It has been reliably reported that the bus with the performers that accompanied him pulled out of town, leaving him behind on the streets of Houston, still drunk - Doctor Clayton is ditched by his band after showing up under the influence at a dance gig for 3,000 people in Houston, Houston Informer, August 29, 1942
I don't know what's happened to the Lightnin' biography I mentioned but if you go to this interview with Alan Govenar http://musictomes.blogspot.com/2008/12/interview-with-alan-govenar.html and scroll nearly to the end you'll see that he's about to publish one. I'm reliably informed that AG's been working on it for 25+ years and given the depth and breath of his previous Texas books it should be a good 'un!
The Lonnie J was published in US beginning of month. In UK next week. (Dean Alger) Two Gary Davis biogs due towards end of the year. (Ian Zack/Bill Ellis) Pioneers of the Blues due July to coincide with Chicago Blues Fest (Steve Cushing) Memphis Minnie - completely revised and updated due May/June (Paul & Beth Garon) Big Mama Thornton biography by Michael Sp?rke due next month.
Eyewitness accounts of the blues' evolution into a global music phenomenon
Steve Cushing, the award-winning host of the nationally syndicated public radio staple Blues before Sunrise, has spent over thirty years observing and participating in the Chicago blues scene. In Pioneers of the Blues Revival, he interviews many of the prominent white researchers and enthusiasts whose advocacy spearheaded the blues' crossover into the mainstream starting in the 1960s.
Opinionated and territorial, the American, British, and French interviewees provide fascinating first-hand accounts of the era and movement. Experts including Paul Oliver, Gayle Dean Wardlow, Sam Charters, Ray Flerlage, Richard K. Spottswood, and Pete Whelan chronicle in their own words their obsessive early efforts at cataloging blues recordings and retrace lifetimes spent loving, finding, collecting, reissuing, and producing records. They and nearly a dozen others recount relationships with blues musicians, including the discoveries of prewar bluesmen Mississippi John Hurt, Son House, Skip James, and Bukka White, and the reintroduction of these musicians and many others to new generations of listeners. The accounts describe fieldwork in the South, renew lively debates, and tell of rehearsals in Muddy Waters's basement and randomly finding Lightning Hopkins's guitar in a pawn shop.
Blues scholar Barry Lee Pearson provides a critical and historical framework for the interviews in an introduction.
Pioneers of the Blues Revival is one I hadn't heard of. It sounds interesting. The University of Illinois website lists the hardcover for $75 - I sure hope it comes out in paperback!
Thanks for the list, Bunker Hill. I'm glad you keep track of this stuff.
Anyone know when the new Charley Patton Book is coming out?
It was August last year that Yuval Taylor, Senior Editor of Chicago Review Press, informed the PWB that he was publishing a biography of Fahey and canvassed opinions on the original blues paperback. Nothing listed on their website.