Watch Your Step (Ted Hawkins album)

Watch Your Step
Compilation album by Ted Hawkins
Released	1982
Recorded	1971–72
Studio	Eldorado Recording Studios, Los Angeles
Label	Rounder [1]
Producer	Bruce Bromberg [1] Dennis Walker
Ted Hawkins chronology
Watch Your Step (1982) Happy Hour (1986)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
Robert Christgau	A− [3]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[4]
The Line of Best Fit	7/10 [5]
The New Rolling Stone Record Guide	[6]
Tom Hull – on the Web	B+ ( ) [7]

Watch Your Step is a 1982 album by Ted Hawkins, a collection of previously recorded songs. ^{[2] [8]}

Release

At the time of the album's release, Hawkins was a prisoner/patient of the California Medical Facility in Vacaville. ^[9]

Critical reception

The Boston Phoenix called Watch Your Step "a triumph ... much more than the best blues album of the year -- it's an unexpected hybrid, the first folk-soul masterpiece." ^[10] Trouser Press wrote: "Teaching a mighty acoustic lesson in roots music, Hawkins inhabits that secular place just outside the churchyard where gospel, folk and soul meet." ^[11] Robert Christgau wrote that "these little dramas of passion, tenderness and betrayal are stamped with the sin-and-redemption of a lived life." ^[3] The New Rolling Stone Record Guide wrote that "soul and blues fans need to hear this, if only to restore their faith in the dying art of emotional conviction." ^[6]

Track listing

All songs were written by Theodore Hawkins, Jr. (i.e. Ted Hawkins); who also sang and played guitar on all of them. ^[12]

1. "Watch Your Step" – Acoustic version
2. "Bring It Home Daddy"
3. "If You Love Me"
4. "Don't Lose Your Cool"
5. "The Lost Ones"
6. "Who Got My Natural Comb?"
7. "Peace & Happiness"
8. "Sweet Baby"
9. "Stop Your Crying"
10. "Put In a Cross"
11. "Sorry You're Sick"
12. "Watch Your Step" – Full band version
13. "TWA"
14. "I Gave Up All I Had"
15. "Stay Close to Me"

Personnel

According to an early vinyl release: ^[12]

• Ted Hawkins – guitar, vocals
• Elizabeth Hawkins – vocals on "Don't Lose Your Cool" and "I Gave Up All I Had"
• Phillip Walker – lead guitar on 2, 6, 8, 12
• Arthur Woods – piano on 2, 6, 8, 12
• Ollie "Count" Gaines – bass on 2, 8, 12
• Dennis Walker – bass on "Who Got My Natural Comb?"
• Donny Tucker – drums on 2, 6, 8, 12
• David Majal Li – saxophone on 2, 6, 8, 12
• Melvin Moore – trumpet on 2, 6, 8, 12
• Ina Bea Walker and Jimmy Grisby – backing vocals on "Bring It Home Daddy"

References

1. "Ted Hawkins | Biography & History". AllMusic.
2. Wynn, Ron. Ted Hawkins: Watch Your Step at AllMusic . Retrieved June 15, 2017.
3. "Robert Christgau: CG: Ted Hawkins". www.robertchristgau.com.
4. Larkin, Colin (2006). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Vol. 4. MUZE. p. 185.
5. "This Ted Hawkins reissue is a deep dive into a tortured character". The Line of Best Fit.
6. The New Rolling Stone Record Guide. Random House. 1983. p. 220.
7. Hull, Tom (May 10, 2021). "Music Week". Tom Hull – on the Web. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
8. "TED HAWKINS is a singer, a songwriter, and a guitarist who for almost 30 years was a street mu..." NPR.org.
9. Dineen, Donal. "Sunken Treasure: Ted Hawkins' Watch Your Step". The Irish Times.
10. Miles, Milo (August 3, 1982). "Blues with a feeling: Ted Hawkins's acoustic soul". The Boston Phoenix. Retrieved September 11, 2024.
11. "Ted Hawkins". Trouser Press. Retrieved October 13, 2020.
12. Liner notes to WOLP 1