Where Have You Been: Remembering Arthur Alexander

by Alejandra Díaz-Pizarro

In my mind, it's organized a little bit like a Jeopardy! category: The only artist whose songs were covered for studio albums by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Bob Dylan. / The first single by this artist put FAME Studios on the map and kickstarted the Muscle Shoals music scene. / This artist took a 21-year break in between studio albums, during which time he worked as a bus driver in Cleveland. / This artist was the first to record "Burning Love" before Elvis took it to the top. / Though generally hailed as a countrysoul pioneer, this Alabama songwriter's range also spanned rock'n'roll, R&B, gospel, soul, and pop.

That's five, which puts us at just the right number for the category—except it wouldn't be a very good one, since they all have the same answer: Who was Arthur Alexander?

Aside from a songwriter's credit or a passing liner note here and there, this question goes unanswered in the general scope of American music history. Or perhaps it is more accurate to say that the question is seldom asked at all. Nevertheless, to the British teenagers on the Mersey scene and London's fledgling jazz and skiffle club circuit, Alexander's name would've been appended not with a question mark but with an exclamation one.

Early pressings of Alexander's records were imprescindible in the collections of aspiring young British musicians tuned into Radio Luxembourg, the station that turned a whole generation onto American blues & early rock music. Years later, Alexander would still be present in the music library of one of those teens who he so impacted: John Lennon's record collection at the Dakota, which had been pared down significantly, still had all of the worn Arthur Alexander records that he and his bandmates were brought up on as musicians

Paul McCartney would similarly attest to Alexander's influence, identifying him by name when recalling that "if the Beatles wanted a sound, it was R&B. That's what we used to listen to and what we wanted to be like. [...] Arthur Alexander." In fact, there is speculation that Lennon/McCartney's penchant for using "girl" in their songs was something they picked up from Alexander's songwriting. Keith Richards would also make similar endorsements of Alexander's influence on the Stones' music—small wonder, since their cover of Alexander's breakout hit ("You Better Move On") was the centerpiece of their 1964 debut EP and a regular favorite at live performances.

Alexander, however, did not enjoy the same kind of recognition on his native shores. His recording career comprised only three studio albums, with a 21-year hiatus between the second and the third. He never broke the Top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100, and only did one stint abroad on a U.K. tour. Nevertheless, Alexander's songwriting and genre-bending influence undoubtedly shaped the course of music in the latter half of the 20th century. So why did he never attain the recognition he deserved? Why is he so seldom remembered?

Part of it must be attributed to the implications of race in America at the time he was recording. He was born in Florence, AL in 1940; enough has been said about racial segregation and attitudes in the South that he no doubt had to contend with. But more interestingly, Alexander was a Black artist who was not content to fit into one of the boxes so designated by the music industry: though the days of "race records" were becoming more distant, R&B was emerging as a genre (and a category) for Black musicians to record in. A young Arthur Alexander, however, was just as enchanted by the bottleneck blues his father would sometimes strum out on an old guitar as by the singing cowboys of the silver screen. In his songwriting, Alexander meshed the conventions of blues, soul, and gospel with those of pop and country & Western, a practice that would in hindsight earn him the epithet of "country-soul pioneer" but that at the time made it difficult for his sound to be neatly encased in one of the safe-bet chart categories that could've furthered his career. It did not help that Alexander's management, unsure of how to market a Black artist that refused to be hemmed into "Black music," fumbled the production and marketing of many of his recordings. Songs that should've been surefire hits ended up relegated to obscurity in the backlog bin of some radio DJ or another.

Not everything can be blamed on the charts. To Alexander, the music was everything— which, though a noble and easily romanticized sentiment, meant that he paid little attention to the checks that should've come with it. Late in his life, in an interview with Terry Gross, Alexander would talk about how he'd been swindled of royalties by those who represented him or took advantage of his inexperience. Even when artists of the profile of Steve Alaimo, Ike & Tina Turner, George Jones and Johnny Paycheck, and the Bee Gees took Alexander's hit songs high on the charts, Alexander almost never saw a penny from the songwriting credits rightfully due to him, and he spent much of his 21-year hiatus working as a custodian and substitute bus driver in Cleveland, a seasonal job that would cyclically place him on federal unemployment. In the 80s, Alexander also began fighting to regain control of "You Better Move On" and "Anna (Go to Him)," both smash-hit songs that in a well-handled contract should've set Alexander on a path to financial stability but which he died without ever attaining full ownership over.

Yet another reason for Alexander's relative obscurity is his years-long struggle with mental health and drug use. In the late 60s, following his U.K. tour, Alexander's consumption of pills and alcohol came to a head, and he was arrested in Florida for possession and vagrancy. Instead of being imprisoned, Alexander was institutionalized, and his many true friends in the music industry ensured that he received the necessary psychological care during these difficult years. Nevertheless, Alexander's "lost year" of 1968 came right at a make-or-break point for his career, which represented a serious setback when he came back to Combine Music as a songwriter in the early 70s and prepared to reignite his recording career.

It wasn't until 1993 that these efforts seemed about to pay off: in the late 80s, Alexander was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame, and around that time, producer and musician Jon Tiven reached out to reintroduce him to a network of contacts in the music world that were reappraising Alexander's legacy and ready to welcome him back. After 1993's Lonely Just Like Me, Alexander's comeback was all but guaranteed: he kicked off a national tour and was slated to appear at several festivals, including SummerStage in mid-June. His first three shows were a success, and Arthur, who had always loved singing for an audience, felt like his time had finally arrived. But a couple of days after his third show in Nashville, Alexander was rushed to the hospital, where he passed away at the age of 53 on June 9, 1993, just a few days before the festival appearances that would've introduced his music to a new generation hungry for his innovative sound.

It is always tragic for an artist to pass before their time, but more so when they are right on the cusp of a long-overdue comeback. The years, however, have vindicated Alexander's music and introduced it to a score of new converts— ensuring that, though he has moved on, many of us who love him won't be doing so anytime soon.

Bibliographical Note: Richard Younger's biography of Arthur Alexander, Get a Shot of Rhythm and Blues: The Arthur Alexander Story, was an indispensable source in preparing both the program and this article.