"The Year of the Blues"
Of course it's the years of the blues you say. After all, it's only early February and a brace of eastern tyrants are busily assembling Armageddon while the markets are nose-diving south. And on top of all that, winter has its chilly grip upon us. Isn't that's enough to give anyone the blues? Actually, when I say "blues" here I'm talking about that most influential form of American roots music upon which jazz, rock 'n' roll, soul and hip-hop are based. You see, the United States Congress has proclaimed 2003 to be the "Year of the Blues". Sadly, other, less sonorous, events have stolen the spotlight so far this year.
Be that as it may, the place to be tonight is New York's Radio City Music Hall where a momentous ?Salute to the Blues? concert will take place. Take a look at the amazing line-up: B.B. King, Robert Cray, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Natalie Cole, Solomon Burke, Honeyboy Edwards, John Fogerty, Macy Gray, Mos Def, Bonnie Raitt, Dr. John, Mavis Staples, Gregg Allman, Chuck D, India.Arie, Angelique Kidjo, Alison Krauss, The Neville Brothers, James Blood Ulmer?
One artist not on the list, however, is R.L. Burnside. Now 76 and in poor health he tends to stay in his native hill country near Holly Springs in Mississippi. He did manage to get to New York last year where he played at Richard Gere's birthday party, and he followed up with a gig at the Village Underground where those trooping backstage to shake his hand included Uma Thurman and Deborah Winger. Now that Burnside's music graces the soundtrack of the hit TV series The Sopranos, he's hotter than hot.
So, what can one say about Burnside except that his life is the stuff of the blues. Cotton farmer, fisherman, father of twelve and convicted murderer, he has lived the music and his blues talk about painful alienation. When he launches into "Bad Luck and Trouble" with that great opening line, "If it wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have had no luck at all", you know he's telling the truth about sharecropping, racism, illiteracy, alcohol abuse, domestic violence and prison time.
By the way, "Bad Luck and Trouble" is one of the dozen live tracks on the album Burnside on Burnside, which was recorded in San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, during his triumphant January 2001 march up the West Coast. This is his finest work since "Too Bad Jim" (1994), which was produced by Robert Palmer, and if you're looking for the authentic North Mississippi blues sound with its heavy shuffle and one-chord guitar drones, this is as good as it gets.
One cannot discuss Burnside, of course, without mentioning Matthew Johnson, the man who rescued him from poverty and obscurity. It's thanks to Johnson's blues label, Fat Possum Records, that the careers of such Mississippi Delta bluesmen as Burnside, T. Model Ford, Cedell Davis, Paul (Wine) Jones and the late Junior Kimbrough were revived. An artist, a wheeler dealer and a superb raconteur, Johnson has been drawn to the blues by its spirit of anarchy, something, by the way, which he says exists also in the music of modern-day nihilists like Eminem.
Back to Burnside on Burnside. After five highly propulsive numbers, a thirsty Burnside is getting ready to crank out "Walkin' Blues". One can almost sense the sweat and the aroma of the Jack Daniels in the crowded club. And then this from Burnside: "After tonight, I'm not goin' to drink anymore, unless I'm by myself or with somebody." Well, well, well.
Diarist of the day: John Evelyn, 7 February 1682"I continu'd ill for 2 fitts after, and then bathing my leggs to the knees in Milk made as hott as I could endure it, and sitting so in it, in a deepe Vessell, covered with blanquets and drinking Carduus posset, then going to bed and sweating, I not onely missed that expected fit, but had no more."
