Name: Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 4 (1932-1934)
Brand: Document (USA)
SKU: 757791
Price: 42.46 USD
Availability: InStock

Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 4

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Album: Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 4 (1932-1934)
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Gone Mother Blues
2)	Midnight Hour Blues
3)	Moonlight Blues
4)	Depression Blues, The
5)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama - (take, take 1)
6)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama - (take, take 2)
7)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama No. 2
8)	Court Room Blues
9)	Hurry Down Sunshine
10)	Corn Likker Blues
11)	Hold Them Puppies
12)	Shady Lane Blues
13)	Blues She Gave Me
14)	Yo Can't Run My Business No More
15)	Blues Before Sunrise - (take, take 1)
16)	Blues Before Sunrise - (take, take 2)
17)	I Ain't Got No Money Now
18)	Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child
19)	Stormy Night Blues - (take, take 2)
20)	Take a Walk Around the Corner
21)	Baby Come Back to Me
22)	Blue Night Blues
23)	My Woman's Gone Wrong

Album: Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 4 (1932-1934)
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Gone Mother Blues
2)	Midnight Hour Blues
3)	Moonlight Blues
4)	Depression Blues, The
5)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama - (take, take 1)
6)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama - (take, take 2)
7)	Mean Mistreatin' Mama No. 2
8)	Court Room Blues
9)	Hurry Down Sunshine
10)	Corn Likker Blues
11)	Hold Them Puppies
12)	Shady Lane Blues
13)	Blues She Gave Me
14)	Yo Can't Run My Business No More
15)	Blues Before Sunrise - (take, take 1)
16)	Blues Before Sunrise - (take, take 2)
17)	I Ain't Got No Money Now
18)	Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child
19)	Stormy Night Blues - (take, take 2)
20)	Take a Walk Around the Corner
21)	Baby Come Back to Me
22)	Blue Night Blues
23)	My Woman's Gone Wrong

Performer Notes

Personnel: Leroy Carr (vocals, piano); Scrapper Blackwell (spoken vocals, guitar).
Recorded in New York, New York & St. Louis, Missouri between 1932 & 1934. Includes liner notes by Alan Balfour.
Personnel: Leroy Carr (vocals, piano); Larry Check (vocals, piano); Scrapper Blackwell (guitar).
Recording information: New York, NY (03/16/1932-08/14/1934); St. Louis, MO (03/16/1932-08/14/1934).
People living in the early 21st century would do well to consider complete immersion in more than an hour's worth of vintage Vocalion blues records made during the darkest days of the Great Depression by pianist Leroy Carr and guitarist Scrapper Blackwell. Vol. 4 in Document's Complete Recorded Works of Leroy Carr contains 23 sides dating from March 1932 through August 1934, with three takes of "Mean Mistreatin' Mama" (suffused with a mood that almost certainly inspired Big Maceo's sound) and an extra version of Carr's beautifully straightforward "Blues Before Sunrise." This is not a "get up and shake your butt" kind of collection, and anyone who complains that it isn't has missed the entire point of historic blues appreciation altogether. In order to connect with this music you need to take a few deep breaths and let these men work on your nervous system with songs that hover and contemplate existence in the middle of the night (as in "Midnight Hour Blues"' "when the blues creep up on you and carry your mind away"), sometimes upgrading to the purposeful lope or the brisk walk, depending on what kind of real-life stuff is being processed. "Hold Them Puppies" and "You Can't Run My Business No More" seem to pulse with energy born of the friction that sometimes arises between two people who don't always see eye to eye. "Court Room Blues" is a boogie with complications in the air; "Take a Walk Around the Corner" is a boogie with murder in its eye. "I Ain't Got No Money Now" is a handsome cousin to Clarence "Pinetop" Smith's "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out." As for "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," Carr has borrowed the title from the bedrock of African-American spirituals, but the song itself, like "Hurry Down Sunshine," "Moonlight Blues," and more than half the material on this collection, is a slow bluesy rumination on the difficulties of life in the world. ~ arwulf arwulf