If you are thinking about a gift for the blues lover in your life, this public domain 5 CD box set certainly is well worthy considering. With 134 songs from both famous and obscure blues performers, and an 88 page booklet with an overview of the post-war Chicago blues scene and the artists heard, along with a full sessionography, it provides over 6 hours of prime Chicago blues. The mastering is as good as one can expect with some of this material coming from rare acetates or 78s.
Musically, this compilation takes us from recordings in the relaxed band sound that some scholars termed “the Bluebird Beat,” to the more familiar impassioned ensemble blues of Mississippi natives Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters and Elmore James. Included are the earliest commercial recordings of Muddy Waters and Johnny Shines, that were not issued until a couple decades later. There are recordings from small independent labels like the Maxwell Street based Ora Nelle label with Johnny Young’s “Money Taking Woman,” the J.O.B. label with Johnny Shines’ “Ramblin’,” Old Swingmaster for Snooky & Moody’s “Keep what You Got,” Parrot with Dusty Brown’s “He Don’t Love You,” Cool Records with Billy Boy Arnold’s “Hello Stranger,” and more.
There are artists new to me such as Grey Haired Bill, Mildred White (who recorded at a session with Pete Franklin (with Tampa Red on piano), and ‘Blues Boy’ Bill, along with representative recordings of Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed, Jimmy Rogers, Little Walter and Howlin’ Wolf, with some of these being alternate takes to those on 78s and 45s and only available on out-of-print album reissues on labels like Blues Classics, Nighthawk, Muskadine, Flyright and others. There are also rarities from Birmingham Jones, St. Louis Jimmy, Robert Nighthawk Albert King, Baby Face Leroy Foster, J.B. Hutto, Pete Franklin, Sunnyland Slim, Eddie Boyd, Memphis Minnie and Po’ Joe Williams (aka (Big Joe).
While not every one of the 134 songs is a blues classic, this collection is filled with so many gems as well as some entertaining selections that give an solid overview of early blues recording in Chicago. Add the 88 page booklet from Blues Scholar Mike Rowe, and this release is invaluable to lovers of Chicago blues. There is almost 6 and 1/2 hours of music on these five CDs which does not duplicate any of the selections on another reissue collection, the four-disc “Down Home Blues Classics Vol. 3:Chicago” on Boulevard Vintage) which is also highly recommended if you can find it.
I purchased this and it was originally submitted as a review for a Holiday issue of Jazz & Blues Report that was issued, but has appeared in the Jan-Feb 2018 issue (Issue 376). For a taste of some of the music, here is Dusty Brown's recording of "He Don't Love You,"
Johnny Nicholas & Friends Too Many Bad Habits The People's Label
In the spring of 1977 I saw Guitar Johnny (Nicholas) & the Rhythm Rockers along with Johnny Shines and Walter Horton outside of Buffalo, NY. Around the time I acquired the album "Too Many Bad Habits" on Blind Pig (and somewhere I may still have the original vinyl album). Released in 1977, it was deleted by Blind Pig in 1978 shorty after Nicholas joined Asleep at the Wheel, and stopped touring under his own name. While he requested getting back the original masters back from the label, he was finally able (in January 2016) to get back the original multi-track tapes, masters, artwork and photos. After transferring the old tapes, he discovered a bunch of recordings that had not been released so in reissuing his lost album, he has been album to add new material to the original recording. These include performances from Shines, Horton and pianist Boogie Woogie Red, along with some having Asleep's Ray Benson and other luminaries.
I do not recall what tracks were on the issued LP but I believe they are all on the first of the two discs, which include some standout ensemble tracks "Looks Can Be Deceivin'" and the witty title track that displays how good a songwriter Nicholas was (and is) as he enumerates the things that his doctor tells him he should give up. There is some nice mandolin on the opening "Mandolin Boogie" along with a solid "Sittin' On Top of the World," with nice fiddle and sax as well. After a rocking band shuffle with Boogie City Red's piano, "Rock My Blues Away," there is a lovely showcase for Walter Horton's harmonica feature"Blues Walk," with Nicholas providing solid backing.
An a cappella cover of Son House's gospel shout "Grinnin' in Your Face," is followed by "The New Canned Heat Blues" a reworking of Tommy Johnson recording with Nicholas adding lyrics about taking Robitussin in lieu of Sterno, with Horton's adding harp to the vocal and acoustic guitar. Horton sings and plays on "West Wind," followed by Shines' feature, "Blues Came Fallin' Down," an excellent number using the "Rollin' and Tumblin'" melody. This performance sounds similar to those on Shines' early Testament recordings. More Shines and Horton follow on a lovely "Careless Love," and then an instrumental feature for Horton "Gettin' Outta Town," where Nicholas opens playing the melody for "The Dirty Dozens," before Horton shifts into a familiar boogie instrumental of his. Having misplaced the discs, I am not sure if it is Shines' guitar heard behind Nicholas on a cover of "Hellhound on My Trail," that has solid Horton harp.
