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| Allen Toussaint's soundtrack for the 1974 film Black Samson is way overdue for proper release. |
Allen Toussaint's "lost" Black Samson OST
Take a cursory scan through Allen Toussaint's discography and you'll notice there's an unusual three-year gap between his Reprise albums, Life, Love and Faith from 1972 and Southern Nights released in 1975. Having just knocked out two successful albums with The Band – 1971's Cahoots and 1972's Rock of Ages, Toussaint's solo career was beginning to take off. In the first quarter of 1973, The Pointer Sisters' cover of his "Yes We Can Can" zooming up the charts and his production of Dr. John's single "Right Place, Wrong Time" was shaping up to be a massive summer hit, clearly this was no time for a ski trip to the Alps or a cycling jaunt through the Burgundy region of France.
From the moment he finished work on Dr. John's In The Right Place album at Criteria in Miami during the latter part of 1972, Toussaint was busy setting up his own recording operation, Sea-Saint Studio, on the east side of New Orleans in the Gentilly neighbourhood. He'd cut a fantastically funky session with Crowbar's harp-honker Richard "King Biscuit Boy" Newell from Hamilton, Ontario using The Meters as the backing band – released as the King Biscuit Boy album on Epic (check out "
Mind Over Matter") – and was ready for the next major step... finding a side door into the movie world.
After Isaac Hayes scored big in 1971 with his Shaft soundtrack, followed in 1972 by Curtis Mayfield's smash success with Superfly and Marvin Gaye's crack "Trouble Man," then in 1973 James Brown chimed in with Black Caesar and Roy Ayers' delivered Coffy, Toussaint didn't want to be left out of the action. A Warner Bros. production Black Samson, a crime-drama set in contemporary New Orleans and directed by by first-time filmmaker Charles "Chuck" Bail, must've seemed like the right opportunity knocking. Bail was a former stuntman who'd taken spills in 50's TV westerns (Gunsmoke, Bonanza, The Big Valley, etc) leading to work on low-budget biker flicks during the latter 60s (Werewolves on Wheels, Hells Angels on Wheels), and was keen on finding a less bruising way of earning a living in the film world.
After taking some lumps in 1973's Cleopatra Jones, Bail figured it was time to make a move after seeing first hand how money could be made in the emerging Blaxploitation genre. He was also sharp enough to know that the film's soundtrack would play an essential role in any such project's financial success. He'd need the right musical accompaniment to create a genuine sounding Big Easy ambiance and help sell the whole Black Samson concept. Based on a story idea from the producer, Daniel Cady (Grave of the Vampire, Garden of the Dead), Black Samson was about a staff-weilding New Orleans club owner who tries to keep his neighbourhood free of drugs and gang activity with the help of his pet lion. The role of Samson would be played by veteran TV actor Rockne Tarkington who, along with a few scenes in The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Mission: Impossible, Bewitched, was the first black actor ever to have a speaking role on the Andy Griffith Show. Evidently his mid-60s work on NBC's Tarzan series, ABC's Cowboy In Africa and the 1965 safari-comedy Clarence, The Cross-Eyed Lion (which spun off the Daktari series) made him the logical choice to work alongside a trained-yet-unpredictable apex predator.
There was similarly a very short list of available music auteurs who could be hired to create an authentic sounding contemporary Crescent City feel. What Toussaint lacked in cinematic experience, he more than made up for in proven skills as a writer, arranger and producer. He also now had his own recording studio in New Orleans, the funkiest group in town, The Meters, were his house band and he had all of the finest local singers on speed dial. In short order, Toussaint scored Black Samson, The Meters made sure it was funky and he called on Willie West to voice the title track.
Millard Leon "Willie" West grew up in rural Raceland, Louisiana and started recording soulful R&B sides in 1959 for Dotty Lee's Rustone label and later with Connie LaRocca's Frisco imprint before connecting with Toussaint for a couple of Dessu and Josie label releases. Solid performances all but no traction. West's Black Samson work led to a Toussaint-produced session for Warner where he was given the rare chance to record two of his own compositions backed by the Meters and a horn section yet sadly, the hard whumpin' "
It's Been So Long" went nowhere in 1974. But that didn't stop West. He continued working with The Meters and regularly performed on Bourbon St. through the 80s. After Katrina, West moved to the Minneapolis suburb of St. Cloud and has been doing some of the most powerful singing of career with the production team of Cold Diamond & Mink for Finland's Timmion label. Check out "
The Devil Gives Me Everything Except For What I Need."
Unfortunately, Black Samson turned out to be a box office dud and despite Toussaint's inspired work with The Meters, Warner Bros didn't bother putting out a soundtrack album. Later that same year Chuck Bail went onto direct the Cleopatra Jones sequel, Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold followed by his crowning achievement, 1976's Gumball Rally which spawned a brief-but-lucrative road race comedy fad – think Cannonball, Cannonball Run I & II, Smokey & The Bandit, etc. Yet even after Black Samson's theatrical re-release in 1981 and a Warner Home Video VHS release in 1994 and DVD release in 2010, a standalone Black Samson album never materialized.
Considering how many soundtrack recordings from the 70s and 80s – good, bad and mediocre – have been reissued over the past few years, it's more than a bit perplexing that a Black Samson OST hasn't appeared in some form. At a time when there contemporary musicians are putting together fake groups to create Blaxploitation-style soundtracks for films that don't even exist, it seems strange that some established reissue operation that specializes in 70s funk, soul and/or soundtrack reclamation projects
wouldn't consider putting out a Black Samson OST – especially if the original analog tapes still exist. Apparently they do according to an L.A. Times
article, which reported how the tapes eventually wound up in the hands of Los Angeles music collector Mike Nishita, brother of keyboardist Money Mark Nishita.
So the story goes, most of Toussaint's original master tapes from his Sea-Saint sessions – including his soundtrack for Black Samson – were maintained on site at the studio. Many people naturally assumed that all of those tapes were lost in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. So the story goes, the multi-track masters stored on the ground floor of Sea-Saint studio were destroyed. However, a number of quarter-inch reels which were kept near Toussaint's office on the second floor survived the flood.
In the wake of Katrina, music biz veteran Bill Valenziano (who'd purchased Sea-Saint Studio and it's contents from Toussaint and his longtime business partner Marshall Seahorn back in 1985) found that some tapes could be salvaged and shipped them to Los Angeles where he lives. Valenziano apparently then sold a few to another party, hung onto some and then stashed the rest in a storage unit. You probably know where this is going. Yes, the locker's contents eventually went up for auction and the buyer flipped 16 tapes to Mike Nishita for $100 a box. Among those reel-to-reel tapes was a version of the Black Samson soundtrack.
That was in 2019. Two years later, there's still no sign of a Black Samson soundtrack album appearing anytime soon. Hopefully some day, an enterprising reissue label honcho will get in touch with Nishita and whatever other parties are involved to work out a plan for a proper release of the complete Black Samson OST. But for now, the snippet below will have to suffice.
