Description
Release Date: 2011
Label: Not Now Records
Track List
Disc: 1
1. Where The Blues Began
2. Key To The Highway
3. John Henry
4. Big Bill Blues
5. Martha Blues
6. Saturday Evening Blues
7. Glory Of Love
8. Backwater Blues
9. Little City Woman
10. You Changed
11. How You Want It Done
12. By Myself
13. Jacqueline
14. Hollerin’ Blues
15. Willie Mae Blues
16. C.C. Rider
17. South Bound Train
18. Mopper’s Blues
19. Lonesome
20. Mississippi River Blues
21. Mindin’ My Own Business
22. Never, Never
23. Bill Bailey
24. Get Back
25. Careless Love
Disc: 2
1. Whiskey And The Good Time Blues
2. Midnight Special
3. I Know She Will
4. Five Feet Seven
5. Stump Blues
6. Preachin’ The Blues
7. Water Coast Blues
8. Lonesome Road Blues
9. Hey Hey
10. Crawdad
11. Walkin’ The Lonesome Road
12. I’m Gonna Move To The Outskirts
13. Shine On, Shine On
14. San Antonio Blues
15. I Don’t Want No Woman
16. Diggin’ My Potatoes
17. Tell Me Who
18. Tomorrow
19. Sweet Honey Bee
20. Wee Wee Hours
21. Romance Without Finance
22. Old Man Blues
23. Make My Get Away
24. I Feel Like Crying
25. Sad Letter Blues
Notes
Big Bill Broonzy built a blues recording career that lasted from 1927, when he tracked his first side with Paramount Records, through his last U.K. tour in 1957, and he did it by subtly adapting his intelligent blues style to the times, starting out with some vital and rough sides of country-blues, then moving into an urban groove that helped build the classic electric Chicago blues sound, before gracefully embracing the acoustic folk-blues just as the folk revival was building in the U.S. in the late ’50s, and he did all this without changing all that much, really, and it makes his recorded legacy a remarkably consistent one across the various blues styles: they all sound like Big Bill. This two-disc, 50-track set collects the essential tracks from all of Broonzy’s different eras (including, of course, his signature “Key to the Highway,” originally released in 1941 by OKeh Records), and it makes for a fine, in-depth survey and portrait of this influential blues player and composer.