The second disc has a number of more showcases for Horton like his backing on "Pump Jockey Blues," and the instrumental, "Apple Grove Boogie," which has some slide guitar as well. "Prisoner Blues" is a slow blues with exquisite harmonica, while the brief, brooding "That's Alright Mama," comes across as brooding Hill Country blues. Boogie Woogie Red is featured on a rendition of Jay McShann's "Hootie Blues," followed by a straight take of Jimmy Rogers' "Money Marbles and Chalk," again with wonderful Horton harmonica. There is also more Big Walter on the folk-ish "Lonesome Traveler," and the lazy tempo shuffle "Froggy Bottom." The final track is a nice rendition of St. Louis Jimmy's "Soon Forgotten," with Boogie Woogie Red on piano and Big Walter on harp.
While there are solid performances on the second disc, some have flaws such as "Believe I'll Make a Change," a "Dust My Broom" variation with the vocal being off mike initially. The alternate take of "Looks Can Be Deceivin'," is slower and not as fully satisfying. "Move on Down the Line," is a vocal duet with Horton, and probably would have benefited from being at a bit quicker tempo. These are not terrible performances.
In additional to his musicianship, one of Nicholas strengths is his singing and that he never forces or strains when he delivers his vocals. With the splendid playing, the music on "Too Many Bad Habits" may not be essential, but its re-release is most welcome with the fine performances by Nicholas and the welcome cameos and assistance of blues legends, Boogie Woogie Red, Johnny Shines and Walter Horton.
I note that the recording album was contemporaneous with the Blind Pig Walter Horton recording (which Nicholas is on) and originally issued at the same time, and I believe still available Also, Ron Levy played keyboards on the Guitar Johnny tour in 1977 I received my review copy from a publicist. Here is a clip of Johnny Nicholas backing another Chicago blues legend, Snooky Pryor, at the 1991 Chicago Blues Festival.
Going back over issues of the Buffalo Jazz Report, which I wrote for in the mid to late 1970s, I came across the following review of the only full album issued under the late Joe Willie Wilkins' name. This recording unfortunately had limited release and even reviewer's copies are prized collector's items. I received a review copy from the distributor. This review appeared in the June 1978 issue (#52).
When
I first put on Joe Willie Wilkins & His King Biscuit Boys (Adamo
ADS 9507) I received a jolt. The opening "Mr. Downchild" and "Muddy
Walter's "Sad Letter" (a great version) had all the power of Muddy's
great recordings from the early fifties . Wilkins was Robert Lockwood's
.successor as Sonny Boy Williamson's accompanist on the famed King
Biscuit Time radio program. This album is his first lengthy exposure on
wax and if there are occasional bum notes from the assorted
accompanists don't let that deter you. Also, much of this album is from a live performance and if the sound isn't perfect, the music is funky and
down home. A truly great record of blues that anyone into Muddy, the
Wolf or others will dig. My choice for album of the month.
Here is "Mr. Downchild" from another live recording.
I’ve known Robert Lockwood since the fall of 1970, my senior year at Case Western Reserve University when I interviewed him for a student newspaper. At the time Robert was driving a delivery truck for a Cleveland pharmacy, and playing music part time. The previoussummer he attended the second Ann Arbor Blues Festival, and was coaxed up on stage where gave a great performance that led to his first album Steady Rolling Man (on Delmark) as well as playing on a Roosevelt Sykes album, Feel Like Blowing My Horn (also on Delmark). In addition to my interview of Robert in the fall of 1970, I had him on my radio show on the CWRU station. WRUW‑FM in Spring of 1971, and I had the opportunity to interview him in a Buffalo hotel May 12, 1978 (which Jim O’Neal and Amy Van Singel transcribed for a Living Blues interview that never ran).
Robert Lockwood Jr at the 2005 Pocono Blues Festival
In a review of Robert Lockwood Jr.’s new recording, What’s the Score, in the first issue of Blues Revue Quarterly, Brett Bonner writes, “Robert Lockwood is one of the greatest guitarists the blues has ever produced. His music has, in its own subtle way, shaped the blues of the modern era.” Living Blues editor Peter Lee concluded an article on Lockwood in the July, 1991 Guitar Player, “Lockwood’s history is almost that of the blues. Yet he brought something more to the blues in both his style and in his playing. And in doing that, he can claim much more than most musicians could ever hope to.”
Robert Lockwood was born 20 miles from Helena in Marvell, Arkansas on March 27, 1915. He was raised on a farm outside town by his mother Esther Lockwood (Shannon). At the age of 7, he was taken by his mother to St. Louis, the first of many trips to that town, but this trip was a brief one and they soon returned South to live near Helena. Robert recalled growing up in Marvel, Helena, Memphis, & St. Louis. “Most of my schoolin’ was in Helena. And I dropped out of school when I was about 14, 13 ‑ something like 13, 14 years old. Started to work and try to take care of my mother.” His mother struggled to make ends meet as a cook for a white family, and Robert dropped out of school in 7th grade, finding work in the cotton fields and levee camps. He also started playing music as an additional way to make money.
