A Time Machine Looking at Blues From October 1976

My 3rd installment of my blues column from the Buffalo Jazz Report, October, 1976. I mentioned the B.B. King and Muddy waters gigs the previous month, but here I have a quick review along with mentioning Buddy and Junior with Jeff Beck in the audience. I believe he opened for Fleetwood Mac at the Old War Memorial Auditorium the next night. I believe Buddy and Junior's Band was pretty much the same as on the album they did backing Memphis Slim including brother Phil Guy on guitar, A.C. Reed on sax and Buffalo native Roosevelt 'Snake' Shaw on drums. The images of the two album covers are from reissues of the Peg Leg Sam and Louisiana Red albums.

The last month has been quite good for live 'blues' in the Buffalo area. B.B. King appeared at Melody Fair, Muddy Waters at the Outside Inn in Angola, Buddy Guy and Junior Wells returned to the Belle Starr and as I write this Bobby 'Blue' Bland will appear at Kleinhans. I had a chance to see B.B. and he is the 'King of the Blues' without question. A true pro who is totally into his music and who worked·through songs associated with him like "How Blue Can You Get" and his current hit (with Bobby Bland) of "Let the Good Times Roll" as well as Leon Russell's "Hummingbird" and a fine version of "Please Send Me Someone To Love". Buddy Guy and Junior Wells were dynamite as usual. The night I saw them Jeff Beck was in the audience to see his favorite guitarist, Buddy Guy, and later sat in with the band. 
 

Peg Leg Sam is a veteran of the medicine show scene. A fine country blues harmonica player and singer his new album Going Train Blues (Blue Labor BL 105). accompanied by Louisiana Red, 1s a fine album demonstrating Sam's skills as a singer and entertainer. He has an earlier album on Trix which I have unfortunately, not heard. Other fine blues Ips on Blue Labor Include Louisiana Red's Sweet Blood Call (BL 104) which features marvelous country blues and original lyrics such as the fine "Death of Ealase, written about his wife who died of cancer. Sonny Terry's Robbin' the Grave (BL 101) finds Sonny without Brownie McGhee, but with friends in a fine set of spirited blues, far removed from the folkie circuit that some have associated Sonny with. Sonny plays and sings with great enthusiasm. Sonny and Brownie back Alec Seward on Late One Saturday .Evening (BL 103) which was recorded at a house party along wilh other fnends with everyone in good spirits. 

Bobo Jenkins is one of many artists playing blues in Detroit. For various reasons Bobo has recorded himself and created Big Star Records out of his own work. A worker for Chrysler for over 20 years (he recently quit). he built his own basement studio and Here I am a Fool in Love Again (BS 11-33) reflects this as it won't win audio awards. The music is great gutty city blues- not very different from Chicago blues of the 50s, played without any BS. The outstanding track of the album is "Sharecropper Blues" where working for Chrysler is compared to being a sharecropper. You will want to get this from Bobo at Big Star Recording Studio, 4228 Joy Road, Detroit, Michigan,

When My Mama Was Living Is Choice Louisiana Red

In the 1970s when Kent Cooper first met the late Louisiana Red, Red was working at the Bayonne (New Jersey) Barrel Company and had given up music as the way to support his family. Red had recorded prior to that including an album for the Atlantic Atco subsidiary. Cooper wrote some songs including Sweet Blood Call, and Red recorded some of Cooper’s as well as his own that led to the critically acclaimed Sweet Blood Call and other albums on Blue Labor which also issued albums by Johnny Shines, Roosevelt Sykes and Peg Leg Sam during this period. Red’s career continued for many years, and he continued to record relatively regularly in the past couple decades with the recordings have a consistent quality despite variations in the musical settings and supporting musicians. When Louisiana Red passed, he was rightfully regarded as a great blues artist who had been a heir to the legacies of Muddy Waters, Elmore James and Lightnin’ Hopkins.

Labor Records has issued a new CD, When My Mama Was Living, that brings together 16 tracks comprised of one track issued on CD for first time and the rest being previously unissued selections or unissued alternate takes. On these selections he is sometimes backed by either Peg Leg Sam or Lefty Dizz with the exception of three tracks Peg Leg Sam is featured on. There is variety in the musical settings that add to the listenability of these performances.

While these may have not been issued previously, there is plenty of strong blues to be heard. Red was in strong vocal form at the time and put so much into delivering the lyrics. Walk All Over Georgia sets the tone backed only by his harmonica followed by his interpretation of Slim Harpo’s King Bee, where he plays spare trebly guitar and overdubbed harmonica. The title track is another selection where his harmonica provides the sole accompaniment and throws in an occasional whoop to accent the lyrics. 

