INSIDE: DETAILED DELMARK BLUES ... - Delmark Records

ITALIAN IMPORT LPs FROM MONK RECORDS.
For vintage blues, you can’t go wrong with these beautiful 180g vinyl issues.
CHARLEY PATTON,
You're Gonna Need
Somebody When You’re
Dead (MONK 300)
4LPs $119.99
Featuring Patton’s
recordings from 1929 to
1934 all in one set.
Includes 6 postcards, a poster and a booklet.
Contains the 3 different volumes of the Electrically
Recorded trilogy (Prayer Of Death, High Water
Everywhere and Jesus Is A Dying-Bed Maker) plus a
forth LP available only in this box.
CHARLEY PATTON, Electrically Recorded:
Prayer of Death (MONK 304) LP $23.99
It was not only Patton’s mastery of the guitar and
incredible vocal style that gained him popularity. His
rock star-style showmanship and stage antics, made
him the idol of music fans everywhere he played.
CHARLEY PATTON, Electrically Recorded:
Jesus is A Dying Bed Maker (MONK 308) LP $23.99
12 more tunes from Patton’s 1929 recording sessions.
Here he performs some of his finest spiritual
blues, like the title track. One the most seminal
blues artists of all time, this collection helps keep
the legend alive.
CHARLEY PATTON, Electrically Recorded:
High Water Everywhere LP
This compilation features the two-part “High Water
Everywhere,” and “Devil Sent The Rain Blues,” making
this second episode of Monk’s retrospective on
Patton another must have.
CHARLEY PATTON, Electrically Recorded:
Moon Going Down $23.99 (MONK 311)
The tracks found here feature another giant of the
Delta blues: Willie Brown. Although Brown was an
accomplished vocalist and his guitar player was second
to none, he was perhaps known as a sideman,
accompanying Robert Johnson, Son House and, as
heard here, Charley Patton.
BLIND WILLIE MCTELL,
Scarey Day Blues
(MONK 309) 2LP $32.99
Despite his blindness,
McTell was a talented
musician since early
childhood. He is credited
with having created an
entire blues sub genre by mixing the hard roots of the
Delta style with the more refined East Coast style
(Piedmont Blues).
BLIND WILLIE MCTELL, Searching The Desert
for the Blues (MONK 335) 2LP $32.99
This 32-track collection of rare sides-originally
released on Okeh (as Georgia Bill), Victor (as Hot
Shot Willie) and Vocalion (as Blind Willie) finds McTell
playing alongside another amazing Georgia blues guitarist,
Curley Weaver, and backing two fine Atlanta
blues singers Ruth (Mary) Willis and Ruby Glaze.
BLIND LEMON
JEFFERSON, IWantTo
Be Like Jesus In My
Heart (MONK 312)
LP $23.99
The epitome of a sort of
“dark” blues, Henry “Blind
Lemon” Jefferson lived a
mere 35 years, during which time he became the
quintessential bluesman, conjuring a personal mix of
rural and urban blues, decrying the conditions of the
sharecroppers and city slum dwellers alike. He actually
got his start playing in brothels and barber
shops, where he developed his theatrical vocal
lament. Unfortunately this early genius of the blues
allegedly met his premature demise by freezing to
death in 1929 in Chicago.
FURRY LEWIS, I Will
Make Your Money Green
(MONK 321) 2LP $32.99
Furry Lewis began his
recording career in
1927 (his first session
is found here) and his
prowess on his instrument,
along with his natural flair for storytelling,
immediately set him apart from so many other
struggling young bluesmen. These sides represent
his best material, recorded at the end of the
roaring twenties, when Lewis was a young man
at the heighth of his abilities.
BLIND BLAKE, That WIll Happen No More
(MONK 331) LP $21.99
After their success with Blind Lemon Jefferson,
Chicago's Paramount was scouting for more male
blues talent, and they found it in 1926 in a man
called Blind Blake (1893-1933), a sophisticated
guitar player who was the antithesis of Delta blues.
No one had fingers as fast as Blind Blake. These
recordings taken from 1927-28 are a collection of
Blind Blake’s early material, showcasing the man
at his musical peak.
BLIND BLAKE, Back Biting Bee Blues
(MONK 313) LP $23.99
Blind Blake may have lived a short time, but his
contributions were monumental. His astonishingly
odd style made his riffs sound like a ragtime piano
and his particular finger picking inspired many
modern blues artists.
TOMMY JOHNSON, Cool Drink of Water Blues
(MONK 320) 2LP $32.99
Tommy Johnson was one of the great early talents
of the Delta Blues style. Recorded in Memphis and
Wisconsin in 1928 and 1929, these 17 tracks represent
Johnson's complete recorded works from
those two years, and capture Johnson in his prime.
There is also some lesser known material included
here like, "Ridin Horse" and "Alcohol and Jake
Blues", taken from what is believed to be the only
remaining copy of the original 78!
SON HOUSE AND OTHER GREAT DELTA BLUES
SINGERS (MONK 328) 2LP $32.99
This 24-track collection of historic Delta blues
recordings kick off with Son House’s earliest recorded
material. They include the original rare versions
of “Walkin’ Blues” (later made famous by Robert
Johnson) and “Death Letter Blues” (here called
“My Black Mama Part II”). The remaining 17 tracks
on this album are a chance for listeners to hear
some lesser known Delta bluesmen, all contemporaries
of Son House.
MISSISSIPPI SHEIKS,
Sitting on Top of the
World (MONK 315)
LP $23.99
Formed in 1930 as a
trio of guitar and fiddle
music, the original lineup
was composed of
Lonnie, Sam and Armenter Chatmon, the latter best
known as Bo Carter, who was also a solo star of
the period. Their first single, “Sittin’ On Top of The
World,” was their biggest success. It went on to
become a standard country blues song covered
by many artists of the caliber of Harry Belafonte,
Bob Dylan and Cream.
FRANK STOKES, Downtown Blues
(MONK 316) LP $23.99
This African American singer and guitar player got
his start playing on the streets of Memphis around
the turn of the century. His enormous repertoire
of early folk, blues, old time country and popular
music, along with his influence on local musicians
has made many point to him as the true father
of Memphis blues. Stokes recorded a number of
sides for Paramount and Victor until his old time
style began to lose popularity with the recordbuying
public.
BESSIE SMITH
Them’s Graveyard
Words (MONK 333)
LP $21.99
Bessie Smith was the
greatest of all prewar
blues singers, and perhaps
the greatest female
blues singer of all time, as these meticulously
restored sides from the very apex of her career in
1927 so divinely prove. In her short lifetime (she
died in a car accident at age 42), she made close
to 200 recordings, teaming up with just about every
talented black musician of her day, including
Clarence Williams, Charlie Green, Joe Smith, James
P. Johnson, Louis Armstrong and Fletcher Henderson,
to name just a few. The "Empress of the Blues"
fought her way to the top of the recording industry
to become the biggest selling and highest paid
black recording artist of the roaring twenties. These
recordings all made in New York City in 1927
include her best known sides, including "Back Water
Blues", "Nobody Knows You When You're Down
And Out,” and "After You’ve Gone".