Robert Lockwood Jr at 2005 Pocono Blues Festival
Recalling this time, Robert stated “That’s when I started to learn to play. Yeah. I was about 13 1/2 years old. During that time I was doin’ farm work. Going out with the cotton chopping trucks, cotton picking trucks‑things like that. But the women wasn’t makin’ no money at that time. Females worked for $3 a week and that kind of shit.... Whenever I could get a job, I’d make around $9. About $9‑10 a week. That was a lot of money at that time.”
Robert didn’t recall a lot of music around the area growing up. “ There was people who was trying to play but, I don’t know. I just didn’t find too many guitar players interesting. I didn’t have no desire to play no guitar. I Thought I was goin’ be a piano player.” Asked if there were a lot of good piano players he answered “There wasn’t a lot. But the piano, you could very well play it by yourself without any help. And that’s what I always wanted when I was beginning-to not have to depend on anybody to help me. As the years passed, I got used to trying to put things together and I got used to help. My ambition was at first to play by myself. But I found it a little boring and dull as the years passed ‑ running all over the world by yourself. I done that for about 10 years, you know about 10 or 11 years, or longer.”
Robert Johnson was the impetus for Robert Lockwood becoming a guitarist. “He was my teacher.” Recalling how he met Johnson, he stated “Oh Robert met my mother. He followed my mother home. He hung around there for, oh, a couple of months. I guess. And my mother at first felt like he was too young but Robert could talk that way‑back talk. He didn’t look like he was no older than me. But I guess he was about 4 or 5 years older than I am. But I met Robert through my mother. And when he found out I was so interested in music, he finally decided to teach me. So, I’m very grateful about that cause my very first beginnin’ was not bad.”
At the 2005 Pocono Blues Festival
Lockwood recalled that Robert Johnson was a “very good musician.... I never heard Robert try to play nothin’ like nobody else. Really I wondered where did he get his understandin’ and style from. I never heard nobody play like him.... Oh you can listen to his records today and you don’t hear nobody playin’ like him but me. Nobody but me.” When I asked about Johnny Shines Robert stated, “Johnny Shines come close. Johnny Shines do pretty good, but he doesn’t play like Robert. So I teaches Johnny Shines every time I see him. Well, we grew up together. You know that.”
Robert recollected travelling with his mentor. “I went quite a few places with Robert ... quite a few. But Robert usually liked to travel alone. That was something else that I didn’t quite understand. But he carried me to Mississippi with him two or three times and he went up into some parts of Arkansas ‑ Eldorado, Arkansas, Camden and different places. I made about three trips with Robert.” Robert remembered some of the other musicians playing at the time. “Oh there was quite a few people down there that’s been gone a long time now. There was a dude called Son Kelly, and one called Stormy Weather. There was two brothers ‑ the Britt brothers, Jim Britt and W.B. Britt. All these people had help. I mean there was always two guitars ‑ one playing lead and the other one playin’ background you know.”
Many of the musicians that would be a vital part of the Chicago blues of the 1950s and 1960s were in Memphis. Robert knew Big Walter Horton in Memphis in the thirties and was the first one to take Walter away from home. “Walter was playin’ what was bein’ recorded. Wasn’t nobody recordin’ then but Big Bill, Peetie Wheatsraw and Lonnie Johnson, Blind Boy Fuller, Memphis Minnie. Walter was playin’ better then he do now.” When I asked Robert what was better about Walter’s playing then. “I don’t know, just seemed like [he was playing better] . . . maybe it was like a kind of new experience to me. Maybe he wasn’t, you know. But he was playin’ like hell then. See Walter and I had left Memphis and went down into a levee camp and came back with so much money Walter’s mother thought we’d done robbed somebody. Yeah, I picked Walter up in Memphis and carried him with me. And brought him back home. He could play. Walter was always a loner, too. You never see Walter, see him with nobody.”
Robert remembered Howlin’ Wolf. “Howlin’ Wolf? Yeah. When I first started playin’ Howlin’ Wolf was trying to play guitar. I used to run into Howlin’ Wolf when we were both runnin’ up and down the road. Howlin’ Wolf was tryin’ to play the guitar then. I didn’t know nothin’ about him playin’ no harp until ... I went down there, it was just after ’40, after ’41. I went back down South and he had a band in West Memphis and was playin’ the harp. I said, “Well I’ll be doggone.”
It was Sonny Boy Williamson II (Rice Miller) who first took Robert Jr. to Mississippi. “I met Sonny Boy through Robert. Robert was always in Mississippi ‑ well Robert’s home was in Mississippi too. And Robert was steady goin’ to and from Mississippi and he would run into Sonny Boy and I think they would play some together. And Robert was steady tellin’ Sonny Boy about me. And as the years passed, Sonny Boy finally came to Helena looking for me. He came over and begged my mother to let me go to Mississippi with him. She never wanted me to go to Mississippi, but he finally convinced her. And she told me to go ahead. And I’d been goin’ all up and down the road by myself, you know, but she just didn’t want me to go in Mississippi. Well, Mississippi was pretty bad then on Blacks. And I went to Mississippi with Sonny Boy, and we made a lot of money. $100 was a lot of money then.”
