Floyd Council born 2 September 1911

Floyd Council was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He began his career playing in the streets of Chapel Hill in the mid-‘20s with musical brothers Leo and Thomas Strowd; the latter is said to have taught him a great deal. Floyd occasionally worked with Blind Boy Fuller in the ‘30s, which may have led to his first recording sessions. In late January 1937 ACR Records scout John Baxter Long heard him, playing alone on a street in Chapel Hill. It was Long who had first brought Fuller to NYC to record in July 1935. Long also gave Floyd a job as a farm labourer and gave Floyds wife work in his home as a domestic. 

It was Long who invited Floyd to join Fuller on his third trip to New York. Floyd agreed, and a week later the three travelled to the city. Accounts leave it uncertain as to whether Floyd was intended to be a solo or backing musician, but his recorded legacy seems to suggest the latter. During his second visit to New York in December 1937,  Floyd was used as a second guitar only. His solo tracks were later issued under the name ‘Blind Boy Fuller’s buddy’. Floyd was also promoted as ‘Dipper Boy Council’, and ‘The Devil’s Daddy-in-Law’; these were probably the invention of record companies, not genuine nicknames. 

By 1948 Floyd had been married twice and had moved to Sanford. Working as a long-haul truck driver, he was only home on weekends. In the meantime, the traditional blues idioms were dying out, giving way to early r&b and vocal harmony. When he wasn’t on the road, Floyd would entertain guests, friends, or acquaintances who’d bring young guitarists by. They’d challenge him, say they could out-play him, but they always lost, and Floyd would joke about giving them some songs to learn before they left. 

Floyd performed around Chapel Hill through the ‘40s and ‘50s, both with Thomas Strowd and on his own; playing at country clubs, the Elks home and on local radio, where he is said to have often sung non-blues material. Floyd slowed and eventually stopped playing, owing to an unspecified illness dating from 1963. In the late ‘60s, a stroke partially paralysed his throat muscles and slowed his motor skills. 

These debilitating handicaps aside, he said to have been quite sharp mentally. His final recordings, made in August 1970, did not, apparently, merit release. Older musicians in Orange County NC none the less remember Floyd as one of the area’s best guitarists. Floyd Council died in 1976 on May 9th at the North Carolina General Hospital in Chapel Hill, Orange County, from a heart attack due to kidney failure. He was buried at White Oak AME Zion Cemetery in Sanford without a marker. 

In 1965, Syd Barrett, the frontman of a London rock group called The Tea Set, pulled a Blind Boy Fuller album called Country Blues: 1935-1940 out of his record collection. He was struck by two names in the text on its sleeve: Pinkney “Pink” Anderson and an obscure guitarist, Floyd Council, who played with Fuller on several tracks. The Tea Set became Pink Floyd, and Council became a footnote. 

The curious Pink Floyd fan that seeks out the recordings of these men will find gritty Negro blues, which is unfamiliar to most modern music fans. Lest we forget, however, the likes of John Mayall, Eric Clapton, the Rolling Stones and Syd Barrett cherished this music, and it is an important root of modern rock. 

(Edited from Way Back Machine. Oxford American.org & Wikipedia)

Foot Note. I found it very confusing when searching for photos of Floyd Council as many stating it was him were actually Blind Boy Fuller (see photo) or Pink Anderson. It seems nobody could be bothered to point this out when the wrong photographs were used and it has stayed that way ever since! So beware! I have only used two photographs verified by discographer Stefan Wirz even then I cannot find any confirmation regarding the head photo.