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| Honky-tonk, from his lips to our ears. |
Sources disagree on the birth year of Clarence Albert Poindexter, but most list either 1902 or 1905. Whatever the year was, Al Dexter was born in Jacksonville, Texas. Either nothing remarkable happened in his childhood or people didn’t find anything worth mentioning, but he started playing music during the 1920s. According to Country Thang Daily, Dexter did a little recording even back then, religious numbers mostly, until something other than divine intervention pushed him to another track: “However, after a friend asked him if he wanted to “write pretty songs or make money,” he was inspired to switch to honky-tonk music.”
Dexter made the switch, but the weight of the Great Depression squeezed Dexter out of music and into the painting business. The fire still burned bright enough that he started moonlighting with an all-black band playing private clubs and square dance parties, just to keep playing. For the record, Wikipedia tweaks that narrative, saying that Dexter kept forming bands throughout the early 1930s, including the all-black ensemble because he couldn’t get white musicians to play his style of music. Once he had enough of everything in place, Dexter toured his band and sound around East Texas oil-boom towns, finally earning enough to return to a career in music.
With money he’d earned on the road, Dexter settled down, opened a tavern, named it Turner Town, and set up as the house band. With that as a base, he further refined his sound until he had something new for American audiences. From a bio on the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame's website:
“Al Dexter is considered to be one of the forefathers of the honky-tonk music style. But rather than specializing in forlorn heartache laments, he emphasized the rollicking, good-time, barrelhouse side of this country barroom genre.”
Dexter recorded a smattering of songs in the 1930s, the biggest being “New Jelly Roll Blues” (1935) and “Honky Tonk Blues” (1937). The latter slipped the phrase “honky tonk” into a song’s title for the first time and into the American musical lexicon, but he spent years struggling to write a follow-up. As the slump deepened, people at his then-label, Columbia Records, urged its president to drop him, but Art Satherley still saw potential and the sound and the act and kept him on. Dexter kept playing Turner Town and tinkering with bands until 1939, when he finally found the right mix. With his name finally clipped to Al Dexter and “his Texas Troopers” behind him, he returned to the studio to take another run at recording…and then World War II broke out.
Unable to serve due to his age (he was in his mid-(or late-)30s by then), Dexter carried as before. Somewhere around 1942-43, he got to work on a song inspired by an incident at Turner Town. From a favorite son bio posted on Jacksonvilletx.org:
“His inspiration for the song came from an incident that happened at his tavern. A gun toting woman chased her husband’s girlfriend (one of Al’s waitresses) out of the bar, across a pasture, and through a barbed wire fence. Al was taken entirely by surprise and so later wondered, ‘How would you talk to a woman with a gun?’ His answer was to become lyrics in the song – ‘Lay that pistol down, babe, lay that pistol down.’”
After he fleshed it out, Dexter recorded his smash, “Pistol Packin’ Mama,” one of the biggest hits of the war years (one source put it at No. 3). Released with “Rosalita” on its b-side, it sold three million copies during 1943-44 and held strong at No. 1 for eight straight weeks. With the single in his pocket, Dexter became a hot property, able to ask for up to $3,500 per performance on the vaudeville circuit. In the year of its release, Republic Pictures made a movie by the same title (netting Dexter $250K in royalties) and, just a little later, Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters recorded a cover that scored them a 1-million-selling hit of their own. It also slipped deep into war-time pop culture: The New York Yankees adopted it as their marching anthem in 1943 and the crew of a PT boat sailing the Pacific, the USS Holder, honored it with a rechristening:
“The insignia on each side of the ship had a Texas steer, a scantily attired cowgirl packing a pistol, and underneath it said, ‘Pistol Packin Mama.’”
Al Dexter and his Texas Troopers churned out hits throughout the 1940s, including “Too Late to Worry, Too Blue to Cry,” “Triflin’ Gal,” “Wine, Women, and Song,” and, a fitting capper for any album (even if they didn’t exist then), “So Long Pal.” He even took a run at his masterpiece with “Guitar Polka,” a single that doubled “Pistol Packin’ Mama’s” 8-week run as “the most played jukebox folk record” on its release in 1946.
By most accounts, Dexter called it quits on his own terms. Looking to retire from touring in 1952, he bought a venue in Dallas called Bridgeport Club and only hit the stage when the spirit moved him, but enough people remembered him fondly enough to give him the honor/encore of being the first country musician to play Broadway in 1971. While he may have played the odd show or two after that, Dexter bowed out for the last time in 1984 when he passed quietly at home.
About the Sampler
Around the same time he died, Al Dexter’s family found 50 studio master recordings. Those lingered in some undisclosed limbo until 2010 when his son, Carl Wayne Poindexter, released them under the title Al Dexter’s Found Masters Volume 1-3. Spotify only has Volume 1 and, because that collection missed a few songs that seemed worth sharing, I pulled from another modest collection to make a 12-song sampler. I linked to several above - and some bonus tracks - so there’s nothing left to do down here but round out the list with: “Honky Tonk Rose,” “I Won’t Be Number 2,” “Once in a Blue Moon,” “Bye Bye Blue Eyes,” “Sundown Polka,” “New Broom Boogie,” and “All I Want Is You.” Clearly, I couldn't find a few of those on the internet. Get the rest while they're hot, I guess, or before they disappear.
