Sweet Honey Hole - BLIND BOY FULLER

Blind Boy Fuller (born Fulton Allen) (July 10, 1907 – February 13, 1941) was an American blues guitarist and vocalist. He was one of the most popular of the recorded Piedmont blues artists with rural Black Americans, a group that also included Blind Blake, Josh White, and Buddy Moss.
Fulton Allen was born in Wadesboro, North Carolina, United States, to Calvin Allen and Mary Jane Walker. He was one of a family of 10 children, but after his mother's death he moved with his father to Rockingham. As a boy he learned to play the guitar and also learned from older singers the field hollers, country rags, and traditional songs and blues popular in poor, rural areas.

He married Cora Allen young and worked as a labourer, but began to lose his eyesight in his mid-teens. According to researcher Bruce Bastin, "While he was living in Rockingham he began to have trouble with his eyes. He went to see a doctor in Charlotte who allegedly told him that he had ulcers behind his eyes, the original damage having been caused by some form of snow-blindness." However, there is an alternative story that he was blinded by an ex-girlfriend who threw chemicals in his face.

By 1928 he was completely blind, and turned to whatever employment he could find as a singer and entertainer, often playing in the streets. By studying the records of country blues players like Blind Blake and the "live" playing of Gary Davis, Allen became a formidable guitarist, and played on street corners and at house parties in Winston-Salem, NC, Danville, VA, and then Durham, North Carolina. In Durham, playing around the tobacco warehouses, he developed a local following which included guitarists Floyd Council and Richard Trice, as well as harmonica player Saunders Terrell, better known as Sonny Terry, and washboard player/guitarist George Washington.


In 1935, Burlington record store manager and talent scout James Baxter Long secured him a recording session with the American Recording Company (ARC). Allen, Davis and Washington recorded several tracks in New York City, including the traditional "Rag, Mama, Rag". To promote the material, Long decided to rename Allen as "Blind Boy Fuller", and also named Washington Bull City Red.

Over the next five years Fuller made over 120 sides, and his recordings appeared on several labels. His style of singing was rough and direct, and his lyrics explicit and uninhibited as he drew from every aspect of his experience as an underprivileged, blind Black person on the streets—pawnshops, jailhouses, sickness, death—with an honesty that lacked sentimentality. Although he was not sophisticated, his artistry as a folk singer lay in the honesty and integrity of his self-expression. His songs contained desire, love, jealousy, disappointment, menace and humor.

In April 1936, Fuller recorded ten solo performances, and also recorded with guitarist Floyd Council. The following year, after auditioning for J. Mayo Williams, he recorded for the Decca label, but then reverted to ARC. Later in 1937, he made his first recordings with Sonny Terry. In 1938 Fuller, who was described as having a fiery temper,[citation needed] was imprisoned for shooting a pistol at his wife, wounding her in the leg, causing him to miss out on John Hammond's "From Spirituals to Swing" concert in NYC that year. While Fuller was eventually released, it was Sonny Terry who went in his stead, the beginning of a long "folk music" career. Fuller's last two recording sessions took place in New York City during 1940.

Fuller's repertoire included a number of popular double entendre "hokum" songs such as "I Want Some Of Your Pie", "Truckin' My Blues Away" (the origin of the phrase "keep on truckin'"), and "Get Your Yas Yas Out" (adapted as "Get Your Ya-Yas Out" for the origin of a later Rolling Stones album title), together with the autobiographical "Big House Bound" dedicated to his time spent in jail. Though much of his material was culled from traditional folk and blues numbers, he possessed a formidable finger-picking guitar style. He played a steel National resonator guitar. He was criticised by some as a derivative musician, but his ability to fuse together elements of other traditional and contemporary songs and reformulate them into his own performances, attracted a broad audience.[citation needed] He was an expressive vocalist and a masterful guitar player, best remembered for his uptempo ragtime hits including "Step It Up and Go". At the same time he was capable of deeper material, and his versions of "Lost Lover Blues", "Rattlesnakin' Daddy" and "Mamie" are as deep as most Delta blues. Because of his popularity, he may have been overexposed on records, yet most of his songs remained close to tradition and much of his repertoire and style is kept alive by other Piedmont artists to this day.
Fuller underwent a suprapubic cystostomy in July 1940 (probably an outcome of excessive drinking) but continued to require medical treatment. He died at his home in Durham, North Carolina on February 13, 1941 at 5:00 PM of pyemia due to an infected bladder, GI tract and perineum, plus kidney failure.

He was so popular when he died that his protégé Brownie McGhee recorded "The Death of Blind Boy Fuller" for the Okeh label, and then reluctantly began a short lived career as Blind Boy Fuller No. 2 so that Columbia Records could cash in on his popularity.
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Talkin Bout Love - Walter " Lightnin Bug" Rhodes

Walter was born in 1939 in Beaufort, NC and learned to play guitar there. In 1960 he was in New York playing for The Gospel Four and starting his recording career as a member of the Golden Arrows. Pretty soon though he made the move into R & B as a member of the Blues Boys duo, touring with such artists as the wonderful Big Maybelle and Shep & The Limelights. With his cousin Arthur Little he apparently recorded as Walt and Art for Dessa, before recording his first solo sessions for Blanche Kaslin’s Hull, with the Leo Price Band. He chose the name The Blonde Bomber as a variant on heavyweight boxer Joe Louis’ nickname The Black Bomber for his own albino pigmentation.
“He died July 4 1990 as a bluesman. He was found at the bottom of a swimming pool in Rockingham, North Carolina. A perfect homicide. He was technically blind and was very fearful of water. He was pushed in the pool and knowing he was about to drown his heart exploded. Walter was a poor person and there was no investigation into his death. Someone got away with murder. Walter was a great friend and talent and was well deserving of Star status and it's sad that he died before ever reaching it. His death was a major loss to music....”
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5 Long Years - Buddy Black

Singer, Guitarist, Journeyman. Self proclaimed musical genius. Unlike Kanye, Not a gay fish.
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Freight Train - Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten

Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten (January 5, 1895 – June 29, 1987) was an American blues and folk musician, singer, and songwriter.

A self-taught left-handed guitarist, Cotten developed her own original style. Her approach involved using a right-handed guitar (usually in standard tuning), not re-strung for left-handed playing, essentially, holding a right-handed guitar upside down. This position required her to play the bass lines with her fingers and the melody with her thumb. Her signature alternating bass style has become known as "Cotten picking".
Elizabeth Nevills was born in Carrboro, North Carolina, at the border of Chapel Hill, to a musical family. Her parents were George Nevills and Louise Price Nevills. Elizabeth was the youngest of five children. At age seven, Cotten began to play her older brother's banjo. By eight years old, she was playing songs. At 11, after scraping together some money as a domestic helper, she bought her own guitar. Although self-taught, she became very good at playing the instrument. By her early teens she was writing her own songs, one of which, "Freight Train", would go on to be one of her most recognized. Cotten wrote "Freight Train" when she saw a train pass by her house on Lloyd Street in Carrboro, North Carolina.

Around the age of 13, Cotten began working as a maid along with her mother. Soon after at age 15, she was married to Frank Cotten. The couple had a daughter named Lillie, and soon after young Elizabeth gave up guitar playing for family and church. Elizabeth, Frank and their daughter Lillie moved around eastern United States for a number of years between North Carolina, New York, and Washington, D.C., finally settling in the D.C. area. When Lillie married, Elizabeth divorced Frank and moved in with her daughter and her family.
Cotten had retired from the guitar for 25 years, except for occasional church performances. It wasn't until she reached her 60s that she began recording and performing publicly. She was discovered by the folk-singing Seeger family while she was working for them as a housekeeper.

While working for a brief stint in a department store, Cotten helped a child wandering through the aisles find her mother. The child was Penny Seeger, and the mother was composer Ruth Crawford Seeger. Soon after this, Elizabeth again began working as a maid, caring for Ruth Crawford Seeger and Charles Seeger's children, Mike, Peggy, Barbara, and Penny. While working with the Seegers (a voraciously musical family) she remembered her own guitar playing from 40 years prior and picked up the instrument again to relearn almost from scratch.
During the later half of the 1950s, Mike Seeger began making bedroom reel to reel recordings of Cotten's songs in her house. The culmination of these recordings would later go on the album Folksongs and Instrumentals with Guitar, which was released on Folkways Records. Since its release, her songs, especially her signature track, "Freight Train", written when she was 11, have been covered by Peter, Paul, and Mary, Jerry Garcia, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Devendra Banhart, Laura Gibson, Laura Veirs, His Name Is Alive and Taj Mahal. Shortly afterwards, she began playing selected joint shows with Mike Seeger, the first of which was in 1960 at Swarthmore College. One of her songs, "Ain't Got No Honey Baby Now", was in fact recorded by Blind Boy Fuller under the title "Lost Lover Blues" in 1940.

