Topic: 1927 Unknown Artist, Gospel Slide - Joe Bussard Masters

[Neal Cassady]

Posting this here in hopes of starting a proper discussion on these recordings. Aside from whoever has visited Joe Bussard, and heard these recordings in person: I'm unsure if these have been widely shared, or posted publicly.

Daniel Bachman, a guitarist from Virginia, visited Joe back in 2011. During his visit Joe played these recordings from a set of masters that he owns. Daniel had Joe dub these songs to tape for him to take home. A couple months back, May 2014, Dan posted them to his blog here:
http://danbachblog.blogspot.com/2014/05/joe-bussard-tape-unknown-artist-1927.html

Please visit that post to download the mp3's and read what Dan has to say about the visit to Joe's house. All in all I was wanting to put them up on Youtube maybe so people can access it easier, stream it instantly, etc; instead of having to download a zip file.

About the artists themselves; Joe may have mentioned some facts about them but Daniel did not replicate them in his blog post, so it seems relatively certain that these recordings are officially unknown to this day.

Really quality songs though: open tuned, slide guitar playing in the gospel style. Male singing with multiple (sounds like 2) female accompaniments. Rough edged guitar playing, shrill female voice, deep male voice. It certainly would've fit right in on Revenant's American Primitive Vol. I: Raw Pre-War Gospel (1926-36).

Anyone else come across this recordings or have any thoughts? The year 1927 has been attributed to them, not sure why though.

http://danbachblog.blogspot.com/2014/05/joe-bussard-tape-unknown-artist-1927.html
http://www.mediafire.com/download/hqdqpavwow27dww/Joes+Tape.zip

[Neal Cassady]

Here is the track listing included for reference:

God Don't Like It
Gone To Glory
Man Going 'Round Taking Names
We Shall Rise
You Got To Go By Yourself
You Got To Reap Just What You Sow

[StoogeKebab]

Four of these are on DOCD-5190. Some under different titles (indicated with brackets)

Lonesome Valley (You Got to Go By Yourself)
My God don't like it (God Don't Like It)
On The Other Shore (Gone To Glory)
There's a man going round taking names

The possible date attribution could come from the collection dating 1927-1931

[Neal Cassady]

Oh nice, thanks -- How could I have doubted Document never issuing these at some point? I wonder about the other two tracks then. Do the liner notes for DOCD-5190 say anything about the artists?

[StoogeKebab]

Oh nice, thanks -- How could I have doubted Document never issuing these at some point? I wonder about the other two tracks then. Do the liner notes for DOCD-5190 say anything about the artists?

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure in what detail they go into, this was from a search of Document's website because I too am curious regarding the artist. I know that they are under "unknown artist" so sadly, no more information there, but the physical CD itself may have more information? I'm not sure, I've only ever bought digital or third man LPs from document. The other artists on the CD are Jessie May Hill, Blind Willie Davis, Laura Henton and Louisville Sanctified Singers.

[jharris]

Here's the notes to Document 5190: