Quick Hitter: Some of the Most Powerful Blues on Record
Big Mama Thornton & Mississippi Fred McDowell: Jamming Free & Easy in Europe
Those of you who know me well probably know I grew up on a healthy diet of Arhoolie Records. For a time as a child I thought of Lightnin’, Mance, and Clifton Chenier as a Holy Trinity of sorts, and it was exclusively through recordings made by Chris Strachwitz that I first came to know them.
In later years I’ve been privy to a whole lot of the Arhoolie catalog, and I’ve always thought these three tracks — recorded in London in 1965, while Big Mama and Mississippi Fred were part of a package tour including Buddy Guy and other Muddy Waters sidemen — were worthy of much, much, much wider acclaim.
Per the straw man fusty blues scholar I am going to make up here, Thornton and McDowell should have had little in common: McDowell’s music was uncut North Mississippi gutbucket blues mantra drone, while Thornton was a relatively commercially successful singer of music that kept with the times — I mean, she did do “Hound Dog” before Elvis. And she performed with slick Johnny Otis orchestras and had a run of hits on the contemporary charts back in the ‘50s.
But while on this tour of Europe the two of them struck a chord, and these three free and easy, off the cuff recordings are some of my favorite blues recordings of all time.
With “Chauffeur Blues” and “Good Morning Little Schoolboy,” Big Mama Thornton and Mississippi Fred McDowell riff off a couple of hit songs from decades past:
Memphis Minnie was probably an idol for Thornton, and “Chauffeur” was one of her signature tunes. Her guitar playing was easily skillful enough to have fascinated even a master like McDowell, as well. They keep sort of close to the script of the song as established by Memphis Minnie, but as with all of these mesmerizing recordings, Strachwitz just left the tape rolling when other producers might have faded out, and you get these amazing twin streams of consciousness between this force of nature vocalist and guitar maestro.
“School Boy” was just out there in the ether, recorded and performed by everybody, but associated with one or both of the Sonny Boy Williamsons.
You know every time you watch some special on the South and they have the atmospheric slide guitar in the background that tells you are in the South and that you should feel bluesy or maybe just “downhome”?
All of that is stolen from Mississippi Fred McDowell.
We start with the two of them kind of sticking to the script of the old Memphis Minnie song and by the end, Thornton is leading McDowell through a litany of the comfort foods they are no doubt longing for while in Europe; McDowell’s strings emphasizing every “collard greens,” “hamburger,” and “black eyed peas.”
“How ‘bout a little salami?”
And now we have “My Heavy Load,” which I do believe is simply freestyle blues: Thornton making up words while McDowell slashes the strings. I’ve already used the word “mantra” once but I’ll use it again — this is a blues mantra, and the guitar licks McDowell hits around the five minute mark have haunted me since I first heard them back in 1984 or so.
He hints at them all the way through, and then finally plays them; given that this is a jam session, it is just so amazingly masterful how he kept them up his sleeve. Loop those five-minute licks and there’s a worldwide dance music hit in there somewhere, but for now, it’s just for us.
Epilogue: McDowell solo, including “Good Morning Little School Girl”
Thanks, Lomax! This was such mesmerizing writing so well syncopated to the music you schooled us on! This!
This is great stuff, I love the blues but there's so much blues history that I don't know.