Over the course of the early 1960s, Cotten went on to play more shows with big names in the burgeoning folk revival. Some of these included Mississippi John Hurt, John Lee Hooker, and Muddy Waters at venues such as the Newport Folk Festival and the Smithsonian Festival of American Folklife.

The newfound interest in her work inspired her to write more material to play and in 1967, she released a record created with her grandchildren which took its name from one of the songs she had written, Shake Sugaree.

Using profits from her touring and record releases, as well as from the many awards given to her for contribution to the folk arts, Elizabeth moved with her daughter and grandchildren from Washington and bought a house in Syracuse, New York. She continued touring and releasing records well into her 80s. In 1984 she won the Grammy Award for "Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording" for her album on Arhoolie Records, Elizabeth Cotten Live. When accepting the award in Los Angeles, her comment was "Thank you. I only wish I had my guitar so I could play a song for you all". In 1989, Cotten was one of 75 influential African-American women chosen to be included in the photo documentary, I Dream a World.

Elizabeth Cotten died in Syracuse, New York, at the age of 92.
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Music Maker artists: Boo Hanks with Dom Flemons - Buffalo Junction - New Recording Review

I just received a copy of one of the coolest traditional and Piedmont style blues recordings to hit the market in a long time. 83 year old Boo Hanks, who has played locally and worked in the tobacco fields of Virginia most of his life and Dom Flemons of the Carolina Chocolate Drops were recorded in 2006 and 2007 in mostly casual settings. The relaxed atmosphere and genuine love for the music comes through very strongly. Hanks has a unique vocal style and phrasing which is all but lost. The recording is made up of 12 traditional songs all which have been arranged by Hanks. The track list includes Railroad Bill; Drinkin' Wine, Spodie Odie (done by many artists but often associated with Hank Williams Sr.); Truckin' My Blues Away (a Blind Boy Fuller song); One Dime Blues; one of my favorites, Wild Geese Blues with a more serious pace (often associated with Gladys Bentley and Eddie Lang); Move To The Outskirts Of Town (which has been covered by many many artists including Big Bill Broonzy, Ray Charles and the Allman Brothers Band); Diddy Wah Diddy (written by Willie Dixon and made popular by Ry Cooder); Ain't Nobody Here But Me; Goin' Down To Cincinatti; Wanna Boogie Oogie; Girls Are Crazy About Me and My Captain Gone On Before. This is a thoroughly entertaining cd that seems to be over just as you put it in the player.If you like Piedmont style blues you can't go wrong with this great cd.
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Sittin' By The Window - Mr. Blues Carson

Arthur Edward Carson (August 25, 1923 - May 29, 1990) born in Statesville North Carolina, vocals and guitars recorded on labels Fortune records and Wheel City records in the 60's and early 70's.
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Doc Watson Dead

Earlier this month Watson was listed in critical condition but was responsive at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, after undergoing colon surgery. Watson fell at his home earlier in the week, after which he was sent to Watauga Medical Center in nearby Boone, NC. Watson was not seriously injured in the fall, but an underlying medical condition prompted the surgery which required him to be airlifted to Winston-Salem. Watson died on today at Wake Forest Baptist at the age of 89.
Arthel Lane "Doc" Watson (March 3, 1923 – May 29, 2012) was an American guitarist, songwriter and singer of bluegrass, folk, country, blues and gospel music. Watson won seven Grammy awards as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Watson's flatpicking skills and knowledge of traditional American music are highly regarded. He performed with his son Merle for over 15 years until Merle's death in 1985, in an accident on the family farm.
My thoughts are with his family.
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Now Tell Me Baby - Guitar Shorty

John Henry Fortescue
b. January 24, 1923 in Belhaven, North Carolina
d. May 26, 1976 in Rocky Mount, North Carolina
NOTE:
This is the original Guitar Shorty.
There's another 'Guitar Shorty' (currently active)
by the real name of David William Kearney
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New Bern -- Big Boy Henry

Richard Big Boy Henry b. May 26, 1921 in Beaufort, North Carolina d. December 5, 2004 in Beaufort, North Carolina
Although Richard “Big Boy” Henry was an imposing figure at first glance, he was one of the sweetest, most gentle men ever to sing the blues. Born in Beaufort, North Carolina in 1921, he spent much of his life near the coast earning a modest living for himself and his family. As a youth he was drawn to the music of the itinerant blues singers who worked the streets near his home, and he learned to play the guitar. Before his first marriage, he made a fair name for himself as a powerful singer and versatile guitarist on the thriving Carolina blues scene. In the Fifties he stopped playing music, and didn’t pick up a guitar again until thirty years later, encouraged by some young musicians who had heard tales of his early exploits. Throughout the 80s and 90s Big Boy appeared at prestigious festivals throughout the states and abroad and issued numerous self-produced cassettes and recordings with various labels.

