blues music

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postmortem/2010/07/musicians-phillip-walker-slim.html

RIP Phillip Walker

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/07/arts/music/07kirkland.html?src=me&ref=arts

RIP Eddie Kirkland, gypsy of the blues

As a child, he was poor in the Jim Crow South. As an adult, he lived through the deaths of several children, including the murder of the niece he had reared as a daughter. By his own account, he also survived two shootings and spent time on a chain gang.

A guitarist, singer, songwriter and harmonica player, Mr. Kirkland performed with some of the greatest names in blues and soul, including John Lee Hooker and Otis Redding. But he remained somewhat in the shadow of the stars, not as widely known as they and not remotely as well off. (Both conditions, by all accounts, were fine with him.)

He kept a rigorous touring schedule. Until several years ago, he spent more than 40 weeks a year on the road; more recently, he toured two weeks out of every four. His itinerant life long ago earned him the nickname the Gypsy of the Blues.

Mr. Kirkland died on Feb. 27, at 87, in a Tampa, Fla., hospital, from injuries sustained in an automobile accident as he drove between gigs that morning.

According to a spokeswoman for the Florida Highway Patrol, Mr. Kirkland turned into the path of a Greyhound bus on a highway in Homosassa, Fla. No one aboard the bus was injured.

So I saw a blues band from India called Soulmate at the Kennedy Center in Washington last Friday. The singer had a great voice. They did an opening song in their native language and then sang in English for the rest. Alas, the band was just a good Chicago blues cover band, albeit one from India.

They need to hear Otis Taylor

vindablues

Not quite Mississippi masala

Is the entirety of Mississippi Fred McDowell In London available somewhere? I have a s/t release on Everest that is apparently In London 2, which has been reissued as Steakbone Slide Guitar, but can I get 1 somewhere?

A movie doc on Mississippi Fred McDowell called "Shake 'Em on Down will be showing in Mississippi at the Clarksdale Filmfest Jan. 28 and the Oxford Film Fest February 18. Directors Joe York and Scott Barretta are working on getting more screening worldwide

Scott used to edit Living Blues Magazine and is a southern soul fan.

So I saw a blues band from India called Soulmate at the Kennedy Center in Washington last Friday...

I saw Aki Kumar recently, have you heard this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsFJ1UD4BY0

Nope.

Tuesday June 13- 4 to 5:30 pm -Film screening and discussion: Shake 'Em On Down, a documentary on the legendary bluesman Mississippi Fred McDowell, Scott Baretta, University of Mississippi; at the Library of Congress Pickford Theater, 3rd Floor, James Madison Building, Washington DC

McDowell's I Do Not Play No Rock & Roll album is so great, probs my alltime fave blues record. I don't know anything about him, so will be looking out for the doc.

there's a doc about alligator records on amazon prime i keep meaning to watch

are there any cool contemporary blues bands?

Gary Clark Jr. was pretty good when I saw him last year, if that counts. Does desert blues count?

forgot about Clark ... yeah, he counts.

if you mean, like Saharan desert blues, no that doesn't count. love that stuff, but that's not what i'm getting at.

not a band as such, but Eric Bibb is an excellent modern blues player. He left the US for Europe in the 70's and his last album is themed on the immigration crisis, so isn't all blind lemons and t-bone steaks or whatever!

*refugee crisis I meant, the album is called Migration Blues.

R.L. Boyce from Mississippi is touring and has a decent album out from last year.

Was impressed with Anthony Big A Sherrod and his band whom I saw in Clarksdale, Mississippi this past summer

Willie Clayton is a great soul blues singer

Boyce, Sherrod, and Clayton don't get the marketing hype of young Gary Clark, but they're still worth checking out

We're enjoying Bibb, Boyce, and Sherrod in plug tonight.

that Bibb track was excellent

Eric Bibb rules!

Skip James 1931 stuff not been mentioned yet.

Also really enjoyed Elijah Wald's Escaping The Delta book on the blues with Robert Johnson as a central focus.

Skip James' Today album from '68 is just awesome.

kickoff Festival International early with another great concert on the coulee in Becky's backyard, featuring the best Swamp Blues and Swamp Pop! Robert Finley, Raymond George, Lazy Lester, Carol Fran, Classie Ballou, Warren Storm, TK Hulin, Major Handy and His Soul Revue Band, Lil Buck Blues Band, and surprise guest! This a B.Y.O.B-n-B (Bring your own booze and blanket) event. Food will be available for sale. Tickets are donation based with a $25 minimum to help pay the musicians.

Event in Lafayette, Louisiana today

Hey ummmm.. if I’m really into the first side of Hooker n Heat, what else should I be listening to? solo electric stuff that’s just kind of unmetered and kind of angry.

Don’t say Phil Orcutt

the 90s Fat Possum stuff? RL Burnside, T-Model Ford, Junior Kimbrough etc

cool, yeah I love sad days and lonely nights by kimbrough, should definitely dig more into fat possum.

This is cool
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Fc30PUWs40

On a related note, was pleasantly surprised in past few years when I heard DJ Charlie Bones play this John Lee-sampling St. Germain track on the NTS morning show--my kinda French Touch wine-bar blues remix:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnzSkIjrtQ0

Hey ummmm.. if I’m really into the first side of Hooker n Heat, what else should I be listening to? solo electric stuff that’s just kind of unmetered and kind of angry.

― brimstead, Monday, September 28, 2020 12:04 PM (six months ago) bookmarkflaglink

"Unmetered and Kind of Angry" would be the name of my blues album

RIP at 68 from cancer Mississippi hill country bluesman RL Boyce who started as a drummer in Otha Turner’s blues fife and drum band, but later became known as a guitarist and was once nominated for a Grammy, and won a National Endowment for the Arts Heritage Fellowship award

he lost his Grammy bid ("Best Traditional Blues Album") to the Rolling Stones of all people, one of the more shameful occurrences in the history of that shameful institution

RIP

RIP. He was Otha's nephew iirc.

On a hot summer day in Mississippi,R L Boyce stopped to check in on long time friend Jessie Mae Hemphill.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxyTE55CNmg

He was incredible. I was fortunate enough to see him play a few times when he cans up here. Just hypnotic.

Sadly I was not aware of him until today. Listening now, this is excellent.

here's a nice remembrance of RL Boyce from 50 Miles of Elbow Room

https://www.50milesofelbowroom.com/articles/301-rl-boyce-a-jessie-qchipq-daniels.html

Boyce was good.

RIP Red Paden at only 67. My wife and I went to his divey blues bar in Clarksdale, Mississippi once . A great place.

Red Paden, who as the self-proclaimed “king of the juke joint runners” spent four decades as the owner of Red’s, an unassuming music spot in downtown Clarksdale, Miss., and one of the last places in the United States to offer authentic Delta blues in its natural setting, died on Dec. 30. He was 67.
His son, Orlando, said the death, in a hospital in Jackson, Miss., was from complications of heart surgery.

From NY Times obit