Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Jesse Mae Hemphill Doing "You Can Talk About Me".
DVD REVIEW
Deep Blues, commentary by musicologist Robert Palmer and performances by various artists, directed by Robert Mugge, Shout Factory, 1993
Over the past year or so I have spent some time in this space addressing the question of why various male folk performers like Jesse Winchester, Tom Rush, and Chris Smither, from the folk revival of the 1960's, did or did not become "king of the hill" in that genre. (I am in the process of doing the same for female folk singers as "queen of the hill"). I have also addressed that same question, although not as extensively, concerning the various 1950's rock `n' roll artists who were left behind when rock exploded on the scene. I thought I had covered so many of the artists from the blues scene that I did not think that I needed to pose the question in that genre. Apparently I was wrong as this well done blues documentary, "Deep Blues", directed by Robert Mugge and narrated by the famed blues musicologist Robert Palmer poses that very question point blank at those left behind down at the lesser levels of the blues pantheon.
This film spends no little time on setting the framework for its above-mentioned premise. That question, as the documentary unfolds, keeps honing in on who has kept the blues tradition alive back down at the roots-mainly in the rural South among the black agricultural laborers, small town black entertainment entrepreneurs and others who want to continue the blues tradition of the Saturday night "juke joint". In short this film is a labor of love by Mugge and Palmer in honor of those who have kept the blues tradition alive, mainly as a labor of their love. Although this film was produced in 1991 in the year 2009 the same question could be fruitfully posed about has kept the faith down home. Although there are periodic revivals of the blues around such events as Martin Scorsese's six-part PBS blues documentary of 2003 the hard truth is that the blues, as a genre, is not generally a paying proposition these days. So it has to be love of this art form that drives the work.
A number of lesser known blues performers performing their work, some that I had heard of previously others that I have not, form the core of this film. After viewing the performances I come way, once again, with that nagging question about why some artists "made it" and others did not. All blues aficionados are familiar with Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Son House, Memphis Minnie, Etta James,"Big Mama" Thornton and the like. But what about those on the "chittlin' circuit"- the likes of Junior Kimbrough, R.L. Burnside, Jessie Mae Hemphill, Roosevelt Barnes, Big Jack Johnson and Lonnie Pitchford? I thought not. Some decided for personal reasons to stay put, some were in the wrong place at the wrong time, some are merely imitative of greater artists and some are just flat out not good enough for the "bigs". Nevertheless this is their story. Kudos to Mugge and Palmer for telling it.
Jesse Mae Hemphill - Standing In My Doorway Crying Lyrics
Oh baby
I'm standing in my doorway crying
Oh baby
I'm standing in my doorway crying
Oh baby
Oh baby
You know I love you baby
But you treat me so lowdown
You know I love you baby
But you treat me so lowdown yeah
When you left me baby yeah
you left me ring in my hand and crying
when you left me baby yeah yeah
you left me ring in my hand and crying
Oh yeah yeah
you know love you baby
wont you come back home to me
You know I love you baby yeah
wont you come back home to me yeah
you left me darling
I never loved a man yeah
like I love you before
I never loved a man baby
like I loved you before yeah
you left me darling
The man love yeah yeah
he treat me so mean yeah
the man I love yeah
he treat me so mean
some day baby
some day baby
you'll want from me
Oh home yeah come home
come home yeah come on home yeah
come on home baby
come on home baby
I got love for you baby
Junior Kimbrough - Done Got Old lyrics
Well, I done got old
I caint do the thangs I used to do;
I'm a old man
Well, I done got old
I caint do the thangs I used to do;
I'm a old man
Remember the day, Babe
Now dead and gone
Days I could love you
So many times
Now things have changed
And I done got old
I caint do the thangs I used to do;
I'm a old man
I don' look like I used
Can't walk like I used
Cain't love like I used
Now things have changed
And I done got old
I caint do the thangs I used to do;
I'm a old man
Junior Kimbrough - Meet Me In The City lyrics
Meet me over in the city
And I see everything is so fine
We'll get together now, Darling
Oh yeah, we will
We'll make everything all right
Oh Honey, don't
Please, please don't leave me right now
Right now
You got me, Baby
You got me, Girl
You got me where you want me, Baby
