Walking in Memphis - and being mistaken for Sir Paul McCartney

A work trip to the US was just what I needed after almost two years of lockdown and the home of the blues and birthplace of rock n roll didn't disappoint.

“You must be British,” said the guy standing at the bar. “How did you guess?” I replied.

“There, I knew it,” he said, my accent obviously a dead giveaway. “Nice suit, man, let me buy you a drink, what you having?”

I had been in Memphis, Tennessee, for less than two hours when I walked into the bar on Beale Street to catch a blues band. Although it was gone midnight and we were well into Friday morning the joint was still jumping, and the music, as you would expect, in the home of the blues, was exceptional, even for a covers band.

I thanked my friend for the beer and eased my way into the night, feeling slightly conspicuous in my suit. I could have changed at the motel before venturing out but decided to keep it on, wearing a vintage jazz t-shirt underneath, with suede boots to complete my ‘British-look’.

Even Sadie, my wife, commented on how sharp I looked when she dropped me off at the local station in France earlier that day for the first train to Paris, and the long haul via Rekyavik and Chicago to Memphis.

I was wearing the suit, which was actually my wedding suit, for a business trip up in Chicago. After almost two years of working remotely in casual attire, apart from the obligatory Zoom shirt for meetings, I was ready for a change of wardrobe and would practically live in my suit for the next seven days.

I remained standing at the bar, taking in the scene, the extraordinary musicianship of the band, the wild crowd, thinking to myself how did I get here .. when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see a big black guy staring at me, intently - “damn, I thought you was Paul McCartney, for a minute, you had me, sorry bro.”

I smiled and said, thank you, but I’m not the former Beatle, I wish. 

“Sure do look like him,” he said, insisting on buying me a drink when he discovered I was from the UK.

The McCartney comparison followed me around whenever I wore my suit, with people shouting at me or gesturing to come over convinced I was a Beatle. Moreover, people just appreciated the suit and passed comment on it, usually black guys that spotted me on the pavement, sorry sidewalk.

The purpose of my trip, the work side of it, was to attend a sweets and snacks trade show in Chicago. It had been almost three years since I was last in the United States so decided to make the short detour south to Memphis for a couple of days' vacation, much to Sadie’s envy.

After the restrictions imposed by the pandemic, I was pleased to be travelling again, and although sorry that my wife could not join me on this trip, I was determined to make the most of it, first of all in Memphis the birthplace of the blues, and Chicago, which of course is also an important blues city.

As I was travelling on my own coin to Memphis, the motel I booked was a little funky and just outside the city, but safe and comfortable enough, although I doubt it would have been acceptable to my wife’s more higher standards.

After a long, jet-lagged induced sleep, I headed downtown for breakfast on the first morning at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, which has a strange tradition of a gaggle of live ducks walking through the foyer to the fountain twice a day.

My first day was taken up by a visit to Graceland, the home of Elvis, AKA, The King of Rock n Roll. At 77 bucks for the cheapest ticket, a visit to Graceland ain't cheap and Elvis Presley Enterprises Inc is royally raking it in, with over 650,000 visitors annually flocking to the King’s shrine.

Elvis loved Graceland as did the hangers-on and his buddies, The Memphis Mafia. Even though the upstairs part of the house was closed to visitors, there was still plenty to see, and the decor has been relatively untouched since the day he died.

Not surprisingly there is no mention of Colonel Tom Parker in the guided tour, Elvis’s manager, and the man who many hold responsible for wrecking the singer’s career, in the later years at least.

The famous gates to Graceland and the home of The King.

In the evening I ended up in Jerry Lee Lewis’s club on Beale Street, which was a no-holds-barred kind of place playing rap and attracting a different type of clientele. The Killer is still alive and I remember reading that one time he rocked up at Graceland, high, to see Elvis, whom he liked, and crashed through the gates, shouting and a hollering.

Sun Studios where Elvis, Jerry Lee, Carl Perkins, and Jonny Cash all recorded early hits is still a functional studio as well as a museum and no trip to Memphis is complete without a visit. Situated about two miles from the centre I walked to the birthplace of rock n roll and for 15 bucks you could stand in the exact same spot and hold the mic that Elvis used when he recorded That’s All Right (Mama) in July 1954.

I had completely forgotten that U2 recorded a couple of songs in the studio for the Rattle & Hum album, and Larry even donated his drumkit to the studio, which is now the house kit.

When I was last in Chicago I also visited Chess Records and saw where The Rolling Stones recorded tracks early in their career, as well as Muddy Waters and other blues legends.

What I didn't know is that there was a kind of rivalry between the two studios. Sun actually started as the Memphis Recording Service, where Sam Phillips would record anyone with enough money to make a disc. Professional artists would then take their records to labels like Chess and get a contract. Phillips realised he needed his own label, and Sun Records was born.

Memphis also has a darker legacy in American culture when in 1968 Dr Martin Luther King was shot dead on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in what was then the segregated part of the city. The room and motel are now incorporated into the National Civil Rights Museum and a visit is a truly moving and quite a humbling experience.

I also discovered that Jeff Buckley drowned in the Missippii in 1997 and his body washed up near Beale Street, which runs from the river to downtown.

Just across the street from the Civil Rights Museum is the Blues Foundation Museum, which I didn’t have time to visit, along with the Stax Museum. I did check out BB King’s blues club on Beale with a brilliant house band - and I also had a catfish burger and fried green tomatoes and met a couple from Leeds, of all places who were on their honeymoon.

The next day it was time to head up to Chicago and get into work mode … leaving the good times rolling in Memphis, making a note to visit again, but next time with my wife.

Spotify playlist: An esoteric mix of music curated just for you and to get me through the night, day, while I work and play. Thanks for your suggestions - a couple of new tracks added this week!