HAPPY BLUES NEW –– 2004!

This year has been a great Year of the Blues.  While Midwest BEAT takes a well-deserved break until February this time of year, one of my favorite columns to write is my look back at my favorite blues releases.  I’ve picked out some of my top blues releases of 2003, and hope that you’ll join me in celebrating the blues by checking these discs out.  In no particular order, here are my top picks of 2003.   

Bob Margolin • All-Star Blues Jam (Telarc)    

Steady Rollin’ Bob Margolin figures prominently in my blues year, first for this outstanding collection of blues featuring many of Muddy Waters’ contemporaries, including Willie “Big Eyes” Smith, Carey Bell, Pinetop Perkins, and Hubert Sumlin, and second for remastering the late-‘70s Mississippi Muddy Waters Live CD.  

Young turks Jimmy D. Lane (Jimmy Rogers’ son), and Mookie Brill round out the All-Star Blues Jam Band with Bob on this Telarc release, and the versions of Little Walter’s “Juke,” “Mean Old Chicago,” “Sweet Little Black Angel,” and “My Baby Owns a Whiskey Store” all remind me why I still love the blues after first discovering them over 30 years ago.  Bravo to Bob for bringing together some genuine blues greats.  The disc has a real homespun, backporch feel. 

Various Artists • Last of the Mississippi Jukes (Sanctuary) 

The Black Starz! cable network aired this homage to two Mississippi Delta juke joints early in the year, and the CD and DVD both deserve places on any blues fans’ shelves.   

We see contemporary blues acts playing at Clarksdale’s Ground Zero, including Alvin Youngblood Hart and we learn more about the effort to preserve Jackson’s Subway Lounge courtesy of heartfelt performances from Chris Thomas King and Bobby Rush.  Thanks to Morgan Freeman, Ground Zero is scratching out a blues living night after night, but I hope that Jackson gets behind the Subway Lounge to restore a room that once held court for African-American musical royalty (as black bands were prohibited from staying in white hotels due to Jim Crow laws).  The Last of the Mississippi Jukes CD and DVD shows what’s happening now in the blues community of the Mississippi Delta.  

Various Artists • West Side Blues (Delmark) 

This Chicago-based boutique blues and jazz label celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2003, and their budget-priced samplers feature mnay treasures from the Delmark vaults.  West Side Blues gets my vote for some outstanding stinging guitar blues from the likes of Otis Rush, Magic Sam, Luther Allison, Willie Kent, and Jimmy Dawkins, among others.

A peerless introduction to West Side guitar giants.  These compilations are listed at $7.99 each, and the other titles in the series –– Blues From Up The Country, Masters Of Boogie Piano, For Jumpers Only!, and Bop Lives!, are bargains at twice the price.   

Muddy Waters • Muddy Mississippi Waters Live  (Remastered/Sony Legacy) 

Steady Rollin’ Bob Margolin produced and remastered this late ‘70s set from the Hoochie Coochie Man, and added other dates from Harry Hope’s club in Cary, IL.   On the second disk, we get some priceless stage banter from Muddy, and some choice cuts like “Trouble No More,” “Kansas City,” and “Corinna, Corinna.”  Margolin’s liner notes explain the set, song-by-song, and if I close my eyes, I can still see Bob, Jerry Portnoy, Calvin Jones, Willie, and Muddy playing ChicagoFest over 20 years ago.

Chicago Blues Posse with Deb Seitz • Road Time.  (Indie)

While Tom Lounges reported last month that Deb Seitz and original Posse leader Glenn “Wiz” Wierzbicki have parted ways, Road Time remains one of my favorite blues releases of 2003.  Dale Plicque has since taken over the Posse’s drum kit, and Road Time is a local classic in the making for capturing a bar band par excellence.  Sample “You Can Have My Husband,” “Bobby McGee” or “It’s 2AM” from this disc online at –– www.debseitz.com –– to hear this Posse member’s soulful pipes.  

Kim Wilson • Lookin’ for Trouble (M-C Records)

 Kim Wilson's latest CD is a harp tour-de-force.   Lookin’ for Trouble features old school Chicago blues, courtesy of Jimmie Rogers and Willie Dixon, and the other nine cuts written or co-written by Kim. There are two versions of the title cut, and the first one that starts off the disc just blows me away: it's got all the power of early Chicago blues that sets the house afire. Lookin’ for Trouble’s got some of the tastiest harp-fueled blues released in 2003.   

In addition to these CDs, I’d be remiss if I didn’t include a couple extras to further honor the Year of the Blues.  There’s Rory Block’s outstanding acoustic blues CD, Last Fair Deal (Telarc) and Tab Benoit’s Sea Saint Sessions (Telarc).  Rory’s cover of Son House’s “Country Farm Blues” is inspired, as is her version of Robert Johnson’s “Last Fair Deal” and “Traveling Riverside Blues.”  Benoit’s visit to Crescent City’s the Big Easy recording studio is electrifying, particularly when Cyrill Neville joins Tab on “Plareen Man” or when Tab goes into guitar orbit on Howlin’ Wolf’s “Howlin’ for My Darlin’” in addition to the other 11 choice cuts from Tab and his band.     

While the Year of the Blues film series may have been uneven in many critics’ eyes, I’m all for having the DVD set so that I can revisit Bobby Rush’s tour, Corey Harris’ trip to Africa, or see the all-star jam at the W.C. Handy Awards ceremony in Memphis agaom and again.  Martin Scorsese’s film series showed quite a breadth of perspectives from documentaries to fictional takes on the blues, and the blues community was the richer for Martin’s efforts.     

I hope that your holidays are memorable this holiday season and your blues loud. Most of all, I hope that 2004 will be a year in which our troops will return safely home, and we’ll once again have the opportunity to celebrate and cherish peace.     

                                                     Until February... Happy Holidays!