Search - Various Artists :: When the Sun Goes Down 2: The First Time I Met the Blues

1920s rock and roll!

R. Riis | NY | 08/29/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Great achievement in sound on these recordings, some of which are 80 years old. Initiates will be amazed at how closely these country and jugband blues numbers border on rock & roll, and close observers will spot originals later covered by the Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers, Canned Heat, and other disciples of the genre. Essential listening."

More "secret history of rock 'n' roll"

Docendo Discimus | Vita scholae | 12/05/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is the second item in Bluebird's "When The Sun Goes Down" series, 77 minutes worth of blues and blues-related material from the RCA Victor label.

Opening with an amazingly crisp and clear "Telephoning The Blues", Victoria Spivey's 1929 single, "The First Time I Met The Blues" is more strictly blues than the first volume in this series. Muddy Waters' "Hoochie Coochie Man" is still quite far away, musically anyway, but this diverse, far-reaching CD includes fine performances by early blues greats like Sippie Wallace, Sleepy John Estes, Tommy Johnson, Furry Lewis, and Blind Willie McTell.



The sound is generally very good considering that all of these songs were committed to tape between 1927 and 1936. Music from this era is often referred to as "country blues", but there is a lot of very urban blues music here, the so-called "classic female blues", jazzy performances like New Orleans singer Genevieve Davis's "Haven't Got A Dollar To Pay Your House Rent Man", which features a great clarinet solo, and "Rent Man Blues" by Edna Winston. And early jazz pioneer Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton is playing the piano on Lizzie Miles' rendition of his (Morton's) "I Hate A Man Like You".

Other highlights include Jim Jackson's bouncy, melodic "When I Woke Up This Morning She Was Gone", "Cocaine Habit Blues" by the Memphis Jug Band, Delta legend Tommy Johnson's eerie "Canned Heat Blues", a good-naturedly dirty "I'm A Mighty Tight Woman" by the great Sippie Wallace, Sleepy John Estes' "The Girl I Love, She Got Long Black Curly Hair", "Don't Want No Woman" by Memphis Minnie McCoy and Kansas Joe Johnson, and of course Blind Willie McTell's "Statesboro Blues".



There are four volumes in this series, available individually or as a box set, plus six volumes dedicated to individual artists (like Blind Willie McTell, Arthur Crudup, and Leadbelly, whose entry is one of the very best), and an eleventh volume of gospel music titled "Sacred Roots Of The Blues". All of these well annotated and carefully remastered discs are highly recommended to anyone with a serious interest in American roots music."