Al Dexter had an interesting sound, one definitely related to the Western Swing sound that made Bob Wills famous (profiled here), but with a little more range. If you take the time to listen, the basic country bones of the music will come through, but you'll also hear snippets of jazz, both hot and sweet, and maybe even a smattering of boogie-woogie and blues. Like a few of contemporaries, Dexter reworked the sounds he heard growing up to lay a foundation for the next generation of popular music.
Dexter made the switch, but the weight of the Great Depression squeezed Dexter out of music and into the painting business. The fire still burned bright enough that he started moonlighting with an all-black band playing private clubs and square dance parties, just to keep playing. For the record, Wikipedia tweaks that narrative, saying that Dexter kept forming bands throughout the early 1930s, including the all-black ensemble because he couldn’t get white musicians to play his style of music. Once he had enough of everything in place, Dexter toured his band and sound around East Texas oil-boom towns, finally earning enough to return to a career in music.
With money he’d earned on the road, Dexter settled down, opened a tavern, named it Turner Town, and set up as the house band. With that as a base, he further refined his sound until he had something new for American audiences. From a bio on the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame's website:
“Al Dexter is considered to be one of the forefathers of the honky-tonk music style. But rather than specializing in forlorn heartache laments, he emphasized the rollicking, good-time, barrelhouse side of this country barroom genre.”
Dexter recorded a smattering of songs in the 1930s, the biggest being “New Jelly Roll Blues” (1935) and “Honky Tonk Blues” (1937). The latter slipped the phrase “honky tonk” into a song’s title for the first time and into the American musical lexicon, but he spent years struggling to write a follow-up. As the slump deepened, people at his then-label, Columbia Records, urged its president to drop him, but Art Satherley still saw potential and the sound and the act and kept him on. Dexter kept playing Turner Town and tinkering with bands until 1939, when he finally found the right mix. With his name finally clipped to Al Dexter and “his Texas Troopers” behind him, he returned to the studio to take another run at recording…and then World War II broke out.
Unable to serve due to his age (he was in his mid-(or late-)30s by then), Dexter carried as before. Somewhere around 1942-43, he got to work on a song inspired by an incident at Turner Town. From a favorite son bio posted on Jacksonvilletx.org:
“His inspiration for the song came from an incident that happened at his tavern. A gun toting woman chased her husband’s girlfriend (one of Al’s waitresses) out of the bar, across a pasture, and through a barbed wire fence. Al was taken entirely by surprise and so later wondered, ‘How would you talk to a woman with a gun?’ His answer was to become lyrics in the song – ‘Lay that pistol down, babe, lay that pistol down.’”
After he fleshed it out, Dexter recorded his smash, “Pistol Packin’ Mama,” one of the biggest hits of the war years (one source put it at No. 3). Released with “Rosalita” on its b-side, it sold three million copies during 1943-44 and held strong at No. 1 for eight straight weeks. With the single in his pocket, Dexter became a hot property, able to ask for up to $3,500 per performance on the vaudeville circuit. In the year of its release, Republic Pictures made a movie by the same title (netting Dexter $250K in royalties) and, just a little later, Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters recorded a cover that scored them a 1-million-selling hit of their own. It also slipped deep into war-time pop culture: The New York Yankees adopted it as their marching anthem in 1943 and the crew of a PT boat sailing the Pacific, the USS Holder, honored it with a rechristening:
“The insignia on each side of the ship had a Texas steer, a scantily attired cowgirl packing a pistol, and underneath it said, ‘Pistol Packin Mama.’”
Al Dexter and his Texas Troopers churned out hits throughout the 1940s, including “Too Late to Worry, Too Blue to Cry,” “Triflin’ Gal,” “Wine, Women, and Song,” and, a fitting capper for any album (even if they didn’t exist then), “So Long Pal.” He even took a run at his masterpiece with “Guitar Polka,” a single that doubled “Pistol Packin’ Mama’s” 8-week run as “the most played jukebox folk record” on its release in 1946.
By most accounts, Dexter called it quits on his own terms. Looking to retire from touring in 1952, he bought a venue in Dallas called Bridgeport Club and only hit the stage when the spirit moved him, but enough people remembered him fondly enough to give him the honor/encore of being the first country musician to play Broadway in 1971. While he may have played the odd show or two after that, Dexter bowed out for the last time in 1984 when he passed quietly at home.
About the Sampler
Around the same time he died, Al Dexter’s family found 50 studio master recordings. Those lingered in some undisclosed limbo until 2010 when his son, Carl Wayne Poindexter, released them under the title Al Dexter’s Found Masters Volume 1-3. Spotify only has Volume 1 and, because that collection missed a few songs that seemed worth sharing, I pulled from another modest collection to make a 12-song sampler. I linked to several above - and some bonus tracks - so there’s nothing left to do down here but round out the list with: “Honky Tonk Rose,” “I Won’t Be Number 2,” “Once in a Blue Moon,” “Bye Bye Blue Eyes,” “Sundown Polka,” “New Broom Boogie,” and “All I Want Is You.” Clearly, I couldn't find a few of those on the internet. Get the rest while they're hot, I guess, or before they disappear.
Al Dexter had an interesting sound, one definitely related to the Western Swing sound that made Bob Wills famous (profiled here), but with a little more range. If you take the time to listen, the basic country bones of the music will come through, but you'll also hear snippets of jazz, both hot and sweet, and maybe even a smattering of boogie-woogie and blues. Like a few of contemporaries, Dexter reworked the sounds he heard growing up to lay a foundation for the next generation of popular music.
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