I hate the blues

[surfer]

Darren, what was the name of that killer harmonica player we listened to in your house a couple of weeks ago?

That was this playlist, but I can't remember what song we were listening to, I think it was the Little Charlie and Nightcats track.

[bedouin]

One of my favorite Blues discs, that doesn't get much mention is Champion Jack Dupree's bittersweet "Blues from the Gutter".

...and for the John Lee Hooker fans out there, this one is unmissable:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GOCAC8FCqE

[Captain Hate]

Elmore James never gets mentioned much, probably because he wasn't very musically advanced with everything being in F iirc, but for raw crazed manic sense of urgency his raspy voice and electrified slide provide compelling listening.

[MRS]

Elmore's 2CD box set is essential. "Something Inside Me" is one of the greatest songs on the idiom.

[greenriver]

whoops, forgot to mention elmore james. that guy was excellent.

[jon abbey]

bumping a short blues thread, upon request.

[Wombatz]

[mudd]

blind roosevelt graves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyCcHWt1TqI

lately i've found a lot to love in the intersection between blues and religious music, from the early jesus howlers likes blind willie to electric guitar gospel.

i suck at making lists but maybe i'll post some more songs.

m

[joeperucki]

While searching (online) for Charlie Patton, I found Founder Of The Delta Blues on LP - Yazoo records.
Anyone familiar with other must haves from Yazoo? Seems like a great resource for very early music.

[jon abbey]

they have a lot of classic material, but the sound quality is generally brutal. for instance, I'd recommend the cleaned up double CD version of The Complete Blind Willie Johnson on Sony/Columbia to the earlier releases on Yazoo.

[negative potential]

Gonna go against the popular wisdom and suggest things in the lineage of Texas/Los Angeles electric blues: T-Bone Walker, Lowell Fulson, Pee Wee Crayton, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, etc. There's a real jazz/swing element to this stuff I find infectious. Also love a lot of 40s Jump Blues.

I'm also a huge fan of Elijah Wald's book, _Escaping the Delta_, which I think is the finest piece of blues scholarship in existence, for finally sweeping away the mythologies of decades of blues fandom casting it as archaic rural folk music. Wald is very good on pointing out that blues, when it was actually popular music, was considered slick, cutting edge commercial pop. The "delta" stuff which is these days regarded as blues canon was not actually what most African American audiences were listening to back then (smooth urban performers of the form like Leroy Carr were more popular than unknowns like Robert Johnson), nor were people like Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Son House and other delta performers part of some archaic folk "tradition"; they were rural guys playing the commercial pop music style of their day. The stereotypical image of the blues as rural, traditional, mystical, etc. music was something that arose in the 1960s through the filter of white rock and folk revivalist audiences. Great book, check it out

[jhreynolds]

Love this guy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UACDi5MuqrM

[Dan Warburton]

A few perennial favourites



That's EVANS - what happened to the S I don't know

[Herb Levy]

Gonna go against the popular wisdom and suggest things in the lineage of Texas/Los Angeles electric blues: T-Bone Walker, Lowell Fulson, Pee Wee Crayton, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, etc. There's a real jazz/swing element to this stuff I find infectious. Also love a lot of 40s Jump Blues.

I'm also a huge fan of Elijah Wald's book, _Escaping the Delta_, which I think is the finest piece of blues scholarship in existence, for finally sweeping away the mythologies of decades of blues fandom casting it as archaic rural folk music. Wald is very good on pointing out that blues, when it was actually popular music, was considered slick, cutting edge commercial pop. The "delta" stuff which is these days regarded as blues canon was not actually what most African American audiences were listening to back then (smooth urban performers of the form like Leroy Carr were more popular than unknowns like Robert Johnson), nor were people like Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Son House and other delta performers part of some archaic folk "tradition"; they were rural guys playing the commercial pop music style of their day. The stereotypical image of the blues as rural, traditional, mystical, etc. music was something that arose in the 1960s through the filter of white rock and folk revivalist audiences. Great book, check it out

Wald's a good writer & historian, and Escaping the Delta is an interesting book that's very useful for understanding the early days of the blues. But using this as an argument for considering the state of the music now, has some of the same problems of the Crouch/Lincoln Center analysis of the history of jazz. Wald is more realistic than that.

While it may be exactly true that, before the 1950s & '60s, blues, and jazz, functioned in the ways described, but denying the influence of what has happened since then ignores how artistic styles and genres develop. The performances & artists that are being described as aberrations took place more than fifty years ago and have become entwined in the music we hear today. Adhering to earlier performance standards for reasons of stylistic purity, can turn artists into historical re-enactors like those in Williamsburg or Philadelphia.

[negative potential]

Oh, I love all that 50s and 60s stuff, make no mistake. I was just making recommendations that go against the grain a bit. And also just making recommendations in line with my personal taste: as far as electric blues goes, I like the slick, polished stuff more.

[Bonehole]

I'd just like to add Freddie King to this thread ...for his guitar sound and his voice. Gets me everytime. And he rarely seems to get a mention.
This album I picked up on spec of the cover many years ago, back when I thought smoking was cool and rebellious.

[yonhosago]

please, can someone recommend a good Little Walter compilation?

[Steve Minkin]

please, can someone recommend a good Little Walter compilation?

He recorded primarily on Chess. I have this single CD comp from Chess, and there's also a his Chess Box, a pricey 5-CD set.

[jon abbey]

he might have been better as a sideman to Muddy Waters, he is all over the classic Chess Muddy Waters material playing killer harmonica.

[yonhosago]

thank you people