Book: Stagger Lee by Derek McCulloch and Shepherd Hendrix (Image Comics, 2006)
Stagger Lee, Staggerlee, Stack-O-Lee, whatever
his name may be, he has become one of the most notorious anti-heroes in music,
from ragtime to blues, folk, rock and even hip-hop, that bad man Stagger Lee
continues to hold a grip on our imagination. This graphic novel looks at the
Stagger Lee legend through multiple narratives: trying as best as possible to
reconstruct the crime and trials that followed; as well as looking at how that
crime may had turned into a song and how that song may have exploded and gone
viral when radios and telephones were barely in the research and development
stage. This much is truly known: on Christmas Eve 1895 in St. Louis, Missouri;
"Stack" Lee Shelton shot Billy Lyons in a saloon after an argument
over his Stetson hat. Lyons died shortly thereafter and Shelton was sent to
jail. Political machinations and the courting of the black vote by various
St.Louis political machines saved Shelton from the gallows and sent him to
prison. That's where the historical record ends and conjecture begins. It
wasn't too long later that variations of the Stagger Lee songs began to appear
before the turn of the century. The recorded pre-war version was by Ma Rainey (with
Louis Armstrong) and the most widely known by Mississippi John Hurt. After the
war, it was a number one hit by Lloyd Price, and recorded by Bob Dylan, The
Black Keys and teased by The Clash. McCulloch makes a case for the original
"version zero" of the song being developed in St. Louis not long
after the crime and then being spread up and down the Mississippi River and
Delta as ragtime musicians took jobs on riverboats and itinerant musicians
crossed the south on foot or on the rails. As the musicians traveled and passed
down the song the names deviated, plot twists were added or subtracted but it
in the end it was always about that bad bad man Stagger Lee. McCulloch does the
best he can with the scant historical record, taking artistic license with much
of the musical beginnings of the song which are unknown, but making clear demarcation
between his theories and the chapter headings where he talks about the
historical record of the crime, politics and music of the era. This is a
fascinating piece of work and definitely worthwhile for fans of the blues or
American history. Stagger Lee - amazon.com
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