Robert Lockwood Jr honored with Lifetime Achievement Award at 2005 Pocono Blues Festival by Larry Hoffman
This was around 1936 or 1937. Sonny Boy wasn’t calling himself Sonny Boy at the time, but rather called himself “Boy Blue”. People were also calling him “Rice.” When John Lee ‘Sonny Boy’ Williamson started making records, Rice Miller started calling himself Sonny Boy. “And Big Sonny Boy could play Little Sonny Boy’s material better than he could play it. So, the way I understand it, they knew each other somehow, but Little Sonny Boy got a chance to make those records. And I think he was a good song writer, Little Sonny Boy was. Both of ‘em was.... Anyway I remember when Little [Sonny] Boy came to Helena. Well when he came to Helena I had played with him. I played with Little Sonny Boy in 1938‑39.... 1939 and a part of 1938, played with Little Sonny Boy in St. Louis. We used to play a lot of house parties. So in 1942 he came to Helena. Well, the word had got around that Sonny Boy Williamson was down South. He came down there and they talked about it and Little Sonny Boy got on the same station ‑ KFFA. And he stayed on that station for about two months. And that really confused the people. Oh man, I’ve seen some things man."
Robert joined the King Biscuit Time radio show in 1941 a few months after it started with the second Sonny Boy. “I went down after I recorded those records for RCA Victor. And I went down and Sonny Boy grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. I stayed with Sonny Boy down there for about two years. And me and the owner of King Biscuit Time, we never got along too well ‑ he’s still living‑ and so I finally split. Well what was really happenin’, then, they wasn’t payin’ nothing. But the publicity was gettin’ us a lot of work. Me and Sonny Boy was playin’ seven nights a week, you know. And those road engagements was really payin’ off, you know.” Responding to my observation that life on the road must have been rough, Robert Jr.. stated, “Nah, it’s not rough when you like it. You know, you just have to like it. You have to like it. There are a lot of people who don’t like it who just be out there for the money. Then it goes kind of hard with them so that’s why they get on all these old different kinds of drugs and dope and stuff‑ to be able to work.”
Longtime Lockwood band member, Maurice Reedus
By the late thirties Robert Lockwood was living and playing in St. Louis, a rich blues community which at the time was the home of Peetie Wheatstraw, Sonny Boy Willliamson I, Henry Townsend, Big Joe Williams, Lonnie Johnson, Dr. Clayton and others. It was with Dr. Clayton, that Lockwood got his first chance to record. “Well Dr. Clayton‑ ton and me and John Lee Williams, which was Little Sonny Boy, and Peetie Wheatstraw and Walter Davis and Elijah Williams and Booker T.. Washington - we all was runnin’ around there in St. Louis - playin’ on the street corners and different little towns in Illinois, you know, and Dr. Clayton and me would sit down and share ideas with each other. And we both was writing songs, you know. So Clayton had been to Chicago and he kept tellin” me, he said, ‘Well, let’s go to Chicago.” So I had a job parking cars, I was working at the Ninth and Chestnut garage. And I got that job down there and kind of got myself together‑ I bought me a lot of clothes, bought me a brand new instrument, and bought me a union card. So when we came to Chicago we came to Chicago to record for Decca. The talent scout was J. Mayo Williams and Mayo Williams was out of town so . . . during this process we ran into Lester Melrose and Lester Melrose and Mayo Williams was racin’ over talent, because at that time, the black musicians, blues singers, they wasn’t paying them a goddam thing ‑ you know about 15% of 1¢ royalty.... That’s what they promised you, know. So anyway, Dr. Clayton and me, I think we got better from Melrose than anybody else. Clayton really got paid ‑ he really got some money out of it. See well, I got $900 for playing with Clayton and for doing my own session. And at that time they was only paying $12.50 a side for a record and then a session was called two records. So that meant you made $50 for a recording session But I told Melrose to forget about the 15% and, oh, he hollered. He didn’t want to give me that much money. He told me, ‘I could record 10 people for what l’m payin’ and you’re askin’ for.’ But what made him record me was I told him, I said, ‘I didn’t come here to record for Victor in no way, you. I’ll just wait until Mayo Williams comes. And he didn’t want Mayo to get me. Oh, we went through a pretty bad time cause he was telling me that he didn’t know whether my material was goin’ to sell or not and ‘I’m taking a chance.’ And I started naming all the dudes who was playin’ for him which was Big Bill, Tampa Red and Johnny Temple.”
