Jack Bonus, Calling Jack Bonus...
One Album Wonder And A Few Others
Way before the internet and fascism in America, Vinyl LP’s cost $ 5.98. There were always bargains to be found. There was the cut-out bin in any record shop or department store where you could find GOLD. And they were yours for a fraction of the price, 99 Cents.
You would buy them because they featured musicians you recognized or were produced by producers you had heard of. Producers Peter Asher and Lou Adler started adding the musicians’ names onto album credits in the 60’s. Without that detail, many albums I discovered while flipping through discs would not have been given a chance.
In the case of this record by Jack Bonus, there was much to pique my interest.
The credits had a couple of the Rowan Brothers lending a hand, Freddie Roulette on guitar and the record was released on Grunt Records. Grunt was a vanity label that the Jefferson Airplane had commenced in 1971. Along with Bonus, they had signed Papa John Creach, Peter Kaukonen, and Hot Tuna. Eventually, the label was only used for Airplane/Starship and Hot Tuna Releases.
I found this eponymous Bonus record for 99 cents, and it was the Grunt label that mostly sucked me in, as I was a massive fan of the Airplane and Hot Tuna. I found it around 1974, and for the last 51 years, I have continued to listen to it.
I kept looking in record stores for years, looking for another release or a mention of his name. Even when the internet emerged, there was little to be found about him.
Nothing. Still nothing in 2025.
Jack Bonus was a session musician who circulated in the San Francisco scene during the 1960s and 1970s. He played with Peter Rowan and his brothers, Earth Opera, Papa John Creach and Tom Paxton. He was a flute and saxophone player, and as you can hear from the attached record (via YouTube), he was quite skilled.
The Hobo Song has been covered by Peter Rowan and Old In The Way, that all-star bluegrass band, made up of Rowan, Grisman, Garcia, Kahn and Clements.
Cold Chicago Wind is a beautiful, melancholy number where Freddie Roulette shines, and Bonus growls and blows a sweet saxophone, just like the wind.
Mother Dear is a beautiful song to motherhood and the production and strings along with the smokey voice of Bonus and the slide of Roulette make for quite a loving statement.
The album closes with Aye Que Lyn a latin jazz fusion number with honking horns, beautiful percussion and quite the groove.
Yes, those are a few of the highlights within these grooves, but I like every track in this overpressed and undersold record.
This is a lost classic. I am sure every one of us music nerds has one (or more!) of these records that 99% of the people you know have never heard.
Jack Bonus may have slipped out of sight but his music will always be with me.
This record is a 10/10.
Have a listen.
Please share your thoughts in the comments….and let me know if you have an obscure record that is a guilty pleasure!
More to come on other cut-outs I found for a buck….
These guys will feature in the next one….do you know them?
