Curtis Jones | Big Road Blues

Big Road Blues Show 9/3/23: Just A Good Woman Through With The Blues – Metal Masters Pt. 2

September 3, 2023September 8, 2023 Jeff Leave a comment

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Charlie McFadden	People People	Blues Box 1
Blind Willie McTell	Ticket Agent Blues	Blues Box 1
Charlie McCoy	Baltimore Blues	Blues Box 1
Walter Coleman	I'm Going to Cincinnati	Blues Box 1
Sweet Georgia Brown	The Long Down Lonely Blues	Blues Box 2
Bea Booze	See See Rider Blues	Blues Box 2
Blue Lu Barker	Cannon Ball	Blues Box 2
Little Brother Montgomery	Vicksburg Blues, No.	Grinder Man Blues
Memphis Slim	Shelby County Blues	The Bluebird Recordings 1940-1941
Willie "Long Time" Smith	Homeless Blues	Roots 'n' Blues: the Retrospective 1925-1950
Tommy Johnson	Canned Heat Blues	Canned Heat Blues: Masters Of The Delta Blues
Ishman Bracey	Saturday Blues	Canned Heat Blues: Masters Of The Delta Blues
Furry Lewis	Kassie Jones Part 1	Canned Heat Blues: Masters Of The Delta Blues
Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup	I'm Gonna Dig Myself A Hole	That's All Right Mama
Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup	Too Much Competition	That's All Right Mama
Leadbelly & Golden Gate Quartet	Alabama Bound	Alabama Bound
Robert Lee McCoy	Every Day And Night	The Bluebird Recordings 1937-38
Jazz Gillium	Gillum's Windy Blues	The Bluebird Recordings 1934-1938
Sonny Boy Williamson	Jackson Blues	He's A Jelly Roll Baker
Sonny Boy Williamson	You Give An Account	The Bluebird Recordings 1938
Blind Willie Johnson	If I Had My Way I'd Tear The Building Down	Roots N' Blues: News & The Blues - Telling It Like It Is
The Mississippi Sheiks	Bootlegger's Blues	Roots N' Blues: Booze & The Blues
Frank Edwards	We Got to Get Together	Roots 'n' Blues: the Retrospective 1925-1950
Muddy Waters	Burying Ground Blues	Roots 'n' Blues: the Retrospective 1925-1950
Washboard Sam	River Hip Mama	Rockin' My Blues Away
Washboard Sam	Flying Crow Blues	Rockin' My Blues Away
Curtis Jones	Levee Side Blues	Blue 88s: Unreleased Piano Blues Gems 1938-1942
Roosevelt Sykes	Floating Power Blues	Blue 88s: Unreleased Piano Blues Gems 1938-1942
Trixie Butler	Just A Good Woman Through With The Blues	When The Sun Goes Down
Sippie Wallace	I'm A Mighty Tight Woman	When The Sun Goes Down
Daddy Stovepipe & Mississippi Sarah	If You Want Me Baby	When The Sun Goes Down
Robert Johnson	Come On In My Kitchen (Alternate)	The Centennial Collection
Robert Lockwood Jr	Little Boy Blue	When The Sun Goes Down
Washboard Sam	Bucket's Got A Hole In It	When The Sun Goes Down
Oscar 'Buddy Woods	Don't sell it (Don't give it away)	The Slide Guitar Vol. 1: Bottles, Knives & Steel
James "Yank" Rachel	Hobo Blues	When The Sun Goes Down
Barbecue Bob	Blind Pig Blues	Roots 'n' Blues: the Retrospective 1925-1950
Tampa Red	When Things Go Wrong With You	When The Sun Goes Down

Show Notes:

Blues Box 2 Over the years on this show, I’ve always tried to play the best sounding reissues of the music, particularly with the pre-war material. I think one barrier of people getting into the early blues is often poor sound quality. The best sound quality is directly from the metal master. As John Tefteller explained to me: “Anything taken from a metal master and properly transferred will be the best possible sound. Problem is that so few original metal master exist that there will be few opportunities to hear music made from them. When working with 78s, rather than masters, there are obstacles to overcome that make it very difficult to match the sound of an original master. …To understand this a bit more you need to know that the recordings were initially made in wax, they were then electroplated to create a metal mother or master from which the 78’s were stamped.”

One of the heroes of remastering from the metal parts is Larry Cohn who was responsible for finding and issuing many unissued gems during his stint at Sony and CBS Records. Asking him about unissued sides he said: “As far as I know, none of these items were ever pressed as 78’s and we got them from the original source, usually metal parts. I am the one who did the research and found what metal parts existed for unreleased material. …Doing this within the confines of a major corporation was an unbelievable task and involved some ‘shady’ work on my part. But then, if I didn’t do it, no one else would, simply because no one cared. It took me 1 1/2 years to talk them into the Roots ‘N’ Blues Series & Robert Johnson [Robert Johnson: The Complete Recordings]. …There remain countless unreleased items, of which the metal parts are still there and unfortunately, they are destined to languish. A sad state of affairs but we Americans couldn’t care less about preservation and the like.” His greatest achievement at Sony, he told me, was the 4-CD Roots n’ Blues: The Retrospective (1925-1950), which reflects his broad tastes and incredibly deep knowledge of the archives—45 of the 100+ tracks were previously unreleased. In 2017 Larry issued Blue 88s: Unreleased Piano Blues Gems 1938-1942 on his Hi Horse Records record label. Cohn unearthed fifteen never released piano blues songs from the late 30s-early 40s, along with two previously released sides.

Roots N' Blues: Retrospective 1925-1950 The idea for today’s show and next week’s sequel, is to try a play reissues drawn from these metal masters. We draw mostly on the major labels who issued some fantastic sounding reissues in the 90s and early 2000s. There were several series during this period including Sony’s Roots N’ Blues, RCA Heritage Series, Bluebird Blues & Heritage Series and When the Sun Goes Down. In addition, we spotlight two German box sets that were issued in the mid-70s that were all sourced from the metal masters. I will mention briefly, because it’s certainly no my area of expertise, that various digital post-processing was done to these records using NoNoise or CEDAR. This was not always to the benefit of the recordings giving them an artificial quality. Over these course shows we hear some all-time classic numbers as well as lesser knowns, all in terrific sound. We certainly have enough material for more installments of this theme which we may get to down the road.

