Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Henry Thomas Performing "Bull Doze Blues".
CD Review
Texas Blues: Early Blues Masters From The Lone Star State: 4CD Set, Various artists, JSP records, London, 2004
Well here we go again. Just when you thought I had stopped talking about Texas after my many reviews of things Texas like the work of the writer Larry McMurtry and singers Janis Joplin, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb, Lonnie Johnson and the electric Lightnin’ Hopkins I am here to review a four CD compilation of early Texas bluesmen. Now in this space I have reviewed North Carolina blues, Delta blues, traveling up river to Memphis blues and then to the Mecca, Chicago blues. They all have their own distinct variations and to a musicologist there are some subtle ways of playing that draw those distinctions out. For the laity though what makes that distinction is the rather laid-back way in which the music flows. Flows nicely, to be sure, but not in the pristine pick of North Carolina blues, the sweat of the plantation of Delta blues, the honky-tonk sound of Memphis or the raw blues sound of Chicago but the hard strum and slurring of words that is much softer by comparison than those other sounds.
I mentioned above the names Blind Lemon Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb and Lonnie Johnson. These are the traditions that the artists on these CDs are working with. They are mainly contemporaries and obviously not as well known either because the vagaries of fate, personal or otherwise didn’t leave much room for their work to become widely recognized in the “golden age” of this type of music in the late 1920’s before the deal when down in the Great Depression and cut off their sources of wider fame. Nevertheless we can, thanks to the producers of this set, get to hear them almost one hundred years later. Hell, most of them still sound good, at least in spots. Here is the cream: Disc A, Henry Thomas on the much-covered classic “John Henry” , a great version of “Don’t You Leave Me Here” and the novelty number (all railroad stops) “Railroadin’ Some”; Pete Harris on “Blind Lemon’s Song” (the also much-covered “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean” :Disc C, Oscar Woods on the salacious “Don’t Sell It” and “Boll Weevil Blues” and Smith Casey on “East Texas Rag”. Also included in this series are Ramblin’ Thomas, Willie Reed, Coley Jones, Little Hat Jones, Jesse Thomas and Black Ace. Some good stuff by the lot of them but nothing that really jumped out like with Henry Thomas and Oscar Woods.
Bull Doze Blues - Henry Thomas
I'm going away, babe, and it won't be long
I'm going away and it won't be long
I'm going away and it won't be long
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
I'm going back to Tennessee
I'm going back to Memphis, Tennessee
I'm going back, Memphis, Tennessee
I'm going where I never get bulldozed
I'm going where I never get the bulldoze
I'm going where I never get bulldozed
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a hole I'm in
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a hole I'm in
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a fool I've been.
Oh, my babe, take me back. How in the world, Lord, take me back.
CD Review
Texas Blues: Early Blues Masters From The Lone Star State: 4CD Set, Various artists, JSP records, London, 2004
Well here we go again. Just when you thought I had stopped talking about Texas after my many reviews of things Texas like the work of the writer Larry McMurtry and singers Janis Joplin, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb, Lonnie Johnson and the electric Lightnin’ Hopkins I am here to review a four CD compilation of early Texas bluesmen. Now in this space I have reviewed North Carolina blues, Delta blues, traveling up river to Memphis blues and then to the Mecca, Chicago blues. They all have their own distinct variations and to a musicologist there are some subtle ways of playing that draw those distinctions out. For the laity though what makes that distinction is the rather laid-back way in which the music flows. Flows nicely, to be sure, but not in the pristine pick of North Carolina blues, the sweat of the plantation of Delta blues, the honky-tonk sound of Memphis or the raw blues sound of Chicago but the hard strum and slurring of words that is much softer by comparison than those other sounds.
I mentioned above the names Blind Lemon Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb and Lonnie Johnson. These are the traditions that the artists on these CDs are working with. They are mainly contemporaries and obviously not as well known either because the vagaries of fate, personal or otherwise didn’t leave much room for their work to become widely recognized in the “golden age” of this type of music in the late 1920’s before the deal when down in the Great Depression and cut off their sources of wider fame. Nevertheless we can, thanks to the producers of this set, get to hear them almost one hundred years later. Hell, most of them still sound good, at least in spots. Here is the cream: Disc A, Henry Thomas on the much-covered classic “John Henry” , a great version of “Don’t You Leave Me Here” and the novelty number (all railroad stops) “Railroadin’ Some”; Pete Harris on “Blind Lemon’s Song” (the also much-covered “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean” :Disc C, Oscar Woods on the salacious “Don’t Sell It” and “Boll Weevil Blues” and Smith Casey on “East Texas Rag”. Also included in this series are Ramblin’ Thomas, Willie Reed, Coley Jones, Little Hat Jones, Jesse Thomas and Black Ace. Some good stuff by the lot of them but nothing that really jumped out like with Henry Thomas and Oscar Woods.
Bull Doze Blues - Henry Thomas
I'm going away, babe, and it won't be long
I'm going away and it won't be long
I'm going away and it won't be long
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Just as sure as that train leaves out of that Mobile yard
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
Come shake your hand, tell your papa goodbye
I'm going back to Tennessee
I'm going back to Memphis, Tennessee
I'm going back, Memphis, Tennessee
I'm going where I never get bulldozed
I'm going where I never get the bulldoze
I'm going where I never get bulldozed
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a hole I'm in
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a hole I'm in
If you don't believe I'm sinking, look what a fool I've been.
Oh, my babe, take me back. How in the world, Lord, take me back.