Now Girl, I know you are
Satisfied
You got me, Baby
You got me, Girl
You got me where you want me, Baby
Now Girl, I know you are
Satisfied
Yeah but there's one more thing I wanna tell you right now, Baby
Don't leave me, Girl
Please, please don't leave me right now
Right now
Sometimes I think I will, Baby
And then again my my my my my my my mind'll change
Yeah, sometimes I think I will, Baby
And then again my my my my my my my mind'll change
Ah tell me don't do it right now
Please, please don't leave me right now, right now
Ah ha, I love you, Girl
Yeah a yeah yeah yeah yeah
I love you, Babe
Please, please don't leave me right
Right now
Junior Kimbrough - Sad Days Lonely Nights lyrics
My momma told me
I was a child
She said, "Son,
You're gonna have hard days"
My daddy told me too
He said, "Son,
You're gonna have sad days
Lonely nights
Setting alone
Head hung down
Tears runnin' down"
Done got old
Sad days, lonely nights
Done overtaken me
Sometimes I set alone
I wonder about the things
My mum and daddy told me
Sad days, lonely nights
come overtaking me
Showing posts with label rural southern blues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rural southern blues. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 09, 2009
Sunday, April 19, 2009
*"Hard Times Come Again No More"- The Songs Of The "First Wave" Great Depression Of The 1930's- In Honor Of "Apple Annie" and "Pencil Slim"
Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Kate And Anna McGarrigle, Friends And Family Performing Stephen Foster's "Hard Times Come Again No More".
CD REVIEWS
Hard Times Come Again No More: Early American Rural Songs Of Hard Times And Hardships, various artists, Volumes One and Two, Yazoo Records, 1998
This review covers both volumes of this two-part CD set.
Yes, I am aware that the 1930’s Great Depression was not the first depression that this country had faced but it was the first in which the United States, as a world power anointed by its successes in World War I, created worldwide economic chaos in its wake. However we will leave aside economic history and concentrate on today’s impeding great depression, as the daily news most painfully reminds us seems to be coming. Today I want to discuss what to do about that eventually in the short haul. Obviously, in the long haul we have to fight for a more rational system based on production (and distribution) for need, not for profit. In the meantime what are all of our fellow unemployed to do- right now! Well, now we do have to look back at history, and at least with a little tongue-in-cheek. Back in the 1930’s its seems that on every corner of every town and village one found an “Apple Annie” selling her apples for a nickel to survive or a “Pencil Slim” hawking his pencils for spare change. Tough times indeed. And to while away that long lonely, sometimes empty-handed, vigil many times they sang songs to get attention.
This brings us to the two volume CD set under review that contains some forty-six songs, almost solely from the rural southern part of the United States. The set features themes of hard times, harder times and then the merely desperate ones. For poor blacks and whites alike. The milieu covered in this set appears to be away from the Mississippi Delta that created the country blues and rather are songs from places like Arkansas (that takes a beating in a couple of songs here that will not sit well with Chamber of Commerce-types), North Carolina and Georgia. The jobs, or lack of jobs complained of, run from small unsuccessful tenant farming and sharecropping fighting off the boll weevil and, as several songs make clear, the Boll Weevil landlord or his agents to cheap labor in the textile mills. The instruments used, to my ear, include simple guitar (especially whatever odd-stringed one , as usual, Joe Williams has concocted on “Providence Helps The Poor People”), fiddles galore (a staple of country music and a real plus when, as here, some of the vocals, are reedy), mandolin, washboard, harmonica and whatever else could make noise cheaply with what was at hand.
Clearly with forty- six songs to choose from the quality, even on a Yazoo production that prides itself on both inclusiveness and getting the best sounds possible (and excellent liner notes as well), is uneven. However the following stand out here; obviously the Joe Williams tune mentioned above; Sleepy John Estes on “Down South Blues”; Blind Blake on “No Dough Blues”; Blind Lemon Jefferson on the classic “One Dime Blues” (if you could have put his voice together with Etta Baker’s guitar version you would have an incredible sound on that one); Mississippi John Hurt on “Blue Harvest Blues”; and The Graham Brothers on the title track “Hard Times Come Again No More” (an old Stephen Foster tune from the 1840’s so there is nothing new about hard times).