Both Big Bill and Tampa Red should be relatively well known to most blues listeners. Jackson, Mississippi born Johnny Temple may not have been a great instrumentalist but was a rather prolific recording artist of the thirties and forties. Robert kidded me about not knowing Temple’s biggest record, “Well, his best record was ‘Big Leg Woman.’ I can’t see how you missed that. But Johnny Temple and those dudes who was playin’ those guitars ... and Melrose, he really didn’t dig me too much because I’m kinda of straightforward about saying what I think. When I think I’m right, I mean you got a problem ‘cause I’m not goin’ be givin’ in, you know. So he was tellin’ me about how he didn’t know whether my stuff was gonna sell or not and I told him, I said, ‘You can line all them sons of bitches you got ‑ that play by themself ‑ and I’ll just walk right through them. I play what they play and play what they don’t play.’ And he really didn’t like that either. But he wouldn’t let me go. He wouldn’t agree and let me record for Decca. So he finally come up with the contract and I recorded for him.”
Robert recorded four selections that were released: Take a Little Walk With Me, Mean Black Spider, Gonna Train My Baby and Little Boy Blue. With the exception of Train My Baby, the songs became blues standards that were recorded by countless other blues artists. Muddy Waters recorded Take a Little Walk With Me for the Library of Congress and his reworking of Mean Black Spider as Mean Red Spider was among Muddy’s first recordings for Chess Records. Robert gave songs to Muddy and others including Glory for Man which Sonny Boy II recorded as All My Love in Vain, Elevator Blues for John Lee ‘Little Sonny Boy’ Williamson and That s All Right for Jimmy Rogers.
Video of Robert Lockwood Jr.
After the Bluebird recordings, Robert moved back down to Arkansas, joining the King Biscuit Time show with Sonny Boy. He remembered other musicians. “WelI in Helena there was Willie Love and Dudlow. That dude, he was nicknamed, was Robert Taylor. And Starkey Brothers. The Starkey Brothers used to be with me ‑ they was part of my first band. And a dude who used to live in Marianna named Jim Leake ‑ he had a string band. And an old man called Poppa Crump that played piano very good. And there’s somebody else who I know real good and I can’t think of him for nothing.” Robert formed his first band with the Starkey Brothers after leaving King Biscuit Time and started his own show for Mother’s Best Flour, a competing company to the Interstate Company that sold King Biscuit Flour and Sonny Boy Corn meal. This band was a much jazzier group than the band with Sonny Boy. As Robert Palmer chronicles in his excellent book, Deep Blues, Robert Lockwood was one of the first amplified guitar players in the Delta region and exerted considerable influence on numerous musicians including the late Joe Willie Wilkins who was one of the other guitarists that was associated with Sonny Boy and King Biscuit Time, the Murphy Brothers, Eddie Taylor, Jimmy Rogers, Louis Myers, Freddie King, and very significantly B.B. King.
When I first met Robert, he mentioned the fact that he had been working with B.B. King at the outset of B.B.’s career, trying to help B.B. work on his time while working with B.B. as a sideman. Frustrated with B.B.’s apparent inability to pick up on this aspect, Robert wanted to quit but B.B. cajoled him to stay a while longer, and when he left told the record company that was going to record B.B. to use a big band to help cover some of B.B.’s timing mistakes. It was almost two decades after Lockwood left B.B. King’s band before B.B. hired another guitarist to play in his band, so deep an impression Robert left with the Blues King.
In the early fifties Robert moved to Chicago where he would stay until the early sixties. In Chicago he became a major part of the blues scene there, recording Dust My Broom for the J.O.B. label a few months before Elmore James’ classic recording, along with Aw Aw Baby (a version of Sweet Home Chicago) and the jazzy Sweet Woman from Maine as well as established as a session player on recordings by Sunnyland Slim, drummer Alfred ‘Fat Man’ Wallace, pianist Eddie Boyd and others. While none of these records were heavy sellers, they stand up today as small gems of postwar Chicago blues. They have been reissued on a Flyright CD, Johnny Shines & Robert Lockwood which also contains Johnny Shines earliest recordings.
When Louis Myers left Little Walter’s band, the Jukes (or the Aces), in a money dispute, Robert replaced him and ended up working with Walter for several years. Robert once told the story of travelling in the south with Little Walter, and they came across some place where the pace had a sign saying that Little Walter was playing. This fact was news to them, and they had problems convincing people there that Little Walter was the real Little Walter.
Another video of Robert Lockwood Jr.
Robert was a mainstay of the Chicago recording scene, being on numerous sessions for Chess Records until the sixties when Buddy Guy assumed a similar role. Robert’s carefully placed chords and immaculate sense of timing perfectly complemented Walter’s hard driving harp solos, Eddie Boyd’s uptown band blues or Rice Miller’s wry vocals. Robert also did sessions with Muddy Waters, Floyd Dixon, Willie Mabon and the Mooglows for Chess. In 1961 Robert Jr.. travelled with Otis Spann and St. Louis Jimmy Oden to record for Candid Records. At the time, the classic album Otis Spann is the Blues with four vocals each from Spann and Lockwood along with two instrumental from Spann. Lockwood once expressed his belief that the album should have been with a full band, yet there can be little disputing the superb playing by both, with Lockwood’s guitar being a perfect compliment for Spann’s piano. A small glimpse of what might have been with a full band was two songs Spann recorded for Chess with Lockwood, Walter Horton, Willie Dixon and Fred Below that were not even known to exist until they turned up on Japanese import some ten years ago, Chicago Pianology, presenting two powerful examples of classic Chicago blues.
