Duffy Power: Hell Hound On His Trail

Overlooked blues powerhouse Duffy Power never got his due, but a recently unearthed album with progressive rockers Argent shows that he could deliver the goods.

London-born singer Raymond Howard started out as a rock ‘n’ roller; he was performing in clubs by age 18. Discovered and rechristened by impresario Larry Parnes as Duffy Power, he would release more than a dozen singles between 1959 and 1967 on a variety of labels (Fontana, Parlophone, Jamie, Decca). Nothing much happened with those records; Power’s first love was the blues.

“With Parnes I never liked anything I recorded,” he told author Richie Unterberger in 1998, “and [I] never performed any of it onstage.” Nonetheless, he did record with superb bands including The Graham Bond Quartet; they backed him on an early cover of The Beatles’ “I Saw Her Standing There.” Yet as the ‘60s drew to a close, Power had yet to secure an album deal.

Meanwhile, The Zombies’ era as a unit was coming to an end. After a promising start with their debut single “She’s Not There,” the London group found each of its successive singles failing to match that record’s success. The group’s second album, Odessey and Oracle had been released but had failed to take off in the marketplace, and in 1967 the group folded.

Zombies songwriters Rod Argent and Chris White had long since developed a productive working relationship, so the two opted to continue. They launched a band using Argent’s surname; White would be a non-performing songwriting member; he also co-produced the group’s recordings.

When The Zombies’ “Time of the Season” became a posthumous hit for the group, Argent and White leveraged the associated interest. “We went over to CBS [Records] and got a deal to produce new artists,” White recalls. Recordings featuring Nexus Productions’ early clients failed to set the charts alight, but they kept looking.

The two knew Duffy Power. “We had played with him at concerts,” White recalls. “He had a great voice, and a great feel for the blues,” he says. But White thought that Power’s talent was unappreciated and being wasted. So he and Argent decided to record a demo with the singer.

A May 1970 session at Regent Sound featured Power with Argent on piano plus a two-man rhythm section. That session yielded a Power original, “Lilly,” and a reading of Robert Johnson’s blues classic “Hell Hound.” A later overdub added guitar by Patto guitarist Ollie Halsall plus a horn section. “We wanted ‘Hummingbird’ to be the A-side,” White recalls, but when BB King released his own version of the tune, CBS said no. CBS released the “Hell Hound” single in September, but it went nowhere.

Around the same time, a cache of Power’s earlier recordings with top-flight musicians including John McLaughlin and Jack Bruce were released as an album, Innovations. The modest success of that record increased CBS’ interest in Duffy, and work began on an album of new material, with Argent and White producing.

The primary lineup for the sessions featured Argent plus his band mates: bassist Jim Rodford, guitarist Russ Ballard and drummer Bob Henrit. “Duffy brought some of his mates to play on other songs,” says Henrit. Those mates included Danny Thompson and Terry Cox from Pentangle, Sam Mitchell and several backing vocalists.

Belying Power’s reputation as an erratic personality, White says that when it came to the blues, “he was fantastic.” Pausing a beat, White adds, “He did smoke a lot of pot, though. But I just loved his cool and relaxed attitude. With Duffy, it was usually one take; he’d get the feeling because his heart was in it.”

As work continued on the album, CBS re-released “Hell Hound,” relegating it to the single’s B-side; “Hummingbird” would now be the A-side.

White says that little time was required to come up with arrangements for the songs. “It was basically Rod sitting down at his keyboard, talking to Duffy, rehearsing a bit and then putting a track down,” he recalls. “Simple as that.” By design, the sessions had a live-in-the-studio feel. “That’s what we liked about Duffy,” White says. “His blues thing was always ad-libbed.”

“Everybody was contributing,” says Henrit. He notes that Argent’s history with Power made the sessions almost effortless. “We had toured with him for, I think, 31 gigs,” he recalls. “And if you’re touring with somebody, you get to know them a lot better than just being in the studio.” Work on the album proceeded quickly and smoothly. “We just went into the studio and got on with it,” Henrit says.

When Argent and White finished the 11-track album, they presented the master to CBS. The label’s response shocked the producers. “They said it was ‘a bit loose,’ and that it needed more professional work on it,” White recalls. “Which we totally disagreed with.” Argent and White stood firm, unwilling to make changes to what they viewed as a fine and finished album. In response, CBS canceled the planned release.

“I think they may have been looking for an excuse,” Bob Henrit surmises. He suggests that CBS might have thought Duffy Power “wasn’t ready for worldwide stardom. He was very bluesy and jazzy, so maybe they just didn’t know what to do with him, how to market him.”

Not long after the non-release of the 1971 sessions, two albums – both titled Duffy Power – appeared on record store shelves. One was a compilation of ‘60s tracks; the other an album of new material co-produced by Andrew Loog Oldham. Later in that decade, Power would cut another LP for a small label; it too sank without a trace. Power left the music business (“He ended up a drive instructor,” White believes) but did eventually return to music, gaining some measure of success in the 21^st century.

Power died in 2014. But the recently-unearthed recording from 1971 comes closer than any previous release in showcasing the unique artistry of this blues singer.

Duffy Power & Argent’s Hell Hound: The Lost 1971 CBS Album was released May 16 by Think Like a Key Music, in 2CD, WAV/FLAC and MP3 formats. The album includes the original 11 tracks recorded for the unreleased record plus additional demos and alternate mixes.