Blues expert Martin Hawkins tells the story of local blues singers and players that got onto records. The story goes beyond the Excello sound and the music of Lightnin' Slim, Slim Harpo, and also features folk music by Willie B. Thomas, Robert Pete Williams and others. A detailed introduction to the topic and artist biographies for each individual performer can be found in the extensive 52-page illustrated booklet. The recordings have been carefully remastered for this edition. Limited edition of 1,000 copies worldwide! These two CDs contain a more or less chronological taster of the blues from Baton Rouge, one of the several cities alongside the mighty Mississippi that has been thought of or thinks of itself as a blues town. Like New Orleans, Memphis, St. Louis and some smaller places, Baton Rouge's local blues players made a big contribution to the recorded legacy of the blues. We really don't know what the blue sound of Baton Rouge was before about 1954, when it's first bluesman was recorded, and by the 1970s the blues as current, recorded, black music was dying out, melding with R&B and the sounds of soul. Those newer sounds were still a part of black culture and, increasingly, of white culture locally and internationally, but a different muse, a different music, a different story. We concentrate on the period between 1954 and 1971, featuring here, together for the first time, those Baton Rouge singers and players who got onto records, one way or another. Some were aspiring professionals aiming for the stars, or at least for a local juke box spin, while others were local 'folk' performers plucked from their everyday life to sing for the man with the remote tape machine and a microphone.
2 Butch Cage and Willie B. Thomas - Who Broke the Lock
3 Lightnin' Slim - Bad Luck
4 Lightnin' Slim - Bugger Bugger Boy
5 Schoolboy Cleve - Strange Letter Blues
6 Clarence Edwards - Smokestack Lightning
7 Robert Pete Williams - Angola Special
8 Butch Cage and Willie B. Thomas - Jelly Roll
9 Slim Harpo - I'm a King Bee
10 Lonesome Sundown - My Home Is a Prison
11 Lightning Slim - Mean 'Ol Lonesome Train
12 Clarence Edwards - Stack O' Dollars
13 Robert Pete Williams - Come Here Baby
14 Sally Dotson and Smokey Babe - Your Dice Won't Pass
15 Lazy Lester - They Call Me Lazy
16 Jimmy Dotson - Looking for My Baby
17 Raful Neal - Crying Hard
18 Lazy Lester - I'm a Lover Not a Fighter
19 Lightnin' Slim - Lightnin's Troubles
20 Slim Harpo - One More Day
21 Lightning Slim - Rooster Blues
22 Lightnin' Slim and Lazy Lester - Trip to Chicago (Alt)
23 Slim Harpo - What a Dream
24 Smokey Babe and Clyde Causey - Black Gal
25 Smokey Babe and Lazy Lester - Mississippi River So Deep and Wide
26 Herman E. Johnson - Depression Blues
- Disc 2 -
1 Slim Harpo - Rainin' in My Heart
2 Lightning Slim - I'm Tired Waitin' Baby
3 Tabby Thomas - Hoodo Party
4 Lonesome Sundown - My Home Ain't Here
5 Jimmy Anderson - Naggin'
6 Silas Hogan - Trouble at Home Blues
7 Lightnin' Slim - Winter Time Blues
8 Jimmy Anderson - Goin Thru the Park
9 Lightnin' Slim - I'm Evil
10 The Nitehawks (Bo Melvin) - Boogie Chillun
11 Whispering Smith - Mean Woman Blues
12 Silas Hogan - I'm Goin in the Valley
13 Silas Hogan - Dark Clouds Rollin'
14 Lightnin' Slim - Can't Live This Life No More
15 Isaiah Chattman - Cold in Hand
16 Slim Harpo - Baby Scratch My Back
17 Slim Harpo - I'm Gonna Miss You (Like the Devil)
18 Silas Hogan - Hoo Doo Blues
19 Henry Gray - Showers of Rain
20 Arthur Kelley - Number Ten at the Station (And Number 12 Is on the Road)
21 Arthur Kelley - How Can I Stay (When All I Have Is Gone)
22 Moses Smith - Baton Rouge Breakdown
23 Silas Hogan - Honey Bee Blues
24 Silas Hogan - I Didn't Tell Her to Leave
25 Slim Harpo - the Music's Hot
26 Robert Pete Williams - Goodbye Slim Harpo
27 Slim Harpo - Talking Blues (Aka Blues Hangover)
Blues expert Martin Hawkins tells the story of local blues singers and players that got onto records. The story goes beyond the Excello sound and the music of Lightnin' Slim, Slim Harpo, and also features folk music by Willie B. Thomas, Robert Pete Williams and others. A detailed introduction to the topic and artist biographies for each individual performer can be found in the extensive 52-page illustrated booklet. The recordings have been carefully remastered for this edition. Limited edition of 1,000 copies worldwide! These two CDs contain a more or less chronological taster of the blues from Baton Rouge, one of the several cities alongside the mighty Mississippi that has been thought of or thinks of itself as a blues town. Like New Orleans, Memphis, St. Louis and some smaller places, Baton Rouge's local blues players made a big contribution to the recorded legacy of the blues. We really don't know what the blue sound of Baton Rouge was before about 1954, when it's first bluesman was recorded, and by the 1970s the blues as current, recorded, black music was dying out, melding with R&B and the sounds of soul. Those newer sounds were still a part of black culture and, increasingly, of white culture locally and internationally, but a different muse, a different music, a different story. We concentrate on the period between 1954 and 1971, featuring here, together for the first time, those Baton Rouge singers and players who got onto records, one way or another. Some were aspiring professionals aiming for the stars, or at least for a local juke box spin, while others were local 'folk' performers plucked from their everyday life to sing for the man with the remote tape machine and a microphone.