All of those names above have been mentioned before in this space and reflect their then emergence as country performers. However there is a second layer of performers here that intrigue me and bear further listening. Of that group The Bentley Boys on the now well-known “Down On Penny’s Farm” sticks out (a song, by the way, that Bob Dylan used as an idea for his early “Talking New York Blues”). Another is Blind Alfred Reed on “How Can A Poor Man Stand” as is the great guitarist Barbecue Bob on “We Sure Got Hard Times”. There are not many women on these CDs but Samantha Bumgarner is fine on “Georgia Blues”. The real sleeper on this whole compilation however is Elder Curry & His Congregation whooping it up on a gospelly “Hard Times”. Okay, so now you have the songs that you can sing on those lonely street corners. Now all you need is some apples or pencils. Hard times come again no more, indeed.
HOW CAN A POOR MAN STAND SUCH TIMES AND LIVE ?
Blind Alfred Reed - 1929
There once was a time when everything was cheap,
But now prices nearly puts a man to sleep.
When we pay our grocery bill,
We just feel like making our will --
I remember when dry goods were cheap as dirt,
We could take two bits and buy a dandy shirt.
Now we pay three bucks or more,
Maybe get a shirt that another man wore --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Well, I used to trade with a man by the name of Gray,
Flour was fifty cents for a twenty-four pound bag.
Now it's a dollar and a half beside,
Just like a-skinning off a flea for the hide --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Oh, the schools we have today ain't worth a cent,
But they see to it that every child is sent.
If we don't send everyday,
We have a heavy fine to pay --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Prohibition's good if 'tis conducted right,
There's no sense in shooting a man 'til he shows flight.
Officers kill without a cause,
They complain about funny laws --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Most all preachers preach for gold and not for souls,
That's what keeps a poor man always in a hole.
We can hardly get our breath,
Taxed and schooled and preached to death --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Oh, it's time for every man to be awake,
We pay fifty cents a pound when we ask for steak.
When we get our package home,
A little wad of paper with gristle and a bone --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Well, the doctor comes around with a face all bright,
And he says in a little while you'll be all right.
All he gives is a humbug pill,
A dose of dope and a great big bill --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Hard Times Come Again No More
(Stephen Collins Foster)
Let us pause in life's pleasures and count it's many tears
While we all sup sorrow with the poor
There's a song that will linger forever in our ears;
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
'Tis the song, the sigh of the weary
Hard times, hard times come again no more
Many days you have lingered
Around my cabin door
Oh hard times come again no more
While we seek mirth and beauty and music light and gay
There are frail forms fainting at the door
Though their voices are silent, their pleading looks will say;
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
There's a pale sorrowed maiden who toils her life away
With a worn heart whose better days are o'er
Though her voice would be merry, 'tis sighing all the day
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
'Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave
'Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore
'Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
CD REVIEWS
Hard Times Come Again No More: Early American Rural Songs Of Hard Times And Hardships, various artists, Volumes One and Two, Yazoo Records, 1998
This review covers both volumes of this two-part CD set.
Yes, I am aware that the 1930’s Great Depression was not the first depression that this country had faced but it was the first in which the United States, as a world power anointed by its successes in World War I, created worldwide economic chaos in its wake. However we will leave aside economic history and concentrate on today’s impeding great depression, as the daily news most painfully reminds us seems to be coming. Today I want to discuss what to do about that eventually in the short haul. Obviously, in the long haul we have to fight for a more rational system based on production (and distribution) for need, not for profit. In the meantime what are all of our fellow unemployed to do- right now! Well, now we do have to look back at history, and at least with a little tongue-in-cheek. Back in the 1930’s its seems that on every corner of every town and village one found an “Apple Annie” selling her apples for a nickel to survive or a “Pencil Slim” hawking his pencils for spare change. Tough times indeed. And to while away that long lonely, sometimes empty-handed, vigil many times they sang songs to get attention.