Blues Box 1 and Blues Box 2 were 4-LP sets issued in Germany on the MCA Coral label compiled by Robert Hertwig who also wrote the notes. MCA Coral was a budget label created by MCA Records in 1973. “In Blues Box 1 the liner notes state: “When we selected these 64 Blues tracks we did not know how they sounded because none of them was around on commercial reissues. And the few 78s are in the hands of few collectors. We just passed through Godrich & Dixon’s Book of Blues & Gospel Records and pulled out this and that title. We were quite surprised to learn that so many titles are existent in the archives of MCA Records.”

We play several tracks from the RCA Heritage Series and the Bluebird Blues & Heritage Series. Here’s the blurb for the RCA Heritage Series: which ran from 1988 through 1992. “In recent years there has been a marked resurgence of interest in the rich bounty of American music prior to the beginning of the rock era-in particular, the country and blues music that has been at the root of so much of our modern popular music. The purpose of the RCA HERITAGE SERIES is to once again make available to audiences (in many instances, for the first time in better than fifty years) classic recordings by some of the most important and influential country and blues artists of all time-recordings that provide an exciting and panoramic view of a significant portion of the great tapestry that is America’s musical heritage.” And for the Bluebird Blues & Heritage Series: “In presenting the Bluebird Blues & Heritage Series, every effort was made to locate and utilize the original metal parts for the nest possible straight transfers to the digital medium. Once transferred, the material was then re-mastered and assembled using state-of-the-art digital systems. However, in many instances the original metal parts no longer existed, in which case the best available test-pressings, lacquers and /or commercially released 78s were utilized to complete this collection.” The series ran from 1995 through 1997.

Canned Heat Blues he Bluebird Blues & Heritage Series issued several collections listed as the The Bluebird Recordings and we hear several selections today by Sonny Boy Williamson (The Bluebird Recordings 1937-1938 & The Bluebird Recordings 1938), Tommy McClennan (The Bluebird Recordings 1939-1942), Big Maceo Merriweather (The Bluebird Recordings 1941-1942 & The Bluebird Recordings 1945-1947) and Jazz Gillum (The Bluebird Recordings 1934-1938). There were several interesting various artist collections we feature including Four Women Blues: Masters of The Delta Blues, Better Boot That Thing (Great Women Blues Singers of the 1920’s), Wild About My Lovin’: Beale Street Blues 1928-1930 and Canned Heat Blues: Masters Of The Delta Blues.

Going back prior to these reissues was a series of gatefold double LP’s RCA put out between 1975-1977 including wonderful sets by Tampa Red, Big Maceo and Little Brother Montgomery. These had excellent notes by Mike Rowe and Jim O’Neal and excellent sound. It doesn’t mention in the notes the source of the records but possibly a mix of metal masters and 78s.

We spin a couple alternate tracks today by Robert Johnson who’s records were first gathered on the 1961 album King of the Delta Blues Singers. For this release recordings were taken from available metal masters at Columbia’s Bridgeport factory and from the following collectors: John Hammond, Bernard Klatzko, Henry B. Backey, Robert Stendahl and Peter Whelan.

Robert John Masters — Click to Read Notes

As mastering engineer Seth Winner noted regarding The Centennial Collection/The Complete Recordings: “A question was brought up concerning the sound of the unpublished sides sounding better than the issued ones. There is a simple reason for this: The published sides were pressed from stampers. This metal part is the third plating from the original lacquer masters cut at the session. The unpublished sides were pressed from the first metal part plated from the original lacquer master. Hence, the metal parts used for the issued sides were two plating generations away from the original metal part, and may have been slightly worn from stamper fatigue cause by use. The unissued takes were seldom if ever plated past the first electroplated part from the lacquer masters and were used to make a limited amount of test pressings for audition purposes.”

Big Road Blues Show 8/13/23: Raining The Blues – The Bluesville Label Pt. IV

August 13, 2023August 13, 2023 Jeff Leave a comment

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Roosevelt Sykes	Drivin' Wheel	The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes	Night Time Is The Right Time	The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes	Number Nine	The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes	Set the Meat Outdoors	The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes
Little Brother Montgomery	How Long, Brother	Tasty Blues
Little Brother Montgomery	Santa Fe	Tasty Blues
Little Brother Montgomery	No Special Rider	Tasty Blues
Sunnyland Slim	Decoration Day	Slim's Shout
Sunnyland Slim	The Devil Is A Busy Man	Slim's Shout
Sunnyland Slim	Brownskin Woman	Slim's Shout
Curtis Jones	Lonesome Bedroom Blues	Trouble Blues
Curtis Jones	Suicide Blues	Trouble Blues
Curtis Jones	Weekend Blues	Trouble Blues
Curtis Jones	Fool Blues	Trouble Blues
Mercy Dee Walton	Have You Been Ever Out In The Country	Pity And A Shame
Mercy Dee Walton	One Room Country Shack	Pity And A Shame
Mercy Dee Walton	Five Card Hand	Pity And A Shame
Memphis Slim	I.C. Blues	Just Blues
Memphis Slim	Raining The Blues	No Strain
Memphis Slim	Lonesome Traveler	No Strain
Roosevelt Sykes	Miss Ida B.	The Honeydripper
Roosevelt Sykes	Mislead Mother	The Honeydripper
Roosevelt Sykes	Satellite Baby	The Honeydripper
Roosevelt Sykes	Jailbait	The Honeydripper
Little Brother Montgomery	Something Keeps Worrying Me	Tasty Blues
Little Brother Montgomery	Vicksburg Blues	Tasty Blues
Sunnyland Slim	Everytime I Get To Drinking	Slim's Shout
Sunnyland Slim	Tired Of You Clowning	Slim's Shout
Sunnyland Slim	Harlem Can't Be Heaven	Slim's Shout
Sunnyland Slim	It's You Baby	Slim's Shout
Memphis Slim	Grinder Man Blues	All Kinds Of Blues
Memphis Slim	Mother Earth	All Kinds Of Blues
Memphis Slim	Fast And Free	All Kinds Of Blues

Show Notes:

The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes — Click Cover to Read Liner Notes

Today’s show is the belated fourth of a multi-part series of programs on the Bluesville label. Bluesville launched in 1959 and was subsidiary of Prestige Records. By 1966, Bluesville had ceased to issue LPs. The first installment focused on those who made records back in the 20s and 30s, part two focused on artists who’s recording careers started later, or were new to recording and the third one focused on several superb, lesser known artists who hadn’t previously recorded or who had recorded sparingly. On this final installment we spotlight the piano players who include all veterans: Roosevelt Sykes, Little Brother Montgomery, Sunnyland Slim, Curtis Jones, Mercy Dee Walton and Memphis Slim.

