Tail Dragger, Stop Lyin'

Tail Dragger (aka James Yancy Jones) is one SINGER. He has that Howlin' Wolf sort of gruff soul and you can hear it to good advantage on this, his very first album Stop Lyin' (Delmark 828), recorded in 1982. Only two songs were originally released from it (on a 45 and then an anthology), so this is the first time the full album has been available.

He belts out some very solid Chicago blues with an excellent band. As a bonus he reminisces for a few minutes about his early Chicago days at the end of the album. It's very funny-real and informative about what things were like for him and the crew he ran with.

It's the real deal, the real blues, done with lots of soul and fire! Oh yeah, it IS.

Junior Well's Classic Hoodoo Man Blues Reissued

Chicago's soul blues dynamo Junior Wells was severely ripping it up by the mid-sixties. He combined some of the heavy qualities of the soul beat with the raw energy of Junior himself and the Chicago blues in general. His 1965 classic Hoodoo Man Blues pitted his leather-for-hell vocals with his wailing harmonica and all of that in turn with Buddy Guy's iconic guitar stylings and a hip backing band. It is with us again in a reissue (Delmark 812) that includes seven alternate takes, several unissued.

Junior of course had a vocal style no one else could touch, with at least five different vocal attacks and a face-full of blues. Buddy Guy was his perfect foil. And with this album every song is a miniature masterwork, some reworked blues classics, others associated exclusively with Junior.

It sounds as good as ever. Better, even. The alternate takes are not a huge revelation but it's good to hear the variations. The previously unreleased studio chatter slices give you a "you are there" feel, bring you into the studio as a spectator from the future.

This is prime Wells--very possibly his very best. And that is saying an awful lot. It is a must for any serious student of the blues. Or anybody who wants the blues to shine with the sun in today's back door (with any luck)!

Demetria Taylor Sings Some Bad Blues on "Bad Girl"!

Demetria Taylor sings the blues. She SINGS the blues. Ever since Ma, Bessie and Minnie, women have made it clear that the blues is no exclusively male domain. That's no less true in the urban, electrified blues world today than it was when the early masters recorded, Bessie in a tent on one session, since her voice was so powerful the cutting needle was jumping off its track. If anybody would make that needle jump again, its Demetria Taylor. She has one huge and imperative delivery. She belts them out, Jack. She's the daughter of Chicago blues guitar legend Eddie Taylor, and you hear how she must have imbibed the blues tradition starting at a young age.

Bad Girl (Delmark 814), her recorded debut, dispenses with the tent because today of course we can get the levels right without recourse to such extremes. Tent or no, Demetria lets it all loose in a program of blues classics and classic blues that electrify as they electri-testify. It's Demetria and a hot band of urban bluesmen. The guitars of Shun Kikuta and Eddie Taylor, Jr come out of the background and power up some firestorming bends and tatoos to match Demetria's passionate soulfulness.

Listen to the growling despair of "Cherry Red Wine" and you know that nothing has been watered down for the feint of heart. There are hot versions of "Wang Dang Doodle," "I'm A Woman/Hootchie Cootchie Woman," "Big Boss Man," and "Wang Dang Doodle" and "Little Red Rooster," and it all hits home. Demetria HAS it in all the ways the classic Chicago blues greats had it. Bad Girl gives you the goods. You think there's nothing happening in the blues today? Think again. Demetria Taylor is one of those happening things. So get with her music.

Studebaker John Returns with Some Blistering Chicago Blues

The Chicago blues have never died. Judging from some choice recent releases, it never will. Studebaker John (and His Maxwell Street Kings) have a new one. It is one of the affirmations that proves the rule, so to speak. That's the Way You Do (Delmark 810) literally teams over with 15 original gems that bring to the fore all the Delta-come-up-to Chi-town sounds that helped define American music over the years.

Studebaker John Grimaldi uses his powerful vocal attack, full-throated harp wielding, and electric-electrifying slide guitar to give you the blues the way it was meant to be heard. Raw, exciting and in-your-face. He's joined by the hotly supportive Maxwell Street Kings, which consists of second guitarist Rick Kreher (who was with Muddy Waters at the end) and drummer Steve Cushing (host of the Chicago radio show Blues Before Sunrise). They give Studebaker the real deal with churning power blues chording, crackling backbeats and relentless shuffle grooves.

But it is Studebaker John himself that puts the music into orbit. He has BECOME the tradition and gives it back in ways that remind we why Little Walter, Muddy, the Wolf, and Jimmy Reed set me on my tail when I was young. The blues may be deceptively simple in form, but playing them with style and conviction isn't. Studebaker John DOES. Yes, he does.

Floyd McDaniel Plays The Classic Blues on "West Side Baby"

The blues. I have them. The times are right for them. They've been with me since I was a kid and I always return to them to refresh my soul. Floyd McDaniel may not be a name everybody knows but he embodies the blues. He died at age 80 in 1995 after a long career as another of the many notable Chicago bluesmen. If you've lived on the South Side of Chicago you know that the blues never needed reviving there. It's been a constant in the fabric of life since the urban blues revolution hit, when guitarists plugged in and let it ride, baby.

Floyd was recorded in concert in Germany in his last days. West Side Baby (Delmark DE-706) is the new re-release of that gig, and it shows you that age is no factor when the blues are real. There he was, 79 years old, singing and wailing on lead guitar, backed by a very hip band, affirming to everyone that blues with a feeling has no mandatory retirement age. The album was out-of-print for a while but it's here again and it's worth checking out.

