Little Caesar !

Harry 'Little' Caesar was born into a family of steelworkers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on 1928 and he grew up in Youngstown, Ohio. Harry’s youth was misspent as a gang member under his knickname ‘Kid Wolf’. He was imprisoned for six months during the 1940s for inciting riots, and upon release became a reformed character, joigning a church choir. Harry migrated from gospel to R&B and from Youngstown to Oakland, California, where he began working with the Peter Rabbit Trio and Que Martyn. His career out of music, which started in the late 1950s, was, if anything, more interesting than his career in music. He was a truck driver and actor in B-movies and TV series, including 'Baretta, Hill Street Blues,' 'Mannix,' ,'Hart To Hart,' and ‘The Dukes Of Hazzard’ ! Anyway, Caesar's tunes were full of pathos, and on cuts like the eerie, near-suicidal plaint "River," he comes across like a lo-fi Roy Orbison of soul, dripping with broken-hearted drama. (btw, the song is wracked with sobbing though, weirdly, ends with a toilet bowl being plunged !) He passed a way in 1994.

Little Caesar :
* The Ghost Of Mary Mead (Part 1) *
* Tried To Reason With You Baby *
* (Going Down To The) River *