Sublime

The track-and-hook method of songwriting reaches its apotheosis with “Rude Boy”; the song is virtually all hooks.

But Jack Nitzsche was an almost silent—and unpaid for reasons still not clear except he did it for fun—arranger, musician, gluer-together of the talent, a man of enormous importance for us in that period. He came to our sessions to relax and would throw in some ideas. He’d play when the mood took him. He’s on “Let’s Spend the Night Together,” when

Art Tatum, Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Teddy Hill, Chick Webb, Lionel Hampton, Tiny Bradshaw, Louis Armstrong, Henry Red Allen, and Jay McShann, mostly—then