VA - Blues With A Message (2005)
EAC | FLAC | Tracks (Cue&Log) ~ 375 Mb | Mp3 (CBR320) ~ 168 Mb | Scans ~ 74 Mb
Blues, Folk-Blues | Label: Arhoolie | # CD 510 | Time: 01:13:22
EAC | FLAC | Tracks (Cue&Log) ~ 375 Mb | Mp3 (CBR320) ~ 168 Mb | Scans ~ 74 Mb
Blues, Folk-Blues | Label: Arhoolie | # CD 510 | Time: 01:13:22
Blues With a Message isn't just about lost love and the toils of specific lives, the blues (particularly within the folk-blues traditions) spent some time dealing with sociopolitical issues on the side, primarily before the rise of electric blues. Here, Arhoolie has compiled a set of pieces related to a surprisingly large number of issues. Among them: Minstrel shows, the mechanization of cotton farming, and its related exodus to the North, sharecropping, segregation, the Korean War, the influenza epidemic, the New Deal, civil rights movements, Chicago employment opportunities – all are given a song or two here. The music quality is roughly equivalent to many of the folk-blues recordings available, though the "big name" artists are largely absent from this one (Lightnin Hopkins does make an appearance singing about sharecropping, however). The songs are deliberately focused on the issues more than the music, but the music can still carry its soul. This one probably won't be on many highest-sales lists in the blues, but it's both historically important and musically enjoyable.