An important factor in Bluesville’s inception was the release in 1959 of Samuel Charter’s ground breaking book The Country Blues. In 1961 Charter’s hooked up with the label and played a important role getting talent for the label and did much of the producing. In addition to Charters there were a number of others whose dedication helped the label grow including Mack McCormick of Houston who provided a slew of Lightnin’ Hopkins records, Chris Strachwitz who would form Arhoolie Records, Art Rosenbaum who recorded Indianapolis artists Scrapper Blackwell, Shirley Griffith and J.T. Adams and Chris Albertson who was instrumental in getting Lonnie Johnson back in the studio.

Bluesville’s roster grew quickly including artists such as Reverend Gary Davis, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Roosevelt Sykes, Big Joe Williams, Jimmy Witherspoon and Memphis Slim among numerous others. A number of older artists such as Tampa Red and particularly Lonnie Johnson found a new home at Bluesville in which to revitalize their careers. In addition the label also caught some important artists on record for the first time or who recorded very little including Pink Anderson (except for two sides cut in the 20’s), Baby Tate, Wade Walton and Doug Quattlebaum to name a few. The Bluesville label tended to take a mainly folkloric approach to blues recording primarily acoustic artists. In line with this the label also cut records by folk singers such as Tracy Nelson, Dave Van Ronk, Geoff Muldaur and Tom Rush among others. There were some notable exceptions including LP’s by urban artists such as Otis Spann, Billy Boy Arnold and Homesick James. Samuel Charters was quoted as saying that the “Prestige/Bluesville catalog was one of the last great sweeps of the blues as social document and as the years pass this becomes increasingly meaningful as a measure of Bluesville’s achievement.”

Tasty Blues — Click Cover to Read Liner Notes

Roosevelt Sykes was born on January 31, 1906, in Elmar, Arkansas, and in 1909, he moved with his family to St. Louis. By 1918 he had taught himself the art of blues piano and, three years later, left home to work as an itinerant pianist in gambling establishments and barrelhouses throughout Louisiana and Mississippi. Sykes made his debut at the Okeh Studios in New York in June of 1929. In the early 1930s, Sykes moved to Chicago. During the Depression years, he recorded for several labels under various pseudonyms. During the 30’s and 40’s he delivered a seemingly endless flow of original and witty compositions, penning several blues standard along the way like “Dirty Mother For You”, “Drivin’ Wheel”, “I Wonder” and “Night Time Is the Right Time.”

Following the end of World War II in 1945, Sykes continued to perform and recorded with several labels. Sykes moved to New Orleans in 1954 and, despite the decreasing popularity of the blues during the mid-1950s, continued to play in small clubs around the Crescent City. He returned briefly to St. Louis in 1958 and then moved to Chicago in 1960, where he was “rediscovered” by enthusiasts of the folk music revival. Through the 1960s he recorded for labels like Delmark, Bluesville (The Honeydripper and The Return Of Roosevelt Sykes), Storyville, and Folkways. In 1961, Sykes toured Europe and appeared in the Belgian film Roosevelt Sykes: the Honeydripper. In 1965 and 1966, he toured with the American Folk Blues Festival.

Eurreal Montgomery was the fifth of ten children, born to Harper and Dicy Montgomery. The family home in Kentwood Louisiana where Harper ran a honky-tonk where logging workers gathered on weekends to drink, dance, gamble and listen to music. Montgomery had plenty of opportunity to hear older musicians. Most of them passed regularly through Kentwood and played at his father’s honky-tonk. He claimed that he quit seventh grade, left home at the age of eleven and began playing piano for a living wherever he could. n late 1930, Montgomery accompanied Minnie Hicks and on two songs, Irene Scruggs on four and recorded “No Special Rider blues” and “Vicksburg Blues” for Paramount. His next recording opportunity was in October 1936 in New Orleans where he waxed a remarkable 18 song session. Around the time World War II started Montgomery moved north to Chicago where he remained for the rest of his career.

After the war, he began playing “old-time jazz” with musicians such as Baby Dodds and Lonnie Johnson. He only recorded a handful of sides in the 1940’s and 50’s. Montgomery toured briefly with Otis Rush in 1956. His fame grew in the 1960s, and he continued to make many recordings. As electric post-war blues took hold in Chicago, Montgomery was an active session musician. He appeared on some of the influential mid-fifties record made by Otis Rush, and played piano on one of Buddy Guy’s first big hits, his 1960 remake of Montgomery’s “First Time I Met The Blues.” Momentum to Montgomery’s career picked up in the 60’s and he became a world traveler, visiting the UK and Europe on several occasions during the 1960’s. In 1960 he cut his one record for Bluesville, Tasty Blues featuring Lafayette Thomas on guitar.

For more than 50 years Sunnyland Slim rumbled the ivories around the Windy City, playing with virtually every local luminary imaginable and backing the great majority in the studio at one time or another. He was born Albert Luandrew in Mississippi and got his start playing pump organ. After entertaining at juke joints and movie houses in the Delta, he made Memphis his homebase during the late ’20s, playing along Beale Street and hanging out with the likes of Little Brother Montgomery and Ma Rainey. He adopted his name from the title of one of his best-known songs, “Sunnyland Train.” If it hadn’t been for the helpful Sunnyland, Muddy Waters may not have found his way onto Chess; it was at the pianist’s 1947 session for Aristocrat that the Chess brothers first met Waters.