Big Boy was the patriarch of the Carolina Blues. He was a saintly man, with tremendous compassion and patience for humanity. Big Boy weaves timeless parables into this his CD, “Beaufort Blues”. In “Old Bill” he points out the helplessness we all feel witnessing senseless sacrifice. In “John Henry” he rewrites an age old classic revealing this legend’s intimate character. And in “Vellevina” he lets us know what true love is all about. Big Boy passes the torch in this album to his son Luther who makes his debut singing an original song, giving us a glimpse of how Big Boy might have sounded in his prime.
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New Release - The Bill Miller Band - Review

I got the chance to listen to the Bill Miller Band self titled release today. TBMB features Bill Miller III on Guitar and vocal, Bill Miller Jr, on vocal and harp, Randall Cowles on bass and Stuart Sullivan on Drums. The recording track lineup is I'm Ready, Broke and Hungry, That's All Right, Baby Please, Sugar Sweet, Help Me, Last 10 Days and Everything Gonna Be Alright. There are two tracks that stand out from the others on this release. Both Baby Please and Last 10 Days exhibit some real nice harp riffs and some smokin' guitar solos. If you get the chance ... check these guys out,

Bman
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American Folk Blues Festival - Mae Mercer

Miss Mae Mercer (vocal) Sonny Boy Williamson (harp), Willie Dixon (bass), Memphis Slim (piano) e Clifton James (drums). Germany TV 1964.
Born Mary Ruth Mercer in 1932 to tobacco-croppers, she was one of nine children and stood out as soon as he started singing in church. Once in New York, she cut several tracks for Atlas, the black-owned jazz and jump blues label, but only her sterling version of Lee Dorsey's "Great Googa Mooga" – paired with her take on Tampa Red's "Sweet Little Angel" – was released in 1959.

The following year, Mercer travelled to Paris, where she met Maurice Girodias, the French publisher of erotica alongside avant-garde novels like Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, J.P. Donleavy's The Ginger Man and The Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. He engaged her to sing at the Blues Bar, one of four clubs he owned near the offices of his Olympia Press company. She was an intense performer, often drinking an ampoule buvable – a cocktail of vitamins – to boost her stamina before going on stage. Indeed, she proved so popular that she ended up running the venue and paved the way for the success of Memphis Slim and Sonny Boy Williamson, two of the many visiting American musicians she worked with. By 1965, she was such a prominent figure in Europe that she was profiled in Ebony magazine.

Mercer spent much of the Eighties raising her own children, as well as a niece and a nephew, but in 1996 she recorded an album entitled When He Called It Quit for Blackhawk Records. In recent years, she had guest roles in the TV series ER and The Shield.

Tall, thin and strikingly beautiful, Mercer possessed a powerful voice as mesmerising as her physical appearance. Her stunning version of the blues standard "Careless Love", shot for German TV in the Sixties and included on the 2004 DVD Memphis Slim and Sonny Boy Williamson: Blues Legends In Europe, featuring Williamson on harmonica and Hubert Sumlin on guitar, is a gem. The Chess Records legend Willie Dixon rather misguidedly introduces Mercer as "the little girl with the real low-down blues" – but there's no mistaking the intensity of her performance.
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Rumble - Link Wray

One of the first songs that I ever learned on the guitar was the Rumble. It always had that cool vibe. I also have what is supposedly Link Wrays Blackfaced Super.

Fred Lincoln "Link" Wray Jr (May 2, 1929 – November 5, 2005) was an American rock and roll guitarist, songwriter and occasional singer.

