Guy Davis – Juba Dance

GUY DAVIS
Juba Dance
M.C. Records 
guydavis.com

Over the past two decades, Guy Davis has been one of the premiere interpreters of traditional acoustic blues and one of the songwriters whose in-the-tradition work has kept the genre vital and alive in modern times. In the hands of Guy and a few of his peers, the traditional blues forms remain timeless – as relevant in 2013 as they were 30, 50 or 80 years ago. All of the recordings Guy has released since the limited edition Guy Davis Live in 1993 (repackaged as Stomp Down Rider in 1995) have been both a homage to Guy’s musical forebears and a crucial contribution to contemporary music.

Juba Dance, about half of which features excellent contributions from Italian blues harmonica player Fabrizio Poggi, is one of Guy’s best as it ranges through various styles from jug band to delta blues to gospel and old-time.

I love jug band music and Guy kicks off the album with “Lost Again,” a happy sounding tune that sounds like it could have been played by the Memphis Jug Band 80 or so years ago. A jug band-meets-classic blues feel animates Guy’s version of Bertha “Chippie” Hills “Some Cold Rainy Day,” a delightful duet with Lea Gilmore.

Guy pays direct tribute to some of his musical ancestors by reinterpreting and revitalizing songs written or associated with them.

His acoustic version of “My Eyes Keep Me in Trouble,” seems to have lost none of the force of Muddy Waters’ electric original. Blind Lemon Jefferson’s “See That My Grave is Kept Clean” seems organically suited to Guy’s banjo accompaniment and gets a deep gospel feel from the formidable harmonies of the Blind Boys of Alabama, and Blind Willie McTell is recalled in Guy’s intense version of “Statesboro Blues.

Another tribute is Guy’s “Did You See My Baby,” in which he pays homage to the whoop-and-holler style of Sonny Terry (that’s Guy, not Fabio playing harmonica on this track). Guy also added a guitar part in homage to Brownie McGhee, Sonny’s long-time partner.

A couple of other banjo-driven songs are among the album’s highlights. “Dance Juba Dance,” is a “butt shaking” song that recalls the African American string band tradition, and “Satisfied,” with Guy playing some very bluesy slide banjo is a powerful prison song.

Great stuff.

Pictured: Guy Davis and Mike Regenstreif at the 2006 Champlain Valley Folk Festival.

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--Mike Regenstreif

Paul Geremia – Love My Stuff

PAUL GEREMIA

Love My Stuff

Red House

paulgeremia.org

As I noted in my Sing Out! magazine review of his 2004 album, Love, Murder & Mosquitos, I was a teenager and Paul Geremia was in his mid-20s when I first encountered him at the Back Door Coffee House in Montreal, circa 1969 or ’70. Paul was certainly a factor in my developing a taste for traditional country blues and he’s remained one of my all-time favorite revivalists of pre-war blues traditions, and one of my favorite songwriters within the idiom. Now, after more than 40 dedicated years of playing the music, and despite the fact that he came from outside the culture that originally produced the genre, I am almost loath to still think of Paul as a revivalist; the blues have become as much a part of Paul’s essence as anyone who was born to them.

Love My Stuff is a great 18-song live collection built from many gigs recorded over a long period of time at various locations. While most of the tracks are from the past decade, a few stretch back about three decades. And while most of the performances are solo, Paul singing with his guitar and, sometimes, harmonica, the terrific swinging version of “Dr. Jazz,” a great old King Oliver tune from the 1920s – also done by Jelly Roll Morton – adds Rory MacLeod on bass, and Sleepy John Estes’ “Special Agent,” features Rich DelGrosso on mandolin, in effect playing Yank Rachell to Paul's Sleepy John.

A few of the other highlights include nifty versions of Blind Lemon Jefferson’s “Shuckin’ Sugar Blues” and “Silver City Bound,” Lead Belly's tribute to Blind Lemon; Blind Willie McTell’s “Savannah Mama,” featuring Paul’s soulful slide work; and a terrific version of “See See Rider,” one of the most popular of the early traditional blues songs featuring some great singing and guitar and harmonica playing.

The vast majority of these songs date from the pre-World War II era. But there are three examples of Paul’s excellent songwriting. “Cocaine Princess” is a clever kiss-off tune to a messed-up woman who wasn’t the woman of his dreams, while “Where Did I Lose Your Love,” is a blues for a woman who might have been. Then, on the infectious “Kick It In the Country,” he sounds like he might be singing to a woman who falls somewhere in between the princess and the woman whose love he lost.

I’ve seen Paul play lots of concerts over the past four decades – I booked him a lot at the Golem, the Montreal folk club I ran in the 1970s and ‘80s – and have never been disappointed at the beginning, middle or end of an evening. I’ll say the same about this live album. Paul Geremia is one of the great ones, he is.

--Mike Regenstreif