Sunnyland cut records for numerous labels between 1948 and 1956: Hytone, Opera, Chance, Tempo-Tone, Mercury, Apollo, JOB, Regal, Vee-Jay (unissued), Blue Lake, Club 51, and Cobra. In addition, his distinctive playing enlivened hundreds of sessions by other artists during the same time frame, backing artists such as Muddy Waters, Robert Lockwood, Little Walter, Johnny Shines, Memphis Minnie, St. Louis Jimmy, John Brim and many others. In 1960 Sunnyland traveled to Englewood Cliffs, NJ to cut a session that was released on Bluesville as the LP Slim’s Shout.

Trouble Blues Memphis Slim was born in Memphis in 1915 as John Chatman, he was exposed to the blues at a very young age by his family. Inspired by Roosevelt Sykes, the young Chatman began to teach himself the piano and was soon touring in juke joints and dancehalls throughout the Southeast. In 1939 he moved to Chicago and soon began recording with Okeh Records under the name Peter Chatman before moving to Bluebird Records in 1940. With a suggestion from Bluebird producer Lester Melrose, Chatman began performing under the name Memphis Slim. lim became a regular session musician for Bluebird, and his piano talents supported established stars such as John Lee “Sonny Boy” Williamson, Washboard Sam, Big Bill Broonzy and Jazz Gillum. After World War II, Slim began leading bands, recording Hy-Tone, Miracle, Premium and King throughout the decade.

In the 50s he cut records for Mercury, United, Vee-Jay and recorded several albums for Folkways between 1959 and 1962. He cut Just Blues and No Strain for Bluesville in 1960 and finally All Kinds Of Blues for the label in 1962. Slim first appeared outside the United States in 1960, touring with Willie Dixon, with whom he returned to Europe in 1962 as a featured artist in the first of the series of American Folk Festival concerts organized by Dixon, which brought many notable blues artists to Europe in the 1960s and 1970s. Slim moved permanently to Paris.

Curtis Jones was born in Naples, Texas to sharecropping parents, and played guitar whilst young but switched to piano after a move to Dallas. In 1929, Curtis Jones left Dallas working his way through the Mid and Southwest via Kansas City, then travelling to New Orleans where he married, finally joining various performing troupes before making his way to Chicago in 1936. Soon he was spotted by Vocalion talent scout Lester Melrose who arranged a recording session on Tuesday 28th September 1937. Jones cut four titles of which only “Lonesome Bedroom Blues” and “You Got Good Business” were released. The former title was apparently written as a eulogy for his wife, who had recently died and was a huge race hit. Over the next five years Curtis Jones was in the studio no fewer than twenty times, recording some hundred titles. By 1941 Jones’s record sales were on the wane and that, coupled with a disagreement with Melrose, led to Jones working outside of music. He did not resume recording until 1953. Jones’s first full-length album appeared in 1960 on Bluesville (Trouble Blues) followed by one on Delmark.

All Kinds Of Blues Mercy Dee Walton was born in Waco, Texas on August 30, 1915. In the late 1930’s Mercy Dee moved to California, where he worked on farms up and down the Central Valley while performing in local bars and clubs for the region’s black farmworkers. In 1949 he recorded for the Fresno-based Spire label and had an immediate hit with “Lonesome Cabin Blues,” which reached Number 7 on the R&B charts. his success attracted the attention of the larger Los Angeles–based Imperial label, which signed him and recorded two sessions of twelve titles in 1950. By 1952 he was recording for Specialty, another Los Angeles label. His first track for them, “One Room Country Shack,” was a hit in 1953, reaching Number 8 on the R&B charts. . A recording for the small Rhythm label in 1954 had little impact, but in 1955 he recorded for the Flair label, part of the Modern Records stable in Los Angeles. In 1961 Mercy Dee came to the attention of Chris Strachwitz, owner of the Arhoolie label. Pity And A Shame was produced by Strachwitz and issued on Bluesville in 1960.

Big Road Blues Show 7/23/23: Aint But The One Thing That I Done Wrong, I Stayed in Mississippi Just a Day Too Long – Mix Show

July 23, 2023July 23, 2023 Jeff Leave a comment

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Benny Will Richardson	O Rosie	Parchman Farm: Photographs and Field Recordings
Unknown	Prison Bound Blues	Nobody Knows My Name
J.B. Smith	Poor Boy	Old Rattler Can't Hold Me: Texas Prison Songs Vol. 2
Jim Thompkins	Bedside Blues	Blues Images Vol. 11
Furry Lewis	Big Chief Blues	Blues Images Vol. 9
Lum Guffin	Old Country Blues	Old Country Blues
Guitar Slim	Headed Blues	Walkin' Boogie
Guitar Slim	Did You Get That Letter	Walkin' Boogie
Billiken Johnson	Frisco Blues	Texas Piano, Vol. 2: 1927-1938
Black Ivory King	The Flyng Crow	Black Boy Shine & Black Ivory King 1936-1937
Alfoncy Harris	Absent Freight Train Blues	The Piano Blues Vol. 11: Texas Santa Fe 1934-1937
Popeye Johnson & Grey Ghost	Call The Number Of The Train I Ride	Cushing Memorial Library and Archives
Memphis Willie Borum	Ain't Gonna Worry My Life Any More	Blues Images Vol. 20
Sleepy John Estes	Someday Baby Blues	American Epic: The Collection
Big Maceo	Worried Life Blues	When The Sun Goes Down
Sippie Wallace & Little Brother Montgomery	Trouble Everywhere I Roam	The Blues Box Storyville
Little Brother Montgomery	Bob Martin Blues	Deep South Piano
Little Brother Montgomery	Do Right Mama	The Piano Blues Unissued Records Vol. 2
Lonnie Johnson	Falling Rain Blues	Me And My Crazy Self
Smiley Lewis	The Bells Are Ringing	Shame Shame Shame
Jimmy Witherspoon	Falling By Degrees	Urban Blues Singing Legend
Sammy Hill	Needin' My Woman Blues	Ramblin' Thomas & The Dallas Blues Singers
Sammy Hill	Cryin' for You Blues	Ramblin' Thomas & The Dallas Blues Singers
Blind Lemon Jefferson	Long Lonesome Blues	The Best Of
The Mississippi Moaner	It's Cold In China Blues	Blues Images Vol. 15
Jesse Thomas	D Double Due Love You	Down Behind the Rise
Otis Harris	Waking Hours	Ramblin' Thomas & The Dallas Blues Singers
Otis Harris	You'll Like My Loving	Ramblin' Thomas & The Dallas Blues Singers
Curtis Jones	Highway 51 Blues	Curtis Jones Vol. 1 1937-1938
Tommy McClennan	New Highway 51	Bluebird Recordings 1939-1942
John Lee Hooker	Goin' Down Highway 51	Graveyard Blues
Memphis Slim	Highway 51 Blues	Alone With My Friends
Bill Gaither	Worried Life Blues	The Essential
Big Maceo Merriweather	Things Have Changed	Big Maceo Vol. 1: Flying Boogie
Jack Mcvea	New Worried Life Blues	Jack Mcvea Vol.1 1944-1945