Wray was noted for pioneering a new sound for electric guitars, as exemplified in his 1958 instrumental hit "Rumble", by Link Wray and his Ray Men, which pioneered an overdriven, distorted electric guitar sound. He also "invented the power chord, the major modus operandi of modern rock guitarist," "and in doing so fathering," or making possible, "punk and heavy rock". Rolling Stone placed Wray at number 67 of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time
Wray was born in Dunn, North Carolina to Fred Lincoln Wray and his wife Lillian M. Coats. Link first heard the slide guitar technique at age eight from a traveling carnival worker nicknamed "Hambone." Link's family moved to Norfolk, Virginia, where his father worked in the U. S. Navy shipyards during World War II. In 1956, the family moved to Washington, D.C., and finally to a farm in Accokeek, Maryland. Link Wray and his brother Vernon went west to Arizona early 1970s, settling in San Francisco several years later.

Wray served in the US Army during the Korean War, and contracted tuberculosis that eventually cost him a lung. The doctors said he would never be able to sing again, so he concentrated on guitar work. Nevertheless, on his rare vocal numbers he displays a strong voice and a range equal to that of Clarence "Frogman" Henry.
For the TV show, they also backed many performers, from Fats Domino to Ricky Nelson. In 1958, at a live gig of the D.C.-based Milt Grant's House Party, attempting—at the urging of the local crowd—to work up a cover sound-alike for The Diamonds' hit, "The Stroll", they came up with an eleven and one half bar blues titled "Rumble" which they first called "Oddball". The song was an instant hit with the live audience, which demanded four repeats that night. Eventually the song came to the attention of record producer Archie Bleyer of Cadence Records, who hated it, particularly after Wray poked holes in his amplifier's speakers to make the recording sound more like the live version (see "Rocket 88" for Ike Turner's similar story). Searching for a title that would hit home with radio listeners, Bleyer sought the advice of Phil Everly, who listened and suggested that it be called "Rumble", as it had a rough attitude that reminded him of a street gang. (Rumble: slang for "gang fight".)

The stalking, menacing sound of "Rumble" (and its title) led to a ban on several radio stations, a rare feat for a song with no lyrics, on the grounds that it glorified juvenile delinquency. Nevertheless it became a huge hit, not only in the United States, but also the United Kingdom, where it has been cited as an influence on The Kinks, The Who, and Jimmy Page among others. Jimmy Page cites the song in the Davis Guggenheim documentary It Might Get Loud and proceeds to play air guitar to the song in the movie. Pete Townshend stated in unpublished liner notes for the 1970 comeback album, "He is the king; if it hadn't been for Link Wray and 'Rumble,' I would have never picked up a guitar." In other liner notes in 1974, Townshend said, of "Rumble": "I remember being made very uneasy the first time I heard it, and yet excited by the savage guitar sounds."

Jeff Beck, Duff McKagan, Jack Rose, Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Cub Koda, Marc Bolan, Neil Young and Bob Dylan have all cited Wray as an influence. Billy Childish has covered several Link Wray tracks, including "Rumble", "Jack the Ripper" and "Comanche", which he still performs in his set. The 1980 Adam and the Ants song "Killer in the Home" (from their Kings of the Wild Frontier album) is based on the same ominous, descending three-chord glissando riff that is featured in "Rumble" (Ants' guitarist Marco Pirroni, an avid Wray fan, has described the song as "Link Wray meets Col. Kurtz" — the latter being a reference to Apocalypse Now). Mark E. Smith of The Fall sang the line "I used to have this thing about Link Wray, I used to play him every Saturday, God bless Saturday" in the song "Neighbourhood of Infinity" on the album Perverted by Language. "Rumble" has also been used as an intro theme to TV shows, particularly the original incarnation of Svengoolie.

In 2003, Link Wray was ranked at number sixty-seven in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the Hundred Greatest Guitarists of all time, but has yet to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He is, however, a member of the Rockabilly Hall of Fame.
The band had several more hard-rocking instrumental hits in the late 1950s and early 1960s, including "Rawhide", "Ace of Spades", and "Jack the Ripper", the latter named after a "dirty boogie" dance popular in Baltimore at the time. The dirty boogie dance was among the several dance crazes featured in the 1988 film Hairspray.

