The other day I was listening to one of the Sun Records compilation CDs in my collection, and as always, I was startled by the wealth of talent that moved through that great recording studio on Union Ave. in Memphis.  A reasonable argument can be made that when Sam Phillips commenced in 1952 to recording the vast multitude of musicians from all genres of music at Sun, he launched one of the most important independent music labels ever.  Memphis and the surrounding region were alive with some many styles of music, including hillbilly, gospel, blues, boogie woogie, country, and western swing, all performed by stunningly gifted individuals, and Phillips and Sun were in the right place at the right time to chronicle it all.

Phillips was known to be brutally honest when assessing musical capacity, but once a musician was invited to record, he was also acknowledged to be an honest man who respected the competencies of the artists he chose to document.  Phillips’ ears were wide open to the countless new sounds being presented to him, and he forged a non-judgmental, instinctive environment within which his artists could create their musical art.  Phillips’ dedication to the singular concept of originality was always at the forefront.  He was continually willing to hear whoever came through Sun’s doors, though at times it may have taken a time or two for someone to convince him it was in his best interest to do so.  With Memphis’ and the region’s broad diversity of musical styles and personalities, Phillips took the maximum rewards for having such an abundance of musical promise in his midst. 

A phenomenal book I recently read, The Birth Of Rock ’N’ Roll: The Illustrated History Of Sun Records And The 70 Recordings That Changed The World by Peter Guralnick and Colin Escott, with an excellent forward by Jerry Lee Lewis, is a highly essential read in understanding the prominent and appropriately lofty status that the Sun Records label achieved.  It is the book to consume to fully understand how the Sun Records label forever changed the course of American music.

While listening to one of my Sun Records compilations, the music of Pat Hare firmly grabbed my attention, the way it always does, and caused me to pay close attention to his offerings.  Hare’s wild, highly amplified and distorted chords and intensely emotional vocals continually give me pause, so since that listening I have thought about presenting an overview of the life of Pat Hare.

If ever there was an unfortunate choice of birth names, Hare’s most certainly ranks right up there: Auburn Hare.  Hare came into the world in late December, 1930 in Cherry Valley, Arkansas, a locale in Cross County, an area in the north central portion of the state.  I know that I state this often, but details about Hare’s earliest and musically formative years are extremely minimal (as is often the case with blues artists who operate on the fringes of the music).  What is known is that by the 1950s Hare was fully embedded into the Memphis, Tennessee blues scene, most likely with his initial most developmentally important job being with Junior Parker, the fine vocalist and harmonica player, in a group named Little Junior Parker’s Blues Flames, an aggregation Hare joined in 1951.  This alliance provided Hare with a lot of visibility within the greater Memphis blues circuit spots.

Right off the bat, detailing Hare’s guitar style is imperative.  Hare’s sound was profoundly contorted, distorted if you will, highly forceful, aggressive, and extremely sharp.  To perhaps analogize Hare’s playing into a modern-day example, think of the high ratio, coarsely distorted sounds favored by the rock grunge crowd achieved by use of electronic guitar effects.  Except, Hare wasn’t using any automated gimmickry to attain his wall of sound; he relied upon ratcheting the volume controls on his guitar and amplifier to their upper limits (he was said to have used a small cheap Sears & Roebuck unit) and his fingers to reach his shattering tone.  While Hare could solo effectively, his use of power chords (also known as fifth chords or two note chords that are neither major or minor) allowed him to create barrages of misshapen sounds.  In a sense, think of, say, Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath at his best and darkest, only Hare was achieving the same sound in the 1950s.

Hare’s first recording opportunity came at Sun Records in 1953 when he backed blues harmonica great James Cotton on the famed “Cotton Crop Blues” and another single “Hold Me In Your Arms.”  Hare’s distinctively wild guitar predates the best of heavy rock music by decades on these cuts. 

Hare continued to work with Parker and Cotton in and around Memphis, and recorded in 1953 for Sun Records with Parker’s group on “Love My Baby.”  He also continued performing and recording with Parker, seeing great personal and band success in 1957 for the Duke label on Parker’s mega-hit “Next Time You See Me.”

It was also in 1953 that Hare first recorded under his own name for Sun Records, in particular, a song that would portend things to come later in his life.  Hare’s “I’m Gonna Murder My Baby” was chock-full of morbid messaging and blistering highly amplified and distorted single string and chorded guitar parts that even now in the 2020s shocks with its sheer intensity.  It went unissued at the time, however.

But by the late 1950s, Hare made a major life decision and moved northward to Chicago, a move that allowed him to slot into a valuable position within Muddy Waters’ band.  Hare was able to record with Waters on the seminal Muddy Waters album, Live At Newport, 1960, with Hare obviously providing guitar support. 

Personally, Hare was by all accounts known to be a discreet, thoughtful person when not drinking, but when he was not sober, he was recognized to be quite the opposite.  All those around him understood his acute trouble with alcohol.  At one time, Hare was married to a woman named Dorothy Mae and had three children, a son and two daughters, but the marriage did not last. 

In the early 1960s, Hare decided to make the move northward to Minneapolis, Minnesota to be closer to and work with his Muddy Waters bandmate harmonica player George “Mojo” Buford.  By 1963, Hare was dating a woman and continuing to play in the Muddy Waters band while still living in Minneapolis.  However, during a domestic situation things became extremely violent and Hare shot his girlfriend dead, also wounding a policeman during an ensuing investigative confrontation.  Hare was eventually sentenced to life in prison for the killing, spending his remaining years incarcerated in prison in St. Paul, Minnesota. 

While in prison, Hare started a band ironically named Sounds Incarcerated.  During his stint in prison, Hare was impacted by lung cancer and succumbed to the syndrome in 1980 at the age of 49.

Left behind in the vault, per se, of unissued Sun Records cuts was Hare’s “I’m Gonna Murder My Baby,” representing a sardonic foretelling of Hare’s later years.  It contained his severely fierce and grainy guitar work and weighty vocals.  The song in time saw the light of day in 1990 on a Rhino Records label release. 

Hare was an influence to many rock-n-rollers from the Yardbirds to the grunge era players in the mid-1980s.  Hare’s sizzling guitar tone, one used to back Cotton, Parker, Howlin’ Wolf, and Bobby Bland, among others, and on his own selections (of which we only hastily touched upon here, was unique for his time.  One can only surmise what additional impacts he may have been able to leave had his life choices and path been different.