Show Notes:

Lucky 78 — Japanese Buddy Moss 78 which is actually Willie Borum’s “Ain’t Gonna Worry My Life Any More.”

A varied mix show spanning the 20s through the 70s with several themes throughout. We open the show with some prison songs, twin spins by Guitar Slim, Sammy Hill and Otis Harris. Also on tap are a fine set of piano blues about railroads, we hear some lyrical themes on a batch of songs related to “Ain’t Gonna Worry My Life Any More”, “Highway 51 Blues” and the lyrical influence of Blind Lemon Jefferson. We also hear a trio of songs by Little Brother Montgomery, some superb blues shouters and much more.

I’m a huge admirer of Bob Dylan who’s lyrics have always drawn deeply from the blues. “Mississippi” is an iconic song from his later period that appears as the second track on his 2001 album Love and Theft. The song was originally recorded during the Time Out of Mind sessions (demo sessions in Fall 1996; official album sessions in January 1997), but was ultimately left off the album. Dylan rerecorded the song for Love and Theft in May 2001. Three outtakes of the song from the Time Out of Mind sessions were eventually released on Dylan’s 2008 “official” bootleg album Tell Tale Signs: Rare and Unreleased 1989–2006. My favorite version is the one that leads off disc one of Tell Tale Signs. In the song he sings: “Only one thing that I did wrong/ Stayed in Mississippi a day too long.” This lyric appears in a song by Benny Will Richardson titled “O Rosie” recorded in late 1947 at the Lambert Camp at the Mississippi State Penitentiary, better known as Parchman Farm. Other recorded versions of this song don’t seem to have that lyric. The lyric is quoted on the back of the album Negro Prison Songs — Mississippi State Penitentiary which first came out in 1957. Here’s the opening of the liner notes by Alan Lomax:

Negro Prison Songs From The Mississippi State Penitentiary — Click cover for liner notes

These recordings were made in 1947 in the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman. The singers were all Negro prisoners, who, according to the practice of Mississippi, were serving out their time by working on a huge state cotton plantation in the fertile Yazoo Delta. Only a few strands of wire separated the prison from adjoining plantations. Only the sight of an occasional armed guard or a barred window in one of the frame dormitories made one realise that this was a prison. The land produced the same crop; there was the same work for the Negroes to do on both sides of the fence. And there was no Delta Negro who was not aware of how easy it was for him to find himself on the wrong side of those few strands of barbed wire. As one of the prison work-songs ironically remarked …

We pair this song with some other prison songs by an unknown singer recorded by Lawrence Gellert and J.B. Smith. Smith was recorded by Bruce Jackson in 1965 at Texas’s Ramsey Prison Farm. Jackson wrote in his book Wake Up Dead Man that, when he met him, Smith had already been in prison three times on burglary and robbery by assault charges. Jackson recorded an entire album devoted to smith titled Ever Since I Have Been a Man Full Grown issued on Takoma in 1965. The album was reissued with additional material by Dust-to-Digital.

We have multiple spins today by James ‘Guitar Slim’ Stephens, Sammy Hill, Otis Harris and Little Brother Montgomery. Guitar Slim was first recorded in the early 70’s by Kip Lornell who recorded him on several occasions in 1974 and 1975. His first LP, Greensboro Rounder, was issued in 1979 by the British Flyright label and are comprised of these recordings. He also appears on the anthologies Eight Hand Sets & Holy Steps and Ain’t Gonna Rain No More from the 1970’s. Green’s final recordings were made in 1980 by Siegfried Christmann and Axel Küstner for the Living Country Blues USA series of albums. Other songs from 1980 appear on the album Old Time Barrelhouse Blues which also includes sides by Memphis Piano Red. He passed away in 1991.

Otis Harris was possibly from Dallas and only had one 78 released under his name, “Walking Blues b/w You’ll Like My Loving.” His records were part of a great recording session conducted by Columbia in December 1927 and December 1928.

Walking Blues The obscure Sammy Hill cut one 78 for Victor in 1929. Not much is known about Hill although he was remembered by Lightnin’ Hopkins and Leon Denton with those recollections appearing in Paul Oliver and Mack McCormick’s The Blues Come to Texas. As Hopkins’ recalled, “Sam Hill and a boy named ‘Keeno’ were both playing guitar in back of Texas [Alexander]. They were both guitar men. Sometimes I worked with them, backing up Texas with my violin. Sometimes when Texas didn’t come around, just the three, or maybe just Sam Hill and I worked around.” McCormick and Oliver write that it was “Some three years before Sammy Hill and McKino had recorded a single coupling in Dallas. Their guitars played in two finger picking fashion interlocked rolling, rhythmic phrases in a manner somewhat akin to the playing of Little Hat Jones. Like Jones, Sammy Hill featured the resgada, the powerful strum played by snapping the fingers of the closed right hand to full extension commencing with the forefinger and flicking out in rapid succession. It was a device that clearly revealed their acquaintanceship with the guitar techniques of the Mexican musicians. Sammy Hill’s voice had a clear, strong projection but with a marked, rapid vibrato. It seems likely that he had already worked with Texas Alexander for the latter’s influence was very evident in ‘Needin My Woman Blues’ in which he used a moaning chorus which was strongly influenced by Alexander’s phrasing. ‘I believe I first met them at a country hop out between Sugar Land and Richmond, one time way back,’ recalled Leon Denton. …Sam Hill was from Wharton I believe I remember. Both Sam Hill and McKino are dead. Sam died about 1943 and McKino died too I heard.”

Little Brother Montgomery’s biographer, Karl Gert zur Heide, called Montgomery “probably the greatest all-round piano player of his time in the Deep South.” As momentum to Montgomery’s career picked up in the 60’s and he became a world traveler, visiting the UK and Europe on several occasions during the 1960’s, cutting several albums there, while remaining based in Chicago. He made some fine records overseas including the excellent Deep South Piano (reissued as Blues Masters Vol. 7) cut for the Storyville label in 1972 and was recorded extensively by piano expert Francis Wilford Smith (issued on Magpie as These Are What I Like: Unissued Recordings Vol. 1 and Those I Liked I Learned: Unissued Recordings Vol. 2.).

“Ain’t Gonna Worry My Life Any More”, “Someday Baby Blues”, “Worried Life Blues”, and “Trouble No More” are all connected. “Worried Life Blues” is the best-known title for a theme popularized by Big Maceo, but the origins of which predate his version. The earliest known recorded version is the late Willie Borum’s “Ain’t Gonna Worry My Life Any More” (1934) which has recently been discovered an issued by John Tefteller. The next earliest issued recording of the song is Sleepy John Estes’ “Someday Baby Blues” recorded in 1935. Estes was an acquaintance of Borum’s, and the lyrics of his chorus closely follow the title line of Borum’s song. However, the song, in different format, was popularized by Big Maceo, and he is often credited as its composer. Maceo made his first version for Bluebird in 1941. Sonny Boy Williamson, Big Joe Williams, Rubber Legs Williams, Brownie McGhee, Lightnin’ Hopkins all recorded version in the 40s. Maceo made a sequel to the song towards war’s end as “Things Have Changed.” In about 1944, Rabon Tarrant recorded “New Worried Life Blues” as did Thunder Smith in 1948. Muddy Waters recorded “Trouble No More” in 1955 which hit number seven on the Billboard R&B charts. Many more version appeared in the 50s and 60s.

“Highway 51 Blues” is a song composed by pianist Curtis Jones, released on record on January 12, 1938.Highway 51 extends 1,277 miles from the western suburbs of New Orleans, Louisiana, to within 150 feet of the Wisconsin–Michigan state line. Bob Dylan’s track “Highway 51”, was released as the closing track of the first side of his debut album Bob Dylan on March 19, 1962. Calvin Frazier recorded the song on November 1, 1938 in Detroit for Alan Lomax, Tommy McClennan recorded “New Highway No.51″ in 1939, John Lee Hooker cut “Goin’ Down Highway 51” in 1950 and Memphis Slim cut “Highway 51 Blues” in 1961 on an album titled Alone With My Friends.

In “Long Lonesome Blues Lemon sings “So cold in China, the birds can hardly sing.” The line was echoed in the song “It’s Cold In China Blues” by The Mississippi Moaner who’s real name was Isaiah Nettles. He cut four sides in 1935. Shorty Bob Parker recorded “So Cold In China” in 1938 but outside of the title, is unrelated to the Lemon song. Eugene Powell recorded a song with that title in 1976 but is also unrelated to Lemon’s song. Another line from Lemon’s song appears in Jesse Thomas’ 1948 number, “D Double Due Love You.” He copies the Lemon line “Hey, mama, mama, papa, papa ‘deed double do love you, doggone it/Somebody’s talkin’ to you, mama, papa ‘deed double do love you.”

Goin' Down Highway 51 We spin a series of piano train songs from Texas bluesmen such Billiken Johnson, Black Ivory King and the Grey Ghost about railroads. Billiken Johnson’s unique talent was his ability to imitate train whistles and provide other vocal effects. Johnson recorded two tracks for Columbia Records (“Sun Beam Blues” and “Interurban Blues”) in Dallas on December 3, 1927, followed by two more (“Frisco Blues” and “Wild Jack Blues”) a year later on December 8, 1928. He is also listed as part of a duet of sorts Coley Jones: with Texas Bill Day on “Billiken’s Weary Blues” and “Elm Street Blues,” recorded December 5, 1929, in Dallas and also issued by Columbia.

Roosevelt Williams, better known as ‘Grey Ghost’ played throughout Texas in the 1930s. In 1940 folklorist William A. Owens discovered him playing at a skating rink in Navasota, Texas. Owen recorded four titles by Williams, including some with singers Popeye Johnson and Pet Wilson. Impressed by ‘Ghost’, Owen recorded him again a year later in Smithville, Texas, including ‘Hitler Blues’, which was not only mentioned in a Time Magazine article, but was also played on a BBC radio broadcast. Owens wrote about the Grey Ghost at length in his book Tell Me a Story, Sing Me a Song…. There are more titles by the Ghost than is generally listed and the original aluminum discs are housed at Cushing Memorial Library & Archives at Texas A&M. For some reason these tracks are not listed in the standard discography, Blues And Gospel Records. I have been in touch with the library and have permission to play these, largely unheard recordings, which will be featured next week. My friend, and piano expert, Michael Hortig noted: “Ghost is a typical member of the Texas blues piano, which is defined by rag/stride based left hand. He is connected with a style that originated around Waco. …All in all, Ghost is a very complete pianist, using a great variety of different keys like G, F, Eb, Ab, C… ”

The Flying Crow was a train line connecting Port Arthur, Texas to Kansas City with major stops in Shreveport and Texarkana. Black Ivory King, Carl Davis & the Dallas Jamboree Jug Band, Dusky Dailey, Washboard Sam and Oscar Woods all recorded songs about the train. Dave Alexander, who was known as Black Ivory King, was one of eastern group who worked the ‘Flying Crow’ line between his home to of Shreveport and Port Arthur on the Gulf Coast, where Ivory Joe Hunter knew him.” He cut four sides for Decca in Dallas early in 1937.

Big Road Blues Show 7/4/21: I Have the Same Old Blues – Delmark Favorites Pt. II

July 4, 2021July 4, 2021 Jeff Leave a comment

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Big Joe Williams & J.D. Short	Drop Down Mama	Piney Wood Blues.
Big Joe Williams	Highway 49	Blues on Highway 49
Magic Sam	That’s All I Need	West Side Soul
Magic Sam	I Don't Want No Woman	West Side Soul
Magic Sam	I Have the Same Old Blues	Black Magic
Speckled Red	The Dirty Dozens	The Dirty Dozens
Speckled Red	Delmar Blues	The Dirty Dozens
Sleepy John Estes	City Hall Blues	Brownsville Blues
Sleepy John Estes	I'm A Tearing Little Daddy	In Europe
Curtis Jones	Tin Pan Alley	Lonesome Bedroom Blues
Yank Rachell	Shout Baby Shout	Yank Rachell And His Tennessee Jug Busters
Otis Rush	Cut You Loose	Cold Day In Hell
Jimmy Dawkins	Welfare Blues	All for Business
Carey Bell	I'm Gonna Buy Me A Train Ticket	Carey Bell's Blues Harp
Roosevelt Sykes	Red-Eye Jesse Bell	Hard Drivin' Blues
Roosevelt Sykes	North Gulfport Boogie	Hard Drivin' Blues
Big Joe Williams & J.D. Short	You're Gonna Need King Jesus	Stavin' Chain Blues
Big Joe Williams & J.D. Short	Stavin' Chain Blues	Stavin' Chain Blues
Junior Wells	Hey Lawdy Mama	Hoodoo Man Blues
Junior Wells	Yonder Wall	Hoodoo Man Blues
Edith Wilson	Poppa-Mama Blues	He May Be Your Man… But He Comes To See Me Sometimes!
Eddie 'Cleanhead' Vinson	Old Kidney Stew Is Fine	Old Kidney Stew Is Fine
Roosevelt Sykes	Feel Like Blowin' My Horn	Feel Like Blowin' My Horn
Robert Jr. Lockwood	Western Horizon	Steady Rollin' Man
J.B. Hutto	20% Alcohol	Love Me Mama
Otis Rush	So Many Roads	So Many Roads

Show Notes:

Bob Koester outside the Jazz Record Mart, in 2009, photo by Michael Jackson.

With news of Bob Koester’s passing on May 12th at the age of 88, I was thinking of airing some tribute shows, maybe picking some favorites from the Delmark catalog. While living in St. Louis where he began collecting records and started recording musicians as well. He originally called his label Delmar, after a St. Louis boulevard, but once he relocated to Chicago in the late 1950s he added the K. He acquired a Chicago record shop from a trumpeter named Seymour Schwartz in 1959 and soon turned it into the Jazz Record Mart. His label not only recorded the players of the day but also reissued older recordings.

Last week we spotlighted several records Bob issued on his Pearl subsidiary which were not Delmark recordings but a variety of great reissue stuff from the 50s, much of it coming from the United/States labels. On this installment we dig into the Delmark label proper, choosing some notable and favorite recordings from the catalog. We stick to the earlier side of Delmark, selecting a fine batch of recordings from the late 50s through the mid-70s.

Read Liner Notes

Among the earliest artists Bob recorded was Big Joe Williams who he recorded first in St. Louis in 1958. Several Big Joe recorded were released on Delmark including Piney Woods Blues, Blues On Highway 49, Stavin’ Chain (with J.D. Short) and Nine String Guitar Blues. As Bob wrote: “An album of Speckled Red’s piano and voice was in first recording stages in the summer of 1955 when the impressive bulk of Joe Lee Williams hauled it up the steep flight to the Blue Note Record Shop in hope of auditioning for the new label. …Joe dug into a patched and scuffed cardboard guitar case, rummaged thru a spare shirt and old recording contracts and came out with a handbill with his photo on it to prove that he was ‘the’ Joe Williams of Columbia Records fame. Once Joe sat down and played the bastard instrument the proprietor knew he was listening to the raw country blues of one of his favorite singers. Joe insisted on a formal audition at his cousin’s home on Cole Street the following Sunday afternoon. By the light of a bare 40-watt bulb, Koester heard for the first time the magnificent combination of two guitars and the blues harmonica without surface noise. The other guitar was played by Joe’s cousin J.D. Short.” The material was issued as Piney Woods Blues in 1958 and on the album Stavin’ Chain Blues in 1961. A notorious rambler, he had vanished by the time the album came out and Koester’s liner notes stated his exact whereabouts is unknown. It seems he was actually in California, where he cut an LP for another then-new and now-venerable label, Arhoolie, but he became a regular in the Delmark stable and at one point lived in the basement of Koester’s Jazz Record Mart in Chicago.

Speckled Red was another early recording by Bob. Red (born Rufus Perryman) was born in Monroe, LA, but he made his reputation as part of the St. Louis and Memphis blues scenes of the ’20s and ’30s. In 1929, he cut his first recording sessions. One song from these sessions, “The Dirty Dozens,” was released on Brunswick and became a hit in late 1929. In 1938, he cut a few sides for Bluebird. In the early ’40s, Red moved to St. Louis, where he played local clubs and bars for the next decade and a half. Charlie O’Brien “rediscovered” Speckled Red on December 14, 1954, who subsequently was signed to Delmark Records as their first blues artist. Several recordings were made in 1956 and 1957 for Tone, Delmark, Folkways, and Storyville record labels. Sleepy John Estes in Europe

Others who recorded back in the 20s and 30s and wound up on Delmark are featured today include Sleepy John Estes, Yank Rachell, Curtis Jones, Roosevelt Sykes and Edith Wilson. When the Victor recording company sent a field recording unit to Memphis in September 1929, Estes recorded several sides backed by the Three J’s Jug Band. He was invited to record again for Victor in May 1930. In all the group cut fifteen sides, three were unissued, over the course of eight session in 1929 and 1930. Estes and partner Hammie Nixon moved to Chicago in 1931 where they played parties and the streets. The Depression hit the recording industry hard, and the Estes/Nixon team did not record until a July 1935 date with the Champion label where the duo cut six sides at two sessions. he Decca label brought Estes to New York City to record in 1937 and again in 1938 where he cut eighteen songs, laying down some of his most enduring songs. Estes was paired with younger guitarist Robert Nighthawk, perhaps to modernize his sound, for his last six song Decca session in 1940. Estes returned to sharecropping in Brownsville in 1941. In 1948, he and Nixon recorded again for the Ora Nelle label but the records went unreleased. In 1952 he cut four sides for the Sun label. Estes was rediscovered in 1962 during the blues revival and cut several albums for Delmark (The Legend of Sleepy John Estes, Brownsville Blues, In Europe, Broke And Hungry, Electric Sleep, Newport Blues) and returned to touring with Hammie Nixon before health problems confined him to Brownsville.