After his initial hits, Wray's career had periods of retirement followed by renewed popularity, particularly in Europe. While living in the San Francisco Bay Area in the early 1970s, Link was introduced to Quicksilver Messenger Service guitarist John Cipollina by bassist James Hutchinson. He subsequently formed a band initially featuring special guest Cipollina along with the rhythm section from Cipollina's band Copperhead, bassist Hutch Hutchinson and drummer David Weber. They opened for the band Lighthouse at The Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles from May 15–19, 1974. He later did numerous concerts and radio broadcasts in the Bay Area including KSAN (FM) and the Bill Graham venue, Winterland Ballroom with Les Lizama later replacing Hutchinson on bass. He toured and recorded two albums with retro-rockabilly artist Robert Gordon in the late 1970s. The 1980s to the present day saw a large number of reissues as well as new material. One member of his band in the 1980s, drummer Anton Fig, later became drummer in the CBS Orchestra on the David Letterman show. Inspired by the use of his songs in various feature films, the 1997 Shadowman album is generally regarded as the Rumble Man's return to his raw rock 'n' roll roots. Backed by a Dutch band consisting of Eric Geevers on bass and Rob Louwers on drums, Wray toured Europe and Australia as well, documented on a live album and DVD. Link's last new recording was 2000's Barbed Wire, again recorded with his Dutch rhythm section. He was generally accompanied on tour by his wife Olive Julie, and since the late nineties his "colorful" Irish born road manager John Tynan. His regular backing band in the USA from 1998 until 2003 were bassist Atom Ellis and drummers Danny Heifetz (Mr. Bungle, Dieselhed) and Dustin Donaldson (I Am Spoonbender, various). He continued to tour up until four months before he died.

His music has been featured in numerous films, including Pulp Fiction, Desperado, Independence Day, Twelve Monkeys, The Warriors, This Boy's Life, Blow, Johnny Suede, The Shadow, Breathless, Roadracers, and Pink Flamingos. His instrumental "Rumble" is featured in It Might Get Loud (2008).

Link Wray is among the many Wray/Rays mentioned in the 1998 Top 40 hit "Are You Jimmy Ray?" by singer Jimmy Ray (along with Johnnie Ray and Fay Wray).
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You Better Be Sure - Lacy Gibson

Lacy Gibson (May 1, 1936 – April 11, 2011) was an American Chicago blues guitarist, singer and songwriter. He most notably recorded the songs, "My Love Is Real" and "Switchy Titchy", and in a long and varied career worked with Buddy Guy and Son Seals.

One commentator noted that Gibson "developed a large and varied repertoire after long stays with numerous bands, many recording sessions, and performances in Chicago nightclubs"
Gibson was born in Salisbury, North Carolina, United States, but relocated with his family to Chicago, Illinois, in 1949. Initially, he was taught guitar playing by his mother.

His early influences included Sunnyland Slim, Muddy Waters, Lefty Bates, Matt Murphy, and Wayne Bennett. Gibson's earliest work was as a session musician, playing mainly rhythm guitar. In 1963 alone, he recorded backing for Willie Mabon, Billy "The Kid" Emerson and Buddy Guy.

Gibson's own recording debut was also in 1963 with Chess Records, who recorded his song "My Love Is Real", with Buddy Guy on guitar. The track remained unreleased at that time, and when it was finally issued, initial pressings credited the work to Guy. Two self-released singles followed, before Gibson recorded his debut album, Wishing Ring in 1971. It was released on El Saturn Records, which was partly owned by Gibson's then brother-in-law, Sun Ra. The family connection continued when Ra recorded Gibson's co-written song, "I'm Gonna Unmask the Batman".

In 1977, Ralph Bass produced another Gibson album, although this was not released until Delmark Records did the honors in 1996. His following work with Son Seals was heard on Seal's 1978 Live and Burning album. Alligator Records then included four tracks by Gibson on their 1980 Living Chicago Blues, Vol. 3 compilation album.

Gibson released Switchy Titchy in 1982 on the Netherlands-based Black Magic Records label. His appearances after the release were reduced due to health problems, but he performed locally around Chicago, both on his own or backing Billy Boy Arnold and Big Time Sarah. Despite the reduction in his engagements, Gibson played at the Chicago Blues Festival in 2004. Gibson also operated the Chicago after-hours nightclub "Ann's Love Nest" with his wife, for whom it was named.