Shortly after returning to Chicago, Robert went to Cleveland with Rice Miller to play a club called Gleason’s for a short gig. While the second Sonny Boy left Cleveland after about nine months, Robert settled in to what has become his home town and raised his family with his wonderful wife, Annie. Musically, he remains active and doesn’t rest on his past laurels or reputation; still writing songs and still developing his music as when he started focusing on a twelve string guitar over a decade ago. He has made a number of fine albums. His Delmark album Steady Rolling Man is on vinyl or cassette, while his two Trix albums, Contrasts and Does Twelve are unfortunately out of print as is a wonderful Live in Japan that he recorded with the Aces. Similarly hard to find should be two albums he collaborated with Johnny Shines that were on Rounder. More recently he recorded an album for the French Black & Blue label Plays Robert & Robert on which he played an acoustic 12 string guitar. This album was recently issued on cassette. Most recently he recorded the fine What’s the Score on his own Lockwood label which also spotlights second guitarist Mark Hahn and harmonica player Wallace Coleman, as well as show that Lockwood is the ideal blues accompanist. While some will go to se Robert initially because of the connection with his stepfather, (Robert Johnson), after hearing him they’ll understand why Bob Dylan was picking up a few pointers from him a decade ago. He is a Giant of the Blues.
This originally appeared in The DC Blues Calendar and Jazz & Blues Report, likely in 1991 or 1992,
Calvin Frazier
This Old World’s In A Tangle
Laurie
This disc is is Laurie Records’ second reissue of Library of Congress field recordings that Alan Lomax recorded in Detroit in the late thirties. Containing all of the blues Calvin Frazier recorded that are still extant on fragile acetate discs, it does not include his religious songs, upon the producer’s belief that they would not appeal to blues fans. This may be a miscalculation, given this disc’s unavoidable rough sound and the short playing time.
Frazier was a cousin of the late Johnny Shines, and was associated with Robert Johnson. Johnson’s influence pervades a good portion of the music here. The title track (heard in a fragment and a full version); I’m in the Highway, Man; She’s a Double Crossing Woman, and Highway 51 Blues, echo Johnson’s Kind Hearted Women, Terraplane Blues, and Dust My Broom. Frazier also sings with a Johnson-like falsetto. Other tracks include Frazier’s Lily Mae, that he later recorded commercially, and versions of The Dirty Dozens and Pinetop Smith’s Boogie Woogie. There are two short interview fragments included as well. Calvin Frazier would be a part of the post-war Detroit blues scene, although his recordings in a combo setting are far different from these country blues recordings.
Like the previous Laurie reissue of Sampson Pittman’s Library of Congress recordings, this is accompanied by a wonderful 40 page booklet with extensive information on Frazier, and full lyric transcriptions. The sound may deter casual listeners, and the playing time is somewhat scanty. Despite these shortcomings, this will be an essential purchase for country blues devotees.
This review originally appeared in the March 1994 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 189) and I likely received my review copy from the record company. This is out-of-print but well worth checking for used copies of it. Here is Frazier's rendition of "Double Crossing Woman."
This is my blues column from the May 1977 Buffalo Jazz Report which
had the great Roy Haynes on the cover. My column was relatively lengthy, and
included a Blues On EP segment which I will post next week. have noted the first 58 issues of Buffalo Jazz Report (now Jazz & Blues Report)
have been digitized and can be downloaded from the University of
Buffalo Library system. The website for these archived issues is: http://digital.lib.buffalo.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/BuffJazz.
Note that Southern Record sales from which I obtained some releases no
longer exists, and of course Living Blues is no longer published in Chicago. Some of the recordings I reviewed are not easily found these days, but the Carey Bell, Johnny Shines and Phillip Walker should be available in some form. March and April have been good months for live blues in Buffalo. Muddy Waters came to town with Johnny Winter and James Cotton for an entertaining show at the Shea's though Winter's contribution was strictly his name as he sang terribly and his guitar playing characterized by the typical excesses of rock guitarists. The following weeks concert of B.B. King and Bobby Bland has each do nice sets of their hits and then dueted together to close a fine evening of blues.
Johnny Shines, Big Walter Horton and the Rhythm Rockers were at the Belle Starr in Colden. The Rhythm Rockers are an excellent white blues band led by John Nicholas on vocals and guitar and Ron Levy on piano (He played with B.B. for several years). They played some fine West Coast styled blues mostly and did provide strong support for Horton and Shines. Horton proved himself the greatest living harp player alive with his warm fluid style of playing and his fat tone. Shines played some electric slide guitar and sand with his gut-tearing vibrato. The highlight of the night I saw them was the duets of Horton and John Nichols which was great stuff. I missed Muddy's appearance at the Belle Starr with his regular group though I'm told they did well. Finally Robert Jr. Lockwood's appearance at the folk festival was marred by the sound at the Clark Hall. Robert's guitar work suffered as he and his band's other vocalist Otis Trotter sang well. Robert's white guitarist Mike Hahn did much of the soloing and displayed considerable mastery. "Hold Everything" was Robert's best number as the sound was sorted well enough for Robert's dazzling chord-work to shine. It was nice, but Robert and his band should be booked into a club where they can get a better feel. Robert is playing weekends (Thursday through Sunday) in Cleveland.