It was in Brownsville, Tennessee, that Yank Rachell met Hambone Willie Newbern (who penned Rollin’ and Tumblin’ in 1929). Newbern took him under his wing, mentoring him in the music and in the business. The Brownsville scene was teeming with great musicians, and in time, Rachell met Sleepy John Estes and Hammie Nixon, and the trio worked the area as a jug band. Later, Rachell migrated to Memphis to work in the Beale Street scene, where he joined company with Estes and Jab Jones as the Three J’s Jug Band where they recorded for Victor in 1929 and 1930. During a stopover in New York Rachell teamed up with guitarist Dan Smith and laid down 25 titles for ARC. In 1934 Williamson went north to Chicago. With the success of Williamson’s first Bluebird dates of 1937, Rachell decided to join Sonny Boy in Chicago for sessions in March and June of 1938. Yank Rachell also contributed four sides of his own to each session, and then 16 more in 1941 with Sonny Boy backing him up. After Sonny Boy Williamson’s murder in 1948, Rachell drifted away from music and relied solely on straight jobs to make his living, settling permanently in Indianapolis in 1958. His wife passed away in 1961, and afterward he began to resume performing. In 1962, Rachell was re-united with Nixon and Estes, and the three of them began playing college and coffeehouse circuit, recording for Delmark as Yank Rachell’s Tennessee Jug Busters. They played Newport in 1964 and toured Europe as part of the 1966

Read Liner Notes

Pianists Roosevelt Sykes and Curtis Jones cut several fine dates for Delmark. Curtis cut the fine Lonesome Bedroom Blues (1962) and Sykes cut several albums of which we feature Hard Drivin’ Blues (1963) and Feel Like Blowing My Horn (1973). Sykes began making records in 1929 and never stopped recording over the decades. The sessions for Hard Drivin’ Blues were recorded in January 1962 and May 1963 but didn’t see light until 1975. Feel Like Blowing My Hornwas recorded in 1970 and issued three yea later. Curtis cut one album prior to the Delmark for Bluesville (Trouble Blues) before moving to Europe.

Edith Wilson was a classic blues singer from the 20s and had not recorded since 1930 when she made cut the fine He May Be Your Man… But He Comes To See Me Sometimes!, recorded at sessions in the early and mid-70s and release in 1976. Her two overlapping backup groups had three horns (including trombonist Preston Jackson and usually Franz Jackson on clarinet and tenor), pianist Little Brother Montgomery, guitarist/banjoist Ikey Robinson and a rhythm section. She would recorded one further album (for Wolverine) in 1974 and a couple isolated tracks in 1976 before her death in 1981

Moving on to more of the electric Chicago blues Delmark became known for, we spin excellent tracks by Magic Sam, Junior Wells, Otis Rush, Jimmy Dawkins, Robert Jr. Lockwood , J.B. Hutto, Luther Allison and others. Magic Sam cut two albums for Delmark: West Side Soul (1967) and Black Magic (1969), the latter issued immediately after Sam’s death in 1969 at the age of 32. West Side Soul was an iconic record, making inroads in the white blues collector market. Prior to this Sam had cut some terrific records for Cobra, Chief, Crash and backed a several artists on record. Sam’s breakthrough performance was at the Ann Arbor Blues Festival in 1969 which won him many bookings in the U.S. and Europe.

Bob Koester recalled that at the time he was considering releasing an album by Junior Wells, he was anxious about both the audience for Wells’ music and the expense of studio time and sidemen, but that he liked the music too much to resist. Wells was given the liberty to select his own sidemen and tracklist, without the usual limitation of songs two or three minutes long, and the album, Hoodoo Man Blues, became Delmark’s then best-seller.

Read Liner Notes

Willie Dixon caught Otis Rush’s act and signed him to Eli Toscano’s Cobra Records in 1956 where Rush cut iconic sides like “I Can’t Quit You Baby”, “Three Times a Fool”, “Keep on Loving Me Baby,” and the classic “All Your Love (I Miss Loving).” After Cobra closed up shop, Rush’s recording fortunes mostly floundered. He followed Dixon over to Chess in 1960 before moving on to Duke, Vanguard, and Cotillion. In 1969 the album Mourning in the Morning was released and the excellent 1971 album Right Place, Wrong Time was shelved for five years. Next was this solid outing for Delmark, Cold Day In Hell. The live So Many Roads was released in 1978 and another live one, All Your Love I Miss Loving: Live at the Wise Fools Pub Chicago, was issued in 2005. Rush also played second guitar on Jimmy Dawkins’ All for Business which is featured today with “Welfare Blues” sporting an excellent vocal from Andrew “Big Voice” Odom.

J.B. Hutto started music back home in Augusta, GA, singing in the family-oriented group the Golden Crowns Gospel Singers. He came north to Chicago in the mid-’40s. His recording career started in 1954 with two sessions for the Chance label supported by his original combo the Hawks. After breaking up the original band, Hutto worked outside of music for a good decade. He resurfaced around 1964 with a stripped-down version of the Hawks. In 1966 he had some songs on the anthology Chicago/The Blues/Today!, Vol. 1 and cut a session for Testament. Next followed two albums for Delmark: Hawk Squat (1968) and Slidewinder (1973).

Robert Lockwood was first recorded as a sideman in 1941, but not until he was 55 did he record his first album as a leader. Steady Rollin’ Man was issued in 1970 and a steady stream of albums followed such as Contrasts (Trix, 1973); …Does 12 (Trix, 1975); Hangin’ On, with Johnny Shines (Rounder, 1979); Mister Blues Is Back to Stay, with Shines (Rounder, 1980); What’s the Score (Lockwood, 1990); and I Got to Find Me a Woman (Verve, 1996).