Spilling The Beans About The Past

The very first piece of writing I did on Vocal Media was a story about the legendary Robert Johnson, the father of the blues and good old Rock and Roll. The reason I wrote this article was to set the record straight about who invented Rock and Roll due to the fact that Johnson's story resonated with me on personal and professional levels.

Looking back at that very first story here on Vocal Media, I hope and think what comes across is my awe and respect for the subject of the piece. In my view, Johnson deserved no less. I also hope that my attention to detail was duly noted and respected for all the work that that involved.

And I now realise that the story was in fact just the beginning of not only my journey on Vocal Media, but also my journey into investigative stories, stories that very much had a personal slant for me. I very much related to did the grave injustice that had been done to Johnson, simply by the omission of his name in any story of the past history of Rock and Roll.

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Far too many times in my life I have had to suffer other fools trying to take credit for something I did. Like people saying that they wrote a song that I wrote, even on one or two occasions with the bare-faced cheek to claim credit out loud into a microphone, in front of a sizeable attentive audience, right in front of me!

Over a lifetime of performing as a professional musician and singer-songwriter, this type of offense has been ever-present. I once played to a crowd where one guy was giving me the evil eye. In the interval, I decided to go over and try to break the ice with this man. Before I could say a word he started to attack me.

"I just don't care man, I've played the self-same songs a darn sight better than you," he growled aggressively.

"That is impossible man. I can guarantee you have never, ever played any of those songs I have just performed. You see, I wrote those songs, and that is the first time I have ever performed them in public. They are on my latest album which is due out today."

"Whatever, I just don't care."

I got the impression he was out to impress the young attractive girl he was sitting with.

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Taking a wider view of this type of trying to heist the credit for somebody else's work, one can find a great many examples not only in the creative arts but also in a variety of other fields. And since that very first article I did on Robert Johnson, I have sought to explore some of those other fields. And here is a quick re-cap of what I discovered.

It may surprise you to know that Alexander Graham Bell most definitely did NOT invent the telephone. The invention actually belonged to an Italian immigrant called Antonio Meucci. Meucci gave his idea to the Western Telegraph Company for their assessment of his idea as a potential addition to their communication services. In time Western Telegraph claimed to have lost Meucci's invention and that was the end of the matter, except it wasn't.

Alexander Graham Bell worked in the labs of Western Telegraph and two years after Meucci gave that company his idea, lo and behold, Alexander Graham Bell went to the patents office and registered the idea for a telephone in his name. Many years later, long after his passing, Meucci was given credit for his invention, sadly too late to be of any use to him.

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Many people believe that either Thomas Edison or the Lumiere Brothers invented motion pictures. And if you are one of those people, I have to tell you that you are laboring under a mistaken belief, that it was neither of the two.

The real inventor of motion pictures was in fact Louis Le Prince, who made the very first motion picture in 1888. Sadly Le Prince was murdered and his invention was stolen, only to re-appear years later in the lab of one certain, master inventor, Thomas Edison.

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Yet another case of an attempted heist with more than a few undertones of skullduggery is the case of the invention of the very first mechanical flying machine. In an attempt to lay claim to being the inventor of such a machine, Samuel Pierpont Langley, the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, tried to convince the world that he was the inventor of the first successful flying machine, when in fact his machine had failed miserably, whereas the Wright Brothers' machine had succeeded.

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Taking us back to the creative arts we find the case of one Saul Bass trying to claim a director's credit for the shower scene in the Alfred Hitchcock film, Psycho. Of course, it is the defining moments of footage that would strike fear into the hearts of the entire population, as well as securing Hitchcock's reputation as a motion picture genius.

The truth of the matter was that whilst Saul Bass did, without question, produce all of the crucial storyboards for the scene, he most definitely did not direct the scene, and it has been proven beyond all doubt.

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And here I am, three years down the line from that very first investigative article, still raking over the past to reveal the truth behind outlandish claims for credit for work carried out by others, usually at the expense of the real creators.

Did Elvis Steal Songs From Arthur 'Big Boy 'Crudup? Putting The Record Straight

My most recent investigation was into the claim that Elvis stole royalties from Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup, who composed quite a few early Rock and Roll classics like 'That's All Right Moma'. Did I get to the bottom of the truth of the matter? You bet, and it does not portray Elvis in a good light.

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Over the last three years here on Vocal Media I have progressed somewhat. I find that I now write very much as an empath. I try to connect my stories of any sort of wrong doing, be it about somebody stealing another person's idea, or a story about being mistreated by a toxic narcissistic partner. I always try to relate to what has happened and to point a way out, or a way of setting the record straight.

I have to say that I have also grown in confidence a great deal. And I have learned to do due dilligence in carrying out original research, never forgetting, that the way forward is always in the small detail. And it is also very important to be alert to what is called confirmation bias, a process whereby a writer will choose whatever evidence he can to confirm his already biased narrative.

One of the things that spurred me on to get to the truth about Elvis was a story I read on Medium, written by a writer who is clearly an Elvis fan and determined to prove that Elvis did no wrong. Not for the first time, I discovered that the truth was in one very small, easily overlooked detail.

I do intend to continue on this Vocal Media and investigative jorney well into the future, and I sincerely hope that my efforts are rewarded with an ever growing appreciative readership.