For those who caught Walter Horton and Johnny Shines at the Belle Starr I would suggest you check up on their recordings. Big Walter's album on Alligator (4702) features his fluid work backed by Eddie Taylor. Carey Bell, one of Walter's pupils on harp, also duets with his teacher on a nice set ranging from Having a Good Time, Little Boy Blue to Trouble in Mind. Johnny Shines has several fine albums out. His Advent album (2803) is stunning featuring six solo performances in the Mississippi Delta tradition and five tracks where he is backed by guitarist Philip Walker's band. One of the band tracks My Love Can't Hide is done over a smoldering band with Shine's vibrato singing creating an intensity matched only by Otis Rush. I agree with Living Blues that this is not to be missed. Both of these albums have been available for some time now but as many may be unfamiliar with these, do try to pick up on them.
Philip Walker incidentally has a solid new album, Someday You’ll Have These Blues (Joliet 6001). Philip had a now out of pr!nt album on Playboy and has done much session work (Johnny Shines and Eddie Taylor for Advent) and is a fleet guitarist and a grainy singer who comes through with strong performances. Particularly fine are Mama's Gone, EI Paso Blues and a gospel number When It Needs Gettin' Done. Definitely one to check out. If you can't find it at stores try Southern Record Sales, 42 North Lake Ave., Pasadena, Cal. 91101. Stores interested in carrying this album night write Joliet Record Co P.0. Box 67201, Los Angeles, Ca. 90067 or Southern Record Sales for information on where they might be able to acquire copies for sale. Another West Coast bluesman is Sleepy Jim Berry who I had acquired a 45 of a few years back. That single Long Time Blues is included on his album The Berry Patch (Consolidated BR-103) an album which is mixed in material and quality but does Include some good strong slow blues notably Long Time and Dehydrated Love. Southern Record Sales can supply this. It is great to have James Peterson back in Buffalo playing the blues weekends at the Sunset Inn on Main Street. Buddy Guy and Junior Wells are scheduled at the Belle Starr May 4-8 and of course the great Big Joe Turner and Lloyd Glenn at the Tralfamadore at the end of May (the 27-29) as a benefit for WBFO and part of Listener Support Week.
I have been a bit lazy and not posted in a few weeks. To remedy that I have a couple blues videos from you tube for you to enjoy. First is T-Bone Walker. I believe this is from the American Folk Blues Festival tours which have been made available on some fabulous DVD's put together by Reelin' In the Ear Productions.
Follow that from Robert Lockwood, Jr. doing a rendition of his stepfather's "Sweet Home Chicago." Lockwood's J.O.B. recording of "Aw Aw Baby" was one of the earlier post-war Chicago Blues versions of this song. I am not sure if this predates Roosevelt Sykes' "Sweet Old Chicago," which likely inspired Junior Parker's "Sweet Home Chicago" for Duke and which Magic Sam cited when he performed it at the Ann Arbor Blues Festival. It was not until after magic Sam's rendition before we got a plethora of recordings, some good, but way overdone. This rendition is part of the Grammy Award Winning, The Blues Shoe Project.
Finally another rendition of "Sweet Home Chicago," by Robert Johnson's travelling friend, Johnny Shines. Listening to mediocre Robert Johnson tributes by the Eric Clapton and Rory Block, I need to cleanse my ears by playing Shines whose mix of Lonnie Johnson, Howling Wolf and Robert Johnson made him, to my mind, the best interpreter of Johnson's songs.
Has it been 40 years since Mike Vernon had traveled to Chicago and recorded Sunnyland Slim and Johnny Shines for the Blues Horizon label. With Willie Dixon on bass and organizing the sessions, and a band that also included Walter Horton on harmonica and Clifton James on drums, two albums were produced, Slim's Midnight Jump, and Shine's Last Night Dream. The two albums along with a few alternates from Slim's session are now available on the just issued CD, Sunnyland Slim & Johnny Shines, The Complete Blue Horizon Session.
Mike Vernon's notes in the booklet gives a pretty thorough account of the lives of both of these legends as well as what went on the June, 1968 day when these were recorded. Sunnyland Slim today is remembered by those lucky enough to have seen him perform. He could band that piano out exhibiting an occasional stutter step in his phrasing matched by his booming voice that delivered the songs with an authority that is missing among the living blues pianists with the possible exception of David 'Omar Sharif' Alexander. Equally impressive solo or fronting the band that would be Willie Dixon's Chicago Blues All Stars here, Slim does not disappoint with a few staples of his repertoire, Get to My Baby, one of the songs heard in alternate takes, the fine Stella Mae with some exquisite harp from Shakey Horton, as well as Slim's topical Depression Blues.
