Smilin' Bobby & the Hidden Charms Big Legged Woman

Smilin' Bobby & the Hidden Charms
Big Legged Woman
Wolf Records

Blues fans have to be grateful that labels like Delmark and Wolf exist to record and issue recordings of lesser-known blues artists which other labels, for whatever reason, lack the means or interest to record. A new release on Wolf, part of its Chicago Blues Session series, is by Smilin' Bobby & the Hidden Charms, "Big Legged Woman." Smilin' Bobby, whose real name is Bobby G. Smith, has been playing blues throughout Chicago for decades. Arkansas born, he moved to Chicago when he was 15.

Smilin' Bobby's music has a number of influences including Magic Sam and Albert King. In his liner notes, Scott Dirks describes Bobby's playing as a cross between Magic Slim's stinging leads with Magic Sam's cool little rhythm fills when he is singing.  His voice does not sound like anyone else. Magic Sam's influence is most evident on the fine rendition of Willie Cobb's "You Don't Love Me," which is based on Sam's rendition. But the solid guitar work and the vocals bring Magic Sam clearly to mind. The vocals are very soulful in a fashion similar to those of Sam as well.

In addition to the Cobbs’ number, there are four other covers that are done in a manner that don't slavishly copy other versions and five originals that certainly have much to recommend them. The opening “I Play For Keeps,” is an original instrumental with an insistent beat and driving guitar and followed by a reworking of Howlin’ Wolf’s “I Didn’t Know” and then a stinging, brooding rendition of a T-Bone Walker classic “Cold, Cold Feeling.” His “I’ve Got To Leave This Woman” is a funky original about a woman that treats him in a low down fashion while the closing original “You Are The One,” has him telling how he keeps his woman satisfied.

The Hidden Charms second guitarist Brian Reed, bass guitarist Warren Lethan and drummer Myron Katz provide steady backing through the ten performances presented on this very enjoyable release. The music on “Big Legged Woman” certainly supports the notion that Smilin’ Bobby is a modern Chicago blues performer of note for who it has taken too many years to get a CD issued. He most definitely merits our attention. 

This review was written in 2011, and I likely purchased it. I do not know if it was published at the time. Here is a video of Smilin' Bobby with Lurrie Bell from 2013.

Eddie Taylor Jr's So Called Friends

One of several blues playing and singing children of the late Chicago blues guitarist legend Eddie Taylor, Eddie Taylor Jr. has followed in his father’s footsteps in playing the Delta rooted Chicago blues style that his father was known for. Taylor senior was best known as Jimmy Reed’s guitarist and worked/recorded with others including John Lee Hooker (on Bluesway), Harmonica Hinds and Carey Bell along with a number of fine recordings for Vee-Jay, Advent and other labels. Eddie Junior picked up much from his father and has been prominent amongst those old school Chicago blues musicians of today. He has recorded five albums for the Austrian Wolf label which has issued So Called Friends: His Best 15 Songs, compiled from those earlier releases along with five newly issued recordings. The selections derive from 5 different record dates with Eddie Jr. backed by brother Tim Taylor on drums along with Harmonica Hinds, Roosevelt Purifoy, Detroit Jr., Ken Barker, Johnny B Moore, and others. 

The first five selections are from a recent session with Purifoy and guitarist Anthony Palmer opening with Hound Dog Taylor’s Wild About You Baby, and includes the topical Welfare Blues, as well as a cover of Jimmy Rogers’ You Sweet. This latter number best suits Taylor Jr.’s introverted vocal approach as opposed to the rocking slide guitar Wild About You Baby, which misses the fervor of an Elmore James or the exuberance of Hound Dog Taylor. They are not bad performances, just that Taylor is strongest on certain material. If his vocals are on occasion bland, the music is wonderfully played classic Chicago blues. The title track is an original that borrows the music of Willie Mabon’s Poison Ivy, with Taylor singing that nobody can hurt one but one’s so-called friends with a nice guitar break.

From his prior sessions comes a number of nice performances including his reworking of a Sugar Pie DeSanto recording Use What You Got, as he sings how he keeps his woman satisfied. His father played on Jimmy Reed’s original of Upside Your Your Head, and Eddie Jr. does his father proud on a relaxed cover, as well as a rendition of Magic Sam’s Easy Baby. There is a relaxed shuffle version of Stop Breakin’ Down, on which his playing and singing evokes his father. His brother Larry contributed a nice philosophical slow blues Blues In Your Life, that suits his introverted vocal. Also nice is his rendition of Sonny Boy Williamson I’s My Little Machine, modeled after Jimmy Rogers’ recording. It sports nice slide guitar and strong playing from Harmonica Hinds. More slide is heard on a Shake Your Money Maker variant, Gotta Make This Money, as he tells us about playing his Gibson all around town.

If not always a compelling vocalist, Eddie Taylor Jr. is always engaging and his playing is terrific. So Called Friends is a welcome introduction to a Chicago blues singer and guitarist that does deserve to be better known amongst the general community of blues enthusiasts.

I purchased this CD. Here is Eddie Taylor Jr. in performance.

Magic Slim Rockin' Zoo Bar Blues

Here is another vintage Magic Slim review. It appeared in the November 1996 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 216). I have made a few minor stylistic changes. I believe I purchased this CD. Magic Slim & The Teardrops Are among the blues most prolific recording artists, with numerous albums on a variety of labels. They will have a new Blind Pig album later this fall or early next year. Austrian Wolf Records recently issued Spider In My Stew/the Zoo Bar Collection Volume 4 consisting of 1980s live recordings from the famous Lincoln, Nebraska club. Despite the similarity in tempos (many being mid-tempo boogaloo-Jimmy Reed shuffles), and a somewhat restricted musical palette, Magic Slim has been able to build a loyal and growing following partly due to the Teardrops’ ability to lay down a consistent driving groove. One surprise here is a very fine, slow-drag tempo used on the late Buster Benton’s Spider in My Stew. If lacking a great vocal range, his subtle embellishments can be quite powerful. If Slim is not one of the virtuoso blues guitarists, his driving, stinging attack is supported by a tight groove keeps the dance floor full with a tempo that never is rushed or hurried. There is plenty of familiar material here including Standin’ on the Highway, which Slim has recorded previously and he rocks through its easy shuffle groove. A singer, Earlene Owens, guests on a medley of blues classics, while Slim’s eclecticism is found in his renditions of other classics like a driving shuffle take of Eddie Miller’s (I’d Rather) Drink Muddy Water, where he exhorts the audience to a call and response, before launching into a hard driving solo. He engages in broomdusting on Walkin’ Cane (a retitled Look On Yonder’s Wall), while gives a smoky blues cast to Ivory Joe Hunter’s Since I Met You Baby. After rocking J.B. Lenoir’s Mojo Boogie, with a raspy vocal, this excellent live recording concludes with Slim’s own affirmation of Little Milton’s The Blues Are All Right. In Magic Slim’s hands the blues certainly are all right, and this is among the better of his recordings that this writer has heard.

With Eddie Taylor Jr, Blues Runs In The Family

A second generation bluesman of note is Eddie Taylor, Jr. One of several children of the late Eddie Taylor, best known as Jimmy Reed’s guitarist, but also an unheralded and under appreciated Chicago blues artist on his own whose music never lost its delta roots. Eddie Jr. has a new CD on the Austrian Wolf label, I Got To Make This Money, Baby. On this his brother Tim handles the drums and sister Demetria (who recently released a well received album on Delmark) sings one song while Harmonica Hinds is present with Greg McDaniel on bass and Anthony Palmer on second guitar.

Its a pretty straight Chicago blues album with Taylor performing several songs in homage of his father, other classic Chicago blues numbers and others in this style. On the opening title track, there is an opening quote of Lester Leaps In, before Taylor and the band launch into a Shake Your Moneymaker groove and sings about playing his guitar and playing the blues. This selection has him playing some nice controlled slide in the vein of Elmore James mixed with Homesick James. Hinds wails in support in support on harmonica here. Echoes of his father’s “Bad Boy,” as well as the lazy Jimmy Reed shuffle groove, are heard in his loving Salute to Eddie Taylor. Hinds is particularly outstanding on this track. 

There is a nice mix of songs including his father’s Train Fare Home, John Lee Williamson’s My Little Machine (from Jimmy Rogers rendition), and a slowed down rendition of Tommy McClennan’s Whisky Headed Woman. There are also a few other originals like his salute to the late bass player and vocalist, Goodbye Willie Kent,” where he notes Willie was a blues solider, a blues soldier going home.” Sister Demetria handles Ruth Brown’s big fifties smash, Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean, with the band providing solid support and an arrangement that does not slavishly copy the original. Similarly the interpretation of Rosco Gordon’s Just a Little Bit, makes that number a walking Chicago shuffle.

This isn’t the first record by Eddie Taylor, Jr. I heard. His earlier recordings had me wanting more and I purchased this. This is a solid, traditionally oriented blues recording. He sings from the heart and plays the old school style of Chicago blues guitar that fewer and fewer still play.

Here is a video of Eddie Taylor Jr, performing Jimmy Rogers' "You're the One."

