10. Fats Waller
Although this song is to be found on a supposedly definitive collection, it is not as well known as other Fats Waller songs that have slipped into common and even careless language. I would be content if the song, ‘Keeping Out Of Mischief Now’ was playing when they carry me out. I’ll just have to decide whether it should be to Waller’s original or the Louis Armstrong version from Louis Plays Fats. When we say definitive, that is a fluid term with Thomas ‘Fats’ Waller, who gave up the copyright on some of his best known tunes in meagre cash purchases, only to go around the corner to sell the same song again to a different publisher. This must have infuriated the co-writer of this tune, Andy Rasaf, whose life story would make a cinematic epic of its own but by biographical account was rather less chaotic in style and action. That said, this tune sees the writers in perfect accord. I love it so much that I had the trumpet player, Mickael Gaschë, quote the theme for the opening refrain of the title track of my new album, ‘Hey Clockface’, while I sang a few lines of ‘How Can You Face Me?’ to bring the performance to a close.