Slim sets out the ten performances by Shines, although Otis Spann sits in for Pipeline Blues. The Shines performances include somewhat more intimate performances with piano or harp, and all feature Shines, certainly one of the most adept slide guitarists and one of the great blues singers of all time (with echoes of Howling Wolf, Lonnie Johnson and Robert Johnson). Certainly there are echoes of Johnson on several songs such as Baby Don't You Think I Know (a reworking of Sweet Home Chicago), Solid Gold and Last Night's Dream (both echoing Walking Blues), as well his rendition of Sonny Boy Williamson I's Black Panther (although I prefer the version of Otis Spann he recorded for Testament). Vernon talks about some issues of Shines and Dixon being in tune and Clifton James' timing occasionally drifting, but Shines' voice simply cuts through any shortcomings.
Slim died in 1995, a few years after Shines had. Listening to these recordings by the Delta natives today one simply must recognize that the what is called Mississippi blues today simply pales in comparison to what these two produced four decades ago. Highly recommended and available from various online sources.
In 1991, the Smithsonian Institution's annual Folklife Festival presented, as one of the featured presentations of the Festival, The Roots of Rhythm and Blues: A Tribute to the Robert Johnson Era. I was fortunate enough to attend and had the pleasure to see a number of captivating workshops and performances. I still recall folklorist and scholar Worth Long asking Robert Lockwood and Johnny Shines about songs Robert Johnson performed but never recorded. That was the first time I heard of Hacksaw Harney who Robert Lockwood Jr said was one of the few guitarists other than his step-father who impressed Lockwood. There was marvelous music whether Ruth Brown on the first day singing accompanied by Robert Lockwood, or Vernell Townsend (accompanied by husband Henry) singing Stormy Monday as if Walter Davis had recorded that number. Of the artists I had not heard previously, Eddie Cusic stood out with his straight-ahead Delta style blues. Some music from that festival was issued on a Sony-Legacy album which only hinted at the music performed and collected. I reviewed it back in 1992 and here is my review as printed in Jazz and Blues Report out of Cleveland. (www.jazz-blues.org)
Roots Of Rhythm And Blues A Tribute To The Robert Johnson Era
Sony - Columbia
This release from Sony/Columbia, in conjunction with Smithsonian/Folkways, documents the program that was part of the 1991 Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Those fortunate enough to attend the festival will remember some of these performances and the workshops, oral history and performers not represented here. In addition to associates of Robert Johnson, like the late Johnny “Ned” Shines, Robert Jr. Lockwood, David ‘Honeyboy’ Edwards and Henry Townsend, a variety of delta blues and traditional African American performers were presented including Lonnie Pitchford, Jessie Mae Hemphill, and others. In addition to festival performers, there are ringers here. While Phil Wiggins appeared at the Festival, John Cephas did not. While I originally thought Cephas and Wiggins’ fine Brownsville Blues was from an earlier festival, I have been told this is a studio performance with dubbed-in applause. ToshiReagon is heard on another studio recording, albeit without dubbed crowd noise. The centerpiece of the performances are several loose jams credited to Johnny “Ned” Shines (with these being his last “official recordings”) and ensemble. The ensemble includes Townsend on piano, Lockwood on guitar, Shines’ young associate Kent DuChaine on guitar, Lonnie Pitchford on bass guitar and Phil Wiggins on harmonica. There was another jam session with Honeyboy and Larry Wise replacing Lockwood and Wiggins, but nothing from that jam is represented here. Certainly the jam recordings are historic, although the music has some rough edges, with Pitchfords’s bass, Townsend’s piano and Lockwood’s strong authoritative playing keep things from getting too chaotic. The album opens with a very ragged Sweet Home Chicago, on which Shines’ singing sounded tired. The other songs, including his B.B. King influenced Loved and Lost (a retitled version of Have to Pay the Cost) are better performances. Also interesting are Shines’ three short acappella performances including a street vendor’s cry, Watermelons, and the traditional Tell Me How You Want Your Rolling Done. Documentation of these archaic song forms is invaluable whether by Shines, former Parchman Farm inmate David Savage, heard on two field hollers, or some retired railroad workers singing while demonstrating lining tracks. Lockwood and Edwards turn in workmanlike solo performances, Lonnie Pitchford’s three Robert Johnson numbers are adeptly performed, but solo performances by Henry Townsend (sounding like Walter Davis on the superb All My Money’s Gone on piano), and Jessie Mae Hemphill (a very strong Train, Train) stand out. Also included is a solo harmonica feature by Phil Wiggins, and several religious performances from the Moving Star Hall Singers. There were a number of strongly delivered performances not included, ostensively because of technical problems attributable to the hot, humid weather that made keeping in tune a real adventure. Barry Lee Pearson and Bernice Reagon places the performances in their social and historic context. While not indispensable, this makes available a variety of performances and performers not otherwise likely to be found on a major label, and has value beyond that of a festival souvenir.
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