When my buddy Lij and I first visited Rosco Gordon in 1997, he was all but forgotten in the music industry. Even among his neighbors in the Rego Park section of Queens, N.Y., Rosco was just a nice old guy who played a little poker, bet the numbers, and kept to himself.

There was much more to Rosco Gordon than met the eye. Unlike his neighbors, and unbeknownst to them, his little mailbox in their high-rise apartment complex attracted songwriting royalty checks. They represented only a fraction of what he had earned, because so many of his rights had been stolen when he was young. But Rosco still made a nickel or two when Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix and Jerry Lee Lewis (to name just a few men of fame who have covered his tunes) sold certain records or had them played on the radio.

Early R&B buffs could recite parts of Rosco’s complicated discography, which jumps back and forth between the seminal labels of the era: Chess, Sun Records, RPM. They could tell you that Rosco, a Memphis native, had a hit with Sam Phillips when “Elvis” was still just an unusual, old-fashioned name. They could screen you the 1957 novelty flick, Rock Baby, Rock It, in which Rosco performed his stage act with his pet chicken, Butch. In a more lax time for animal rights, Rosco used to deprive his sidekick of water before a gig, and then set out whiskey so the animal would drink up, and lose some of its chicken inhibitions.

When we met Rosco, he was still trekking into Manhattan a few times a year to appear on the “Midnight Ravers” show on WBAI, a Pacifica Radio affiliate. The show’s hosts knew that the jerky back-beat of Rosco’s early hits — especially “No More Doggin’” from 1952 — pioneered ska and reggae when his records became available in Jamaica. As Terry Wilson of WBAI says, “Rosco is the seed of reggae. Not the root, the seed.”
So, to the industry, Rosco Gordon was an historical footnote, a museum piece. To his neighbors, he was a man nearing 70 with a nice smile. But inside, Rosco was on fire.
That was why our friend, the roots music critic Kevin Roe, suggested that we visit him. Kevin had interviewed Rosco at his home, and been struck by the passion of his impromptu performances on his “raggedy” electric guitar and tuneless piano. When Kevin heard that Lij and I had disbanded our rock group and taken up field recording, he sent us to Rosco.

We appeared in Queens with an assortment of recording gear stuffed into my 1987 Cavalier. Lij, the lead producer and sole engineer, turned Rosco’s apartment into a studio. Rosco literally sang himself sick for us, clawing his guitar and banging his decrepit piano like a man possessed, then ending up in the hospital after we left. Eventually, Rosco would fess up to his ulcers, diabetes and at times crippling back pain, but only bit by bit. He remained secretive about his health until the end, which made that end a terrible surprise.
During our early sessions, Rosco was anything but secretive about the illness of his dog, Tiger. Rosco said Tiger was mysteriously wasting away, and suspected hoodoo inflicted by neighbors. “I’m going to have to have him destroyed,” Rosco said. So we piled man and dog into my crumbling car, and drove them to the vet. During the drive, Rosco paused from telling bawdy tales about the old R&B days to bid goodbye. “Tiger,” he said, “I hope one day to see you in doggy heaven.” This man, the author of a goofy song called “No More Doggin’,” was nearly weeping. We waited in the car as Rosco went to have the deed done. But he soon emerged, smiling, carrying his dog, and said, “I couldn’t bring my heart to do it.""
In Nashville, where Lij lives, he began to build a band around Rosco’s solo tracks. The piano numbers we recorded the night Rosco sang himself sick were unusable, because Rosco’s piano was permanently warped after years of neglect. (You can hear this sick piano on “You Look Bad When You’re Nekked.”) So we returned to New York, vagabonds that we were, and recorded Rosco, again solo, playing on a piano owned by Lij's brother, the jazz pianist Nate Shaw, then added those tracks to our bulging archives.

Lij’s contacts in the Nashville rock scene jumped at the opportunity to play, even via overdub, with this forgotten legend. At first, we continued our field recording approach, erecting a studio in Ken Coomer’s basement. Ken, best known for having played in Wilco but a producer in his own right, vowed ""to get one with Rosco."" He and Lij worked for days to overdub drums to that jerky Rosco rhythm. Lij also borrowed time at Alex the Great, a local pop studio, and eventually built his own permanent studio, the Toy Box, where he would finish this record alone, years later, after Rosco was gone. This record began as two buddies on a road trip, but it owes its existence to Lij spending endless hours coaching sidemen through overdubs, and then orchestrating dozens of different sessions into one coherent sound.

Rosco liked our method, driving around like tramps and recording him in the comfort of homes. A fondness grew between us. I moved to New York, for love, and Rosco became my best friend in town despite the forty years that separated us in age. When I got married, he stood up with me as best man. We watched Mets games, drank dwarf Budweisers. As Rosco began to confide his fear that he was drying up as a songwriter, I would scratch out lyrics and cheerlead every time a new idea did creep through him, sometimes aided by the most unlikely source, such as a chord change on country music television.

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