This brings us to the two volume CD set under review that contains some forty-six songs, almost solely from the rural southern part of the United States. The set features themes of hard times, harder times and then the merely desperate ones. For poor blacks and whites alike. The milieu covered in this set appears to be away from the Mississippi Delta that created the country blues and rather are songs from places like Arkansas (that takes a beating in a couple of songs here that will not sit well with Chamber of Commerce-types), North Carolina and Georgia. The jobs, or lack of jobs complained of, run from small unsuccessful tenant farming and sharecropping fighting off the boll weevil and, as several songs make clear, the Boll Weevil landlord or his agents to cheap labor in the textile mills. The instruments used, to my ear, include simple guitar (especially whatever odd-stringed one , as usual, Joe Williams has concocted on “Providence Helps The Poor People”), fiddles galore (a staple of country music and a real plus when, as here, some of the vocals, are reedy), mandolin, washboard, harmonica and whatever else could make noise cheaply with what was at hand.
Clearly with forty- six songs to choose from the quality, even on a Yazoo production that prides itself on both inclusiveness and getting the best sounds possible (and excellent liner notes as well), is uneven. However the following stand out here; obviously the Joe Williams tune mentioned above; Sleepy John Estes on “Down South Blues”; Blind Blake on “No Dough Blues”; Blind Lemon Jefferson on the classic “One Dime Blues” (if you could have put his voice together with Etta Baker’s guitar version you would have an incredible sound on that one); Mississippi John Hurt on “Blue Harvest Blues”; and The Graham Brothers on the title track “Hard Times Come Again No More” (an old Stephen Foster tune from the 1840’s so there is nothing new about hard times).
All of those names above have been mentioned before in this space and reflect their then emergence as country performers. However there is a second layer of performers here that intrigue me and bear further listening. Of that group The Bentley Boys on the now well-known “Down On Penny’s Farm” sticks out (a song, by the way, that Bob Dylan used as an idea for his early “Talking New York Blues”). Another is Blind Alfred Reed on “How Can A Poor Man Stand” as is the great guitarist Barbecue Bob on “We Sure Got Hard Times”. There are not many women on these CDs but Samantha Bumgarner is fine on “Georgia Blues”. The real sleeper on this whole compilation however is Elder Curry & His Congregation whooping it up on a gospelly “Hard Times”. Okay, so now you have the songs that you can sing on those lonely street corners. Now all you need is some apples or pencils. Hard times come again no more, indeed.
HOW CAN A POOR MAN STAND SUCH TIMES AND LIVE ?
Blind Alfred Reed - 1929
There once was a time when everything was cheap,
But now prices nearly puts a man to sleep.
When we pay our grocery bill,
We just feel like making our will --
I remember when dry goods were cheap as dirt,
We could take two bits and buy a dandy shirt.
Now we pay three bucks or more,
Maybe get a shirt that another man wore --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Well, I used to trade with a man by the name of Gray,
Flour was fifty cents for a twenty-four pound bag.
Now it's a dollar and a half beside,
Just like a-skinning off a flea for the hide --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Oh, the schools we have today ain't worth a cent,
But they see to it that every child is sent.
If we don't send everyday,
We have a heavy fine to pay --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Prohibition's good if 'tis conducted right,
There's no sense in shooting a man 'til he shows flight.
Officers kill without a cause,
They complain about funny laws --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Most all preachers preach for gold and not for souls,
That's what keeps a poor man always in a hole.
We can hardly get our breath,
Taxed and schooled and preached to death --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Oh, it's time for every man to be awake,
We pay fifty cents a pound when we ask for steak.
When we get our package home,
A little wad of paper with gristle and a bone --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Well, the doctor comes around with a face all bright,
And he says in a little while you'll be all right.
All he gives is a humbug pill,
A dose of dope and a great big bill --
Tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
Hard Times Come Again No More
(Stephen Collins Foster)
Let us pause in life's pleasures and count it's many tears
While we all sup sorrow with the poor
There's a song that will linger forever in our ears;
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
'Tis the song, the sigh of the weary
Hard times, hard times come again no more
Many days you have lingered
Around my cabin door
Oh hard times come again no more
While we seek mirth and beauty and music light and gay
There are frail forms fainting at the door
Though their voices are silent, their pleading looks will say;
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
There's a pale sorrowed maiden who toils her life away
With a worn heart whose better days are o'er
Though her voice would be merry, 'tis sighing all the day
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
'Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave
'Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore
'Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave
Oh, hard times come again no more
Chorus
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