to the music business, whilst living mainly in New York. In the 1980s he found himself lauded by the city's garage rock scene for his pioneering, no-holds-barred rock and roll. It seems, however, that being a cult hero didn't really pay, and he passed away in 1986 and was buried in an unmarked "pauper's" grave. He wasn't yet 50 years old and just as he was being rediscovered!