Bad Case of the Blues is one of several selections that finds Red playing the manner of Lightnin’ Hopkins followed by a solo Peg Leg Sam Piedmont harmonica blues Little Susie James. Lefty Dizz adds support behind Red’s slide on Got a Girl With a Dog Won’t Bark, which adapts the melody of Shake Your Money Maker. Red’s playing on this previously unissued alternate take is a bit tentative sounding to this listener. Cold White Sheet is another Hopkins’ styled blues as he sings about can’t stand the city no more and would rather die on a southland farm, while Going Back to Georgia adapts the 44 Blues melody for his lyric about leaving those Northern gals behind.

You’ve Got To Move is the traditional sacred number in the style of Fred McDowell with Peg Leg Sam adding harmonica behind Red’s slide with Jim Robinson adding a second vocal. Peg Leg Sam sounds feisty on I'll Be Glad When You Are Dead You Rascal You, with plenty of crying harmonica. Cooper and Red’s Cold, Cold Feeling is another traditionally grounded blues strongly performed in the vein of Lightnin’ Hopkins. Red accompanies Peg Leg Sam on his spirited John Henry. This album closes with Red’s “Joanna.” This was recorded with a small group at WKCR and Red lays down nice slide guitar adding a some spoken interjections to his vocal.

This writer has long been fond of the Blue Labor Louisiana Red recordings and this new release of unissued songs and alternate takes is most welcome. Louisiana Red was in quite fine form during this period and When My Mama Was Living certainly stands up as an excellent release that lovers of down home blues will certainly appreciate.

I received a review copy from a publicist for the release. Here is a video of him in his Elmore James mood.

Trix Stopped Walking

The Trix label was started by Peter Lowry in the 1970s and included field and studio recordings of a number of blues artists who unfortunately are no longer with us. Included were two marvelous Robert Lockwood albums that I believe are in print on Savoy Jazz as The Complete Trix Recordings. Also were equally good recordings, many in the Piedmont tradition and by lesser known but by no means lesser blues performers. The November 1994 Jazz & Blues Report ran my review of three of these albums that were reissued on Muse in the early 1990s but probably only available on ebay or some select mail order specialists such as bluebeatmusic.com. Here is my review from 1994:Muse Records has released  several new Trix reissues on compact disc, as they  continue to make available the label’s important documentation of East Coast bluesmen.  Like the original four releases, these include reproductions of the original covers and liner notes with an addendum from producer Peter Lowry.

The Guitar Shorty of Alone In His Field (Trix 3306) is a different individual than David “Guitar Shorty” Kearney, who currently records for Black Top.  Born John Henry Fontescue, he  was a North Carolina native when Lowry located him there in Elm City. While he recorded for Savoy in 1952, his recordings (as Hootin’ Owl) were not released. When discovered in Elm City, he was living in pretty poor conditions, but little of that could be heard in his ebullient recordings, which show influences including Blind Boy Fuller and Lightnin’ Hopkins. Like Bukka White he could create blues spontaneously with unusual twists, occasionally scatting as on Boogie, Now. A limited, and not completely apt reference point would be describing Guitar Shorty as an East Coast Jesse Thomas, but that only partially suggests his wonderful and totally unique music which employs his own unique tuning.  Lowry mentions that there is more material from this gentleman who died in 1975. This is an album that anybody seriously interested in acoustic or older blues must get.

 Compared to Guitar Shorty, Henry Johnson may come across as conventional on his album,  Union County Flash (Trix 3304), but that doesn’t take away from the fact he was an excellent artist.  On an album of originals, and his own unique adaptations of traditional blues, Johnson emerges as a facile fingerpicker (his playing on Crow Jane stands up well to Carl Martin’s classic 78), as well as a capable player of bottleneck using a knife on the exhilarating John Henry.  Peg Leg Sam adds his rough-edged country blues harp on the house party number Boogie, Baby and My Dog’s Blues, a slow blues.  Rufe’s Impromptu Rag is a delightful instrumental which mixes a bit of blues, gospel, ragtime and country.  Playing in a variety of settings and tunings, Henry Johnson remains another long gone master of the Carolina blues tradition, and it is hard to believe it’s been two decades since he passed away. Acoustic blues of this level is far rarer to find today.

Rufe appears on a couple of tracks on Peg Leg Sam’s Medicine Show Man (Trix 3302).  His real name was Arthur Jackson and he lost his right leg below the knee while riding the freights. As the album title states, Peg Leg Sam played medicine shows. Sonny Terry provides an obvious reference point as Sam comes out of the same basic musical tradition, plays in a similar, but not derivative, fashion,  and sings in a similar husky style. In addition to Henry Johnson’s two accompaniments, four tracks feature’s Baby Tate’s nimble guitar, while Ode to Bad Bill  and Born in Hard Luck are narratives, adding diversity to a mix of folk songs and Piedmont blues from the Blind Boy Fuller school.  In addition to an unusual treatment of the old folk song Reuben, Sam has two spectacular features for his vocals and harp playing, his treatment of Lost John, and Peg’s Fox Chase.  His harmonica pyrotechnics certainly will impress the most jaded listener. Certainly this is a must for those who enjoy rural blues harmonica playing.