Gibson died of a heart attack in Chicago in April 2011, aged 74.
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Better Treat Me Better Baby - Riyen Roots

Original Blues/Soul/Roots Music From The Mountains Of Asheville, North Carolina Giving us raw uncut truth through his blues influenced songs, time and time again. Inviting us to take a look at ourselves and the everchanging world around us through his music, while taking the blues genre to a new place, with unique rhythms, truly original song stylings, and a voice that has been compared to the likes of Muddy Waters, Johnny Cash, Warren Haynes, and even Tom Waits. From the roots to the fruits...RiYeN RoOtS is keeping his music roots music alive, one show at a time. If you like what I’m doing, Like ---Bman’s Blues Report--- Facebook Page! I’m looking for great talent and trying to grow the audience for your favorites band! - ”LIKE”

I'll Run Your Hurt Away - Ruby Johnson

Ruby Johnson (19 April 1936 - 4 July 1999) was an American soul singer best known for her recordings on the Volt label in the late 1960s. She was born in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, and was raised in the Jewish faith. She sang, with her eight brothers and sisters, in the Temple Beth-El choir. After completing high school, she moved to Virginia Beach where she worked as a waitress and began singing rhythm and blues with local bands, before spending two years with Samuel Latham and the Rhythm Makers. She then moved to Washington DC in the late 1950s, and joined Ambrose and the Showstoppers, the house band at the Spa nightclub. Local entrepreneur Never Duncan Jnr. became her manager, and placed her with record producer Dicky Williams. Her first single, "Calling All Boys", was issued in 1960 on the V-Tone label, before Duncan established his own recording company, NEBS. She released a succession of singles on NEBS, including "Here I Go Again", "Worried Mind", and "Nobody Cares", some of which became local hits. When her local supporter, disc jockey Al Bell, began working for Stax Records in Memphis in 1965, he won her a contract with the label. There, she recorded a handful of classic soul records with the writing and production team of Isaac Hayes and David Porter, and backing musicians including Steve Cropper, "Duck" Dunn and Al Jackson. These were issued on the Stax subsidiary label, Volt. They included "I’ll Run Your Hurt Away", which reached #31 on the Billboard R&B chart in 1966, and "If I Ever Needed Love", both tracks which became staples of subsequent soul compilations, such as those by Dave Godin. Despite the quality of her records, they met with little success, and after a few more years singing in clubs, she gave up her singing career in 1974. She worked in government posts, and eventually became the director of Foster Grandparents, a federal programme helping handicapped children relate to older generations. She also returned to worship and sing at the Temple Beth-El near her home in Lanham, Maryland. A compilation CD, including many previously unissued tracks, was issued in 1993. She died in 1999, aged 63 If you like what I’m doing, Like ---Bman’s Blues Report--- Facebook Page! I’m looking for great talent and trying to grow the audience for your favorites band! -  ”LIKE”

The Guy With A "45" - Allen Bunn

Talk about a versatile musician: Alden Bunn (aka Tarheel Slim) recorded in virtually every postwar musical genre imaginable. Lowdown blues, gospel, vocal group R&B, poppish duets, even rockabilly weren't outside the sphere of his musicianship. However, spirituals were Bunn's first love. While still in North Carolina during the early '40s, the guitarist worked with the Gospel Four and then the Selah Jubilee Singers, who recorded for Continental and Decca. Bunn and Thurman Ruth broke away in 1949 to form their own group, the Jubilators. During a single day in New York in 1950, they recorded for four labels under four different names!

One of those labels was Apollo, who convinced them to go secular. That's basically how the Larks, one of the seminal early R&B vocal groups whose mellifluous early-'50s Apollo platters rank with the era's best, came to be. Bunn sang lead on a few of their bluesier items ("Eyesight to the Blind," for one), as well as doing two sessions of his own for the firm in 1952 under the name of Allen Bunn. As Alden Bunn, he encored on Bobby Robinson's Red Robin logo the next year. Bunn also sang with another R&B vocal group, the Wheels. And coupled with his future wife, Anna Sanford, Bunn recorded as the Lovers; "Darling It's Wonderful," their 1957 duet for Aladdin's Lamp subsidiary, was a substantial pop seller. (Ray Ellis did the arranging.)