Mr. McDaniel gives us some of his own special versions of some of the all-time classics--Handy's "St. Louis Blues," T-Bone's "Mean Old World," "Route 66," "Evening," which Jimmy Rushing made his own, "Sweet Home Chicago" and Floyd's own signature "West Side Baby," among others. He digs in and makes them Floyd McDaniel songs, absolutely.

It's prime, vibrantly alive music. Floyd plays a very soulful lead and his vocals are right there too. It's some stunning music if you dig the real blues. It's the way I'm sure he would want to be remembered. Click on the Delmark link below for more info and/or to order a copy.

Junior Wells Kicks Tail on a Previously Unissued Live Recording

When I was a kid there were bargain 45-rpm record deals to be had at my local 5 & 10. You'd get something like 10 records for, if I remember right, $1.19. They put a minor hit on the outside edge of each side of the package, to entice you to buy. Buried within were eight more records, and those were not hits. You'd wind up with all kinds of things. In one pack I found a single by Junior Wells, "Up in Heah." I listened and I was entranced. It sounded like the Rolling Stones (well, in a way), only better. I had discovered the blues, the source! I bought some more "flop packs," as my peers called them, and was turned on to more blues artists, Jimmy Reed, for example. I was hooked. And I realized that music that was not in the top 10 pop charts could be good, great, even better than the hits! My listening expanded from there but I was a confirmed Junior Wells fan from that moment on.

Junior passed in 1998 and the world lost a great one. But of course his music lives on. Now we have an unearthed treasure to savor, a previously unreleased Junior Wells live date with his wonderful Aces, Live in Boston 1966 (Delmark 809). The sound is good and Jr. and the band is smoking! What a band. Junior vocals and harp, the legendary Fred Below on drums, Louis Meyers on guitar and Dave Myers on bass. At the time of the recording they were one of the hottest and hippest blues bands alive and they show you how hot on these sides.

They cover some of the blues classics in a way the only Jr. Wells and the Aces could. After his version, who cared about the others? This is blues with a blazing immediacy, soul incarnate. Live in Boston captures the excitement of live Junior, one of the greatest blues acts that ever graced the stage in a small club. And he was at a peak in 1966!

From "Feelin' Good" (He sings "gonna boog-gae" like his immortal sound depended on it) to "Got My Mojo Workin'" this is totally prime Wells and Aces.

Oh I know you know, if you know. But even if you KNOW, this is the stuff to KNOW. This is a killer disk, a knockout, a TKO in the first round. Do NOT miss this, if you have a soul, if you have soul, if you have soles on your shoes to walk down to your neighborhood record store (oops, there aren't any left. . . ) well take a virtual walk through cyberspace if you need to, just get to a place that sells this one. Like http://www.jazzmart.com, which you can get to by clicking the Delmark link in the section below. Then pop it on your player. Then you'll really KNOW you KNOW. Honest.

Jimmy Dawkins and the Leric Story: '80s Chicago Blues Lives On

Chicago bluesman Jimmy Dawkins ran his Leric Records in the '80s, turning out a series of sides that carried on the urban blues tradition in fine fashion. Dawkins and a series of key sidemen backed up a number of lesser known but not lesser endowed blues artists on the local scene: Little Johnny Christian, Tail Dragger, Queen Sylvia, Vance Kelly, and others.

Delmark Records has wisely reissued sixteen prime cuts from the labels output on Jimmy Dawkins Presents the Leric Story (Delmark 808).

These are totally committed slabs of pure sanctified blues-soul. Dawkins guitar work sparkles, the singers are putting it out and the backup band knows just what to do. It's the real thing, 1980 style. I was living in Chicagoland in those days and I must say it feels like home to hear these. Now if I could only get some Harold's Chicken Fedexed to my door, WITH the hot sauce, of course.

Jimmie Lee Robinson, Posthumously

February 13, 2009—The blues keep on playing a pivotal role in the American musical heritage as we experience it today. Much of the music out there presupposes its existence. Chicago has of course been an important, central city for its development, mainly for wave after wave of the urban, electric style that has been so influential.

Today we look at one of the lesser known electric blues heroes from Chicagoland, Jimmie Lee Robinson. He was Little Walter’s guitarist in the ‘50s and gigged around before making a comeback in the ‘90s. The CD we’re looking at today, Chicago Jump (Random Chance), was recorded during that later period but languished on the shelf until recently. Jimmie passed away in 2002 and so the CD is a kind of posthumous tribute. It’s a straightforward date with a small electric outfit doing songs in the tradition of the Chicago sound. Now Jimmie Lee was no B.B or Buddy Guy, but he was decent and in the tradition. And his vocals had a nice soulful attack. Perhaps this CD will not be nominated as one of the 100 best blues recordings of the 20th century but it is solid, real, engaging and direct. The best of the blues is like that.

Buddy Guy and Junior Wells

Originally posted on January 30, 2008

I’ve spoken of guitarist Buddy Guy before. I have another one on my list lately, Buddy Guy and Junior Wells (Castle). It’s one of those cobbled together things, sounds like from the ‘70s or ‘80s, but it has some nice moments with harmonica-vocalist Wells and his forceful blues attack trading lines with Buddy. One of my favorite Buddy Guy records was on Delmark. It included a blues to Chicago’s Mayor Daley (the first one) that was pretty amusing. I don’t know if it is still in print. Have to look for it again.