It gets dark in Mississippi. Pitch black dark.
The State's nearly the size of England with a population of less than 3 Million... most being congregated in three spots. Jackson in the middle, Southaven/Olive Branch (this is the Mississippi part of Memphis) in the north and The Coast.
If you got yer map out, and shame on you if you don't, you'll notice that Louisville (sanely Anglosized as Lewisville in this state) and Carthage are not among these population centers...and between those two there is nothing more powerful than a reflector on a mail box to illuminate the night...and those need headlights to work.
There are the headlights...and the black top, yellow and white strips racing at the car out of the dark. With nothing on the periphery but darkness...it's hard to tell whether it's the car or the road that's moving at an 80 mile an hour clip.
Saturday night, just as I turned south on 25, passing Louisville, turning into the dark...the Highway 61 Project at Ole Miss unleashed Junior Kimbrough on the night.
That's Junior at his friend and acolyte Charlie Feathers' house...both from the Holy Springs area, Feathers said music began and ended with Junior Kimbrough. Who'd argue with that in the middle of the night?
Gives me goose bumps every time I hear it...
That's Mississippi.
That is just soooooo good. Hypnotic. Funky. Raw.
ReplyDeleteI like e.f. - I really really like.
Closed my eyes and for a few minutes was there, in Mississippi...
That's about as close as you can get without being here.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you like it...just click the Hill Country Blues tab for more. You won't be disappointed.
R.L. Burnside! Wow.
ReplyDeleteHill Country Blues. Words just don't do it justice e.f.
I am grinning. This is real good stuff.
Hmm...that's RAW. Good.
ReplyDeleteThe great benefit of having Fat Possum on the scene as opposed to the American Studies crowd was that they left the music alone...with clearly defined and specifically limited exceptions.
ReplyDeleteI'll have to scare up some Sound Machine era Burnside...recordings from house parties for y'all...you believe your ears.
You won't...won't believe your ears.
ReplyDeleteThere's clearly no sane explanation for this behaviour: riding the wheel like a depraved four-wheeled jackal, lit cigarette-end gyrating in the manner of a demented firefly, alternatively hooting and howling in the lunar-light forsaken, ink-night landscape, radio tuned to funneling raw-brain pulp from the ear canals in time to the beat of Delta blues Juju - bloody-eyed, salivating, white-knuckled highway cruising, while wholesome folk have long-gone to bed, post warm milk and kneeled bedside prayers.
ReplyDeleteI made it home in time to say my prayers.
ReplyDeleteSomehow, I know that to be true.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know if I was gonna make it back in time tonight.
ReplyDeleteThe fella I'm workin with this week is a flipping champ...one of my favorites. Just a good dude but, you better pack a supper if you're ridin with him.
That's how it goes when you're out there "fightin the psychos and the ufos."
He's twisted...prolly from workin 14 hours a day. I pride myself on makin it look like I'm never workin but that's hard to do when you leave and come back in the dark.