Only recently picked up Alvin's latest record, Down in the Alley. FrontPage recommended this way back when. This is back to the country blues Alvin, not an electric geetar to be heard, and it's great. It's pretty clear to me that he is one of the top performers of this material around today when he's playing it. Three songs into the disc and I was floored.
Track list:
1. Judge Bouche 2. How Long Before I Change My Clothes 3. Deep Blue Sea 4. Jinx Blues 5. Bootlegger's Blues 6. Alberta 7. Broke And Hungry 8. Devil Got My Woman 9. Chilly Winds 10. Tom Rushen Blues 11. Please Baby 12. Motherless Child
Alvin does great interpretations of Charlie Patton on Jinx Blues (which is really just him doing another version of Screamin and Hollerin) and Tom Rushen, a personal favorite. He also got me listening to the Mississippi Sheiks again with Bootlegger's Blues and Please Baby. Forgot how much I love those guys. They have a tremendous variety of strong material - songs, blues, dances, hokum. Walter Vinson seems to me an unsung great.
Couple of the tunes here on Alvin's record are done on banjo (Deep Blue Sea, Chilly Winds), couple have overdubbed mando (Broke and Hungry, Bootlegger's Blues).
Looking forward to seeing Alvin at the Freight and Salvage February 27th. Miller, or any other Bay Area Weenies thinking they might make it? Alvin sometimes posts on the IGS forum about his Todd Cambio replica of his Oscar Schmidt 12, so we've had a little interplay. All for now. john c.
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"People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it." George Bernard Shaw
“Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.” Joseph Heller, Catch-22
Hey John. Am very jealous. As they say in the Beverly Hillbillies song, "Californy is the place you oughta be." Especially with the weather we've been having in Montreal, where nary a country bluesman has passed through in a long time. Is Alvin playing solo or with a band? Enjoy the show...
It'd be nice to get him back to Port Townsend. I wasn't around the year he partook.
Yes, great CD! I've had it for awhile. I especially like "How long before I change my clothes." What a voice and groove!!! Alvin is IMHO one of the best acoustic bluesmen out there today.
My first time @ PTCBW, Mr. Hart taught. I sat in on a couple of his classes, and it was pretty "free form." Focused directed instruction was not the "top priority" of the day. (8^)
Love to see him again in concert. Great footage of him in the DVD "Last of the Mississippi Jukes!"
Lee
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I must say that I find television very educational. The minute somebody turns it on, I go to the library and read a book.
My first time @ PTCBW, Mr. Hart taught. I sat in on a couple of his classes, and it was pretty "free form."? Focused directed instruction was not the "top priority" of the day. (8^)
Love to see him again in concert. Great footage of him in the DVD "Last of the Mississippi Jukes!"
Lee
Hi Lee,
Haven't seen the Jukes DVD yet. Aside from the Alvin footage is it any good?
I heard his classes at PT were a little "free-form" but would still enjoy getting him there again.
'Free-form' is right. But I learned a load of stuff in his classes largely by osmosis rather than formal pedagogy. Not only licks, AYH turned me on to a lot of players I'd not really focused on esp. Henry Townsend and Robert Pete Williams.
Alvin is nominated in 2 or 3 Handy categories, and deserves the recognition a win would bring. Also nominated is Otis Taylor - his most recent release is a good'un too.
Jeez -don't be shy. What do youse guys really think?
Bill, one of the many highlights of going to PT each year is I get to hear you tell more stories or explain how something works. That's what I really think...
Bill, one of the many highlights of going to PT each year is I get to hear you tell more stories or explain how something works. That's what I really think...
Uncle Bud sez: "... explain how something works. "
OK - so long as you understand that most of my "explanations" are total BS that is created on the spot in real time. One of my partners once told me that I remind him of a Kevin Welch lyric that goes something like this: "He knows a little bit about about everything and can pretty well guess the rest." It can be a blessing, but is definitely a curse if you ever start believing your own "explanations!"
Being the artistic black sheep (not really, I was encouraged) in a science family (yes, I was a chem/math major before I switched to theatre), I know that what you're refering to, FP, are theories, spoken with conviction, yet nonetheless, created to inspire new theories which discount them. An explanation of the facts at hand, waiting for more data. BS to some, thought flow to others. It has come to mind recently as I have been struggling with Calt/Wardlow's King of the Delta Blues, after just starting Elijah Wald's Escape from the Delta (went to his signing at City Lights, nice guy) and before that, really enjoying David Evans' Big Road Blues. I find the popular(?) writers have a far greater Oedipal urge, i.e. they seem to have a fixation on destroyng the ideas that came before them and it gives an emotional coloring to their choice of adjectives that is, to me, distasteful. The academician has more of a lust for detail, and while that data may cause him to disprove previous thinking, he doesn't seem to have a need to dwell upon it, nor use it as the basis of an advertizing campaign. "Everything you know about the blues is wrong!" starts a recent interview. Whoops, I'm getting carried away. Just my opinion disclaimer and all that. Anyway, I'm lookin forward to Bastin's Red River Blues. Actually, what I started out to say was that I really appreciate that this board has allowed me to get to know some of you folks, whom I barely met at PT (or some, not at all), and I am looking forward to sharing music and merriment with you. Yup, I've got PT fever bad. All for now. John C.
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"People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it." George Bernard Shaw
“Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.” Joseph Heller, Catch-22
BTW anyone interested in the roots of Alvin might want to, as Lovesick pointed out on the old list, check out John Lee Granderson's album on Testament 'Hard Luck John', track 1, Minglewood Blues.
The weird open G riff on Alvin's song Big Mama's Door comes from there, marinated in Sleepy John Estes and Henry Townsend.
John Lee Granderson also appears on the Chicago String Band Testament CD Frankie mentioned on the string bands thread but he's less audible on that one.