It's all good, as long as it's all Blues.

Dig.


Bouncing to some William Lee Perryman, that is, Piano Red.

I like Red's pounding style of playing. Quite a bit less smooth as say Memphis Slim, and not an overly great singer, but he had this charm about him, and a great unorthodoxy in his playing. He's kind of like the Monk of boogie woogie.

Eddie Martin - "Play the Blues With Feeling"

I first heard of this guy on a local college radio blues show. He's from England but he is, obviously, steeped in the blues - from Chicago's south side gin mill pioneers to the turned on re-imaginings of Beck/Page/Bloomfield et.al.. His guitar work is a blast to listen to. And his 'soul' isn't pandering. This disc was a good get.

Martin's not without his charm I suppose, especially when he plays straight up Blues rather than blues-rock.

Here's an interview for you:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=6HjI0FM8Rlo

Blues and Ragtime by Reverend Gary Davis

The Rev is in fine form here...some great live stuff...I love this version of "Hesitation Blues"

Melvin Taylor - 'Dirty Pool' - Evidence Records

A 1996 recording. I picked this one up, cheap, a few years ago and never thought much of it. Then I gave it a spin yesterday and got on the bus! Taylor is a Chicago rooted blues man whose electric guitar work is expansive. Jazz fans would get into this as well as newbies to the blues who come in from the Stevie Ray Vaughn end of things. This is solid, modern Chicago style blues from a basic trio with guitar solos to sink your teeth into. A little wah wah pedal never hurt anyone ;o)

From the liner notes (because I love the description):

Right from the opener, 'Too Sorry', there's a casual edge to Taylor's musical cleverness, a sense of abandon that comes from the gut, not from learned technique. The familiar accented strums that open the tune yield to a straight-forward verse and chorus, like you'd hear any perfectly good blues band deliver. Then Taylor flips his switch. He steps on his wah wah pedal to take a solo that balances sweeping runs and bends with standard turnarounds - stepping right up to the brink of extremity, then falling respectfully back into the song. But don't be lulled. Taylor's a master of the stealth solo. He's baiting us. Just when you think he's going to stick to the rules, he comes back in with another guitar soliloquy that's an outright brain-fryer. And on 'Too Sorry', it's that second shot of guitar that draws blood. His six string courses up in a sudden headrush of volume, braying until the notes cease speaking in melodies and fall into a jumble of tongues. (It's the kind of slurring, trilling clusters the late, great jazz guitarist Sonny Sharrock mastered - and he learned it from Coltrane) Then Melvin's back to slashing up the melody, gliding through the wah wah's timbral range (he loves that wah wah) until the corker; a giddy rush of unaccompanied guitar glossolalia that culminates in the Slack band rejoining him for the closing chord.

Yum. Tastes great.

Brownie McGhee - The Complete Brownie McGhee





If you don't get to toe tapping and enjoying yourself....you're either in need of an E.R. or you're dead.




YO!

Big Bad!

Ma Rainey / Ma Rainey's Black Bottom

Can you do the black bottom, Rovias?