Tarheel Slim made his official entrance in 1958 with his wife, now dubbed Little Ann, in a duet format for Robinson's Fire imprint ("It's Too Late," "Much Too Late"). Then old Tarheel came out of the gate like his pants were on fire with a pair of rockabilly raveups of his own, "Wildcat Tamer" and "No. 9 Train," with Jimmy Spruill on blazing lead guitar. After a few years off the scene, Tarheel Slim made a bit of a comeback during the early '70s, with an album for Pete Lowry's Trix logo that harked back to Bunn's Carolina blues heritage.by Bill Dahl
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Fleetwood Covington

I try to create art that people can relate to on a very basic level. Using raw materials and a raw documentary approach, I try to project a reverence, not only for the cultural/ historical aspects of my subjects, but for the integrity of the individuals as well. Having been raised in the South, I feel a deep connection to the landscape and its people, and I’m always trying to capture its unique beauty, energy, and humor.
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A Fool For Your Stockings - Max Drake

Uncle Grub handles the vocals with Max Drake and Rusty Barkley on Guitar. MAX DRAKE has been playing in and recording with blues/R&B bands such as Arhoolie, The Excellos and the Ministers of Sinister since the '60s. More recently, he has lent his fiery fretwork to the late Skeeter Brandon and Big Bill Morganfield before joining forces with The Wicked Mojos in 2005. Max also performs with a stripped-down nasty blues/roots band known as The Buzzkillz Photo is used with permission of Doug Mokaren

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Piedmont Blues - Etta Baker

Etta Baker (March 31, 1913 – September 23, 2006) was an American Piedmont blues guitarist and singer from North Carolina.
She was born Etta Lucille Reid in Caldwell County, North Carolina, of African American, Native American, and European American heritage. She played both the 6-string and 12-string forms of the acoustic guitar, as well as the five-string banjo. Baker played the Piedmont Blues for ninety years, starting at the age of three when she could not even hold the guitar properly. She was taught by her father, Boone Reid, who was also a long time player of the Piedmont Blues on several instruments. Etta Baker was first recorded in the summer of 1956 when she and her father happened across folk singer Paul Clayton while visiting Cone Mansion in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, near their home in Morganton, NC. Baker's father asked Clayton to listen to his daughter playing her signature "One Dime Blues". Clayton was impressed and arrived at the Baker house with his tape recorder the next day, recording several songs.
Over the years, Baker has shared her knowledge with many well known musical artists including Bob Dylan, Taj Mahal (musician), and Kenny Wayne Shepherd. Baker received the North Carolina Folk Heritage Award from the North Carolina Arts Council in 1989, the National Endowment for the Arts' National Heritage Fellowship in 1991, and the North Carolina Award in 2003. Along with her sister, Cora Phillips, Baker received the North Carolina Folklore Society's Brown-Hudson Folklore Award in 1982.

Baker had nine children, one of whom was killed in the Vietnam War in 1967, the same year her husband died. She last lived in Morganton, North Carolina, and died at the age of 93 in Fairfax, Virginia, while visiting a daughter who had suffered a stroke.
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Music Maker artist: Carolina Blues and Gospel - Shelton Powe - New Release Review

I just received a copy of Carolina Blues and Gospel, the new release by Shelton Powe. Shelton is a real Blues Man having been raised in a music family and spending a lot of his youth deeply consumed by the blues scene of Atlanta. This 13 track release has the sincerity of early blues recordings having not been tainted my modern technology. Powe plays guitar and harp as well as sings on the tracks. There it is ...stripped down to it's pure nakedness. Powe knows every finger picking accent note and uses this knowledge and feel to effectively sting the bottom of his tunes with just the right amount of juice. The recording opens with Stranger Blues and the finger picking technique along with the choice of guitars is perfect. The effectiveness of properly placed bass accents placed on this particular instrument are excellent. Vestopol, a classic blues instrumental is very well done. Powe has just the touch to deliver the authentic feel of the tune as it was written. Diving Duck Blues is played on slide guitar and Powe's voice is right on for this tune in coordination with the slide echo of the melody. Powe has a strong command of the country slide technique and this again sounds very authentic. One Monkey Don't Stop The Show is a favorite of mine. A traditional song, Powe sings it acapella with field hollers and harmonica. I love it! Down On Me, another traditional tune done with just vocal and harmonica, is very effective. Buckdancer's Choice is strictly instrumental and Powe shows his finger picking acuity. You can easily see how the blues is a blend of European folk tunes and of course the root in Africa. John Henry is played with the melody on slide guitar and Powe echoing the melody on vocals. This is such an honest recording it is a pleasure to listen to. Gypsy Woman is a cool song with vocal over the drone of the bass of this particular instrument (guitar) which has just the perfect acoustic for raw blues. Powe of course plays excellent finger picked melody as well, but it is the sound of the guitar itself that is captivating in some cases. The recording is concluded with This Little Light of Mine, ...Powe doing a number with Drink Small on vocal and guitar. It is a great conclusion to a truly simple and honest blues recording.

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