Excellent Rough Dried Magic Slim

It might surprise blues fans, but the Austrian Wolf label has issued 14 albums by Magic Slim & the Teardrops, way more than any other label. And these are not some run of the mill issues. Three of them have won WC Handy Awards and five were recorded at the legendary Zoo Bar which became Slim’s musical home some time ago. The 14th and latest Wolf album is Rough Dried Woman, which is subtitled “Magic Slim’s best 14 songs.” It is compiled from sessions recorded for Wolf between 1986 and 1992 and include 3 previously unissued live recordings. Present on all the recordings are Slim, his brother Nick Holt on bass guitar and second guitarist John Primer with four different drummers present on the sessions.

Magic Slim’s music is not fancy. It is pretty simple and direct with Slim’s emphatic driving guitar with its single note runs that show a bit of Albert King’s influence, the interaction with him and his second guitarist who during this period was John Primer, and brother Nick’s bass which originated the “lump ta lump” style made for the strong, immediately recognizable Teardrops sound. Nick passed away a little while ago and this CD is dedicated to his memory.

From the opening rendition of Big Mac’s Rough Dried Woman through the reworking of Buster Benton’s Spider in My Stew, to the concluding notes of Roy Brown’s Hard Luck Blues, this is typically solid Magic Slim recording. And the songs come from a variety of sources including Albert King, Lefty Dizz, Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters, Bonnie Lee and Roy Brown. In this strong grouping of blues a few tracks stand out. There is a terrific slow rendition of “Matchbox Blues as done by Albert King as well as the down-in-the alley, slow grind of the cover of Lefty Dizz’s Bad Avenue. Slim’s marriage of a Dust My Broom groove to Bo Diddley’s Before You Accuse Me, is an driving rocker while the medium tempo reworking of Eddie Taylor’s Bad Boy is similarly irresistible before the stunning live rendition of Hard Luck Blues.

One rarely will go wrong with a Magic Slim recording and Rough Dried Woman is one of the better ones by him.

This was a purchase.

Vance Kelly's Soulful Bluebird

Chicago native Vance Kelly has been playing a whole stew of music before A.C. Reed took him on the road. Later he had a stint with Little Johnny Christian and since 1990 has worked throughout Chicago. Even today though a show from Vance Kelly will traverse jazz, rock, R&B and blues. His seventh album for the Austrian Wolf label Bluebird is subtitled “The First Blues-Only CD by Vance Kelly.” Accompanying Vance his vocals and guitar is The Backstreet Blues Band of John Walls on keyboards; Ed Williams on saxophone; Mark Miller on bass; and Charles Handcox on drums. Five of the selections are studio sides recorded in Chicago and the other 8 are live European performances with Vance’s daughter Vivian singing on one.

The time spent with A.C. Reed are reflected in strong renditions of Reed’s songs; the driving I Stay Mad, with a fine organ break from Walls; and the celebratory,My Baby Is Fine, with Williams raspy saxophone very prominent in this slow number where Vance celebrates his woman. Little Johnny Christian’s Ain’t Gonna Worry About Tomorrow, showcases some nice B.B. King styled guitar with Walls’ keyboards again standing out. These tracks also showcase Kelly’s very soulful, sometimes raspy vocals.

A good deal of the program here come from the soul side of bluestown including I Wish He Didn’t Trust Me So Much, where he sings about his feelings about his best friend’s woman and he’s scared she’ll feel about him while he husband’s away. Bump and Grind and Denise LaSalle’s Someone Is Steppin’ In, are strong Malaco blues with solid band work and guitar in addition the urgent singing which suggests the late Z.Z. Hill (and Vance’s daughter takes the vocal on LaSalle’s Soft-Hearted Woman).

Frank Kold, in his notes, observes that the rendition of Issac Hayes’ Bluebird owes a bit to Littler Milton’s rendition while the medley of another Johnny Taylor hit Doing My Own Thing with Al Green’s rendition of I Can’t Get Next To You, which segues into the Z.Z. Hill anthem I’m a Bluesman, with its lyrics about being raised on Jimmy Reed, washed in Muddy Waters and mothers watch out for your daughters, which just may be a highlight of this release. Then there is a driving rendition of the Bobby Bland classic Ain’t Doin’ Too Bad (with a booting sax solo that conjures up the memory of A.C. Reed) and a terrific medley of Stormy Monday with Take Off Your Shoes with some searing fretwork.

Delmark issued an anthology of recordings Kelly made for Jimmy Dawkins’ Leric label sometime ago, and he is heard on the Little Johnny Christian recordings anthologized there. I said at the time “Use What You Got, is a mix of soulful singing and a down home blues groove.” Much the same can be said of the present, very appealing recording and I will undoubtedly be checking out some of Kelly’s prior Wolf recordings, even if they are not 100% blues.

I purchased this CD.