hypersongs

Jackson C. Frank

An American folk singer and guitarist from Buffalo, New York, who made one album in his lifetime, produced in London in 1965 by Paul Simon, and wrote "Blues Run the Game".

Buffalo to London

Jackson Carey Jones was born in Buffalo, New York on March 2, 1943, and took the surname of his stepfather, Elmer Frank. A settlement of $110,500, which he received at twenty-one, paid for a move to England in February 1965; there he played the folk clubs, and in July of that year recorded his only album. Paul Simon, then living in London, produced it, with Al Stewart picking guitar on "Yellow Walls" and Art Garfunkel attending. One source places the recording at CBS Studios in London, under three hours; another at Levy's Recording Studio on New Bond Street, in six. Frank reportedly needed screens set around him to play.

Columbia released Jackson C. Frank in December 1965, with a single of "Blues Run the Game" backed with "Can't Get Away from My Love" (Columbia DB 7795). The album did not chart and sold poorly, and he never released another record in his lifetime. Sandy Denny sang with him in 1967 and 1968 and played tambourine on the single's B-side, and he played Les Cousins in London on December 7, 1968 and March 28, 1969, and appeared in the BBC series My Kind of Folk on November 13, 1968.

Afterlife

The album returned as Jackson Again (B&C, 1978), as Blues Run the Game (Mooncrest CD, 1996, with bonus tracks from 1975), on Castle Music in 2001, and in a two-disc expanded edition in 2003 with the single, his early recordings and later material. After his death on March 3, 1999, aged 56, came Forest of Eden (2013, Secret Records), Fixin to Die (2014), The Complete Recordings (2015) and American Troubadour (2020). Jim Abbott, a fan who befriended him in the 1990s, wrote Jackson C. Frank: The Clear, Hard Light of Genius (Ba Da Bing, November 11, 2014), and the documentary Blues Run the Game is by Damien Aime Dupont.

Nick Drake recorded four of his songs on Family Tree, and "Blues Run the Game" has also been recorded by Simon and Garfunkel (on the 1997 box set Old Friends), Sandy Denny, Bert Jansch, John Renbourn, Counting Crows, John Mayer, Laura Marling and Robin Pecknold. Marianne Faithfull covered "Kimbie" on Easy Come, Easy Go (2008).

Albums

  • Jackson C. Frank 1965 · Columbia

    His only album: ten songs recorded in London in July 1965, produced by Paul Simon.

Songs

  • Blues Run the Game Jackson C. Frank · 1965

    The opening track of his album and the A-side of his only single, covered by Simon and Garfunkel, Nick Drake and many others.

  • Milk and Honey Jackson C. Frank · 1965

    Track six of his album, the first on side two, heard in The Brown Bunny.

Sources

  1. Jackson C. Frank, Wikipedia
  2. Jackson C. Frank (album), Wikipedia
  3. Jackson C. Frank: Geoff's page, hut-six.co.uk
  4. Jackson C. Frank, Mainly Norfolk