A.C. Reed - Biography
By Eric Brightwell
A.C. Reed, was a saxophonist associated with the Chicago blues scene. He was a highly regarded session player who, throughout his long career maintained a parallel solo career as one of a handful of saxophone-playing blues band leaders whose songs like "I'm in the Wrong Business'' and "I Am Fed Up With This Music,'' reflected his gently cantankerous sense of humor.
Aaron Corthen was born May 9th, 1926 in Wardell, Missouri, a small, village in the bootheel’s bayou. Mrs. Corthen sewed clothes for Aaron and his sister Sarah and their brothers, a skill that she taught him and which he continued to utilize even when a professional musician. The Corthens were also a musical family, with one of Aaron’s brothers playing piano and another playing washtub bass. The Corthen family moved to Carbondale, Illinois. It was at a tavern there that Corthen heard Jay McShann and more influentially, an Erskine Hawkins record and was bewitched by the playing of his saxophonist, Paul Bascomb.
Reed moved to Chicago early in 1942 and got hired at a steel mill. The sixteen-year-old used his earnings to buy a saxophone from a pawn shop and enrolled at Chicago Conservatory of Music and fell under the spell of Gene Ammons. Reed chose the stage name A.C. Reed as a nod to Jimmy Reed, regularly playing in his off hours with various musicians on the city’s south side. By the end of the 1940s he often played with blues guitarist Earl Hooker and rhythm & blues singer/pianist Willie Mabon. At Hooker’s suggestion, Reed took in a performance of J.T. Brown, the saxophonist for Elmore James and J.B. Lenoir.
In 1956, with Dennis "Long Man" Binder, Hooker and Junior Wells, Dennis Binder's Rhythm All-Stars embarked on a tour of the Midwest and Southwest. They lost Binder to Lawton, Oklahoma, where he decided to stay, living there to this day. Reed spent the early 1960s working both as a session musician and solo artist. At Mel London’s Age and Chief labels, his session playing appears on recordings by Lillian Offitt, Ricky Allen and Hooker. As much as he leveled tongue-in-cheek complaints about the blues, his disinterest in rock ‘n’ roll was genuine and he aspired to record a saxophone-dominated album that outsold the guitar onslaught. He recorded his own debut for Age, “This Little Voice,” in 1961. “Come on Home,” “Mean Cop” and “I Stay Mad” followed. Recording at Cool, he cut “I’d Rather Fight than Switch” and “My Baby is Fine” in 1963. At Nike he recorded “Talkin’ ‘Bout My Friends” in 1966.
Reed joined Buddy Guy’s band in 1967 but continued to record solo on the side. As part of Guy’s unit, Reed traveled to Africa in 1969 and recorded “Things I Want You to Do” for T.D.S. In 1970, his old partner Junior Wells joined Guy’s band and they opened for The Rolling Stones. Reed stayed with Guy until 1977 when he moved to Alligator where he played first with Son Seals and then, Albert Collins, appearing on his first five albums for the label. His first solo recordings for Alligator appeared on the second volume of Living Chicago Blues compilations (1980-Alligator).
It wasn’t until 1982 when Reed got around to recording a solo full-length, Take These Blues and Shove 'Em! (1982-Rooster), on the Ice Cube Records imprint, co-owned by himself and drummer Casey Jones. I'm in the Wrong Business! (1987?-Alligator) featured guest appearances from Bonnie Raitt and Stevie Ray Vaughan (whom he claimed to not have heard of) performing new versions of Reed’s older numbers. In the early 1990s, he recorded for the Austrian Wolf label and appeared on albums by Lousie Miranda and Larry Davis & Byther Smith. Junk Food (with Albert Collins) (1998-Delmark Records) and I Got Money (2002-Black & Blue Records) followed. Reed remained active in Chicago with his band The Sparkplugs (a reference to AC Sparkplugs) until his death from cancer on February 24th, 2004.