Sunday Morning Blues - Jimmy Reed, Otis Rush, Jimmy Rushing, Tampa Red

Volumes 37 and 38 of the ABC Of The Blues ... onwards!

Jimmy Reed
Many early blues artists are either guitar or harmonica, Jimmy was both, and an early pioneer in electric blues. Moving to Chicago his near-rock rhythmic style of playing gave him a string of minor hits through the 1950s. Though his alcoholism kept him from taking any serious advantage of this and he languished just out of reach of major stardom. During the late 1960s, after his label Vee-Jay shut down, he made somewhat of a living touring the blues and folk festivals of Europe with other contemporaries. But he never did get another hit after the mid 1960s.

While his guitar sounds and feels a lot like rock and roll, and the Rolling Stones even sited him as an influence, it's Jimmy's harmonica and voice that keep his music firmly planted in the blues. A great early electric-blues sound, I like the slow rambling songs the best in this selection.

Otis Rush
Left handed guitarist Otis Rush moved to Chicago to begin playing in the late 1940s. His sound became locally known as 'West Side' Chicago Blues. He started to record in the mid 1950s but really didn't come up until the revival in the 1960s when he began touring the blues festivals. He stopped touring for a short period in the early 80s, made a come back, and toured through the 90s. He didn't release any new material intil 1997, and hasn't recorded or toured since 2004 due to a stroke.

A smooth Chicago style, the recordings here are mostly the early stuff. Several recordings from his days with Cobra Records. If there's a cross between the late Chicago style after Muddy Waters made the scene bigger and the other styles, Otis is it, his distinct guitar sound is long and drawn out, with bent notes. He stands out from a lot of Chicago Bluesmen due to his guitar style.

Jimmy Rushing
James Andrew Rushing was as much a jazz singer as he was a blues singer. In the blues his style was a shouting blues common in Jump Blues. His vocal range was wide, from tenor to baritone. He was able to shout over the horn section if needed. By the 1950s he was recording as much, or more, pure jazz than blues, changing with the times. While he definitely had influence in the blues scene, he's known mostly as a jazz singer, or at least I know him mostly as a jazz singer.

There's a lot of jazz in this section of recordings actually, not quite all his blues releases. A few of his bigger hits are missing, doing the artist justice by digging a little deeper into the back catalog and finding some of the gems.

Tampa Red
Hudson Woodbridge was another Chicago bluesman, with a 40 year career spanning from the 1920s to the 1960s. He started recording in 1928, and through the 1930s was a popular session musician, appearing a many recordings from the era. His loud slide guitar sound from pre-amp days was due to him playing a National resonator guitar, and a signature bottleneck slide style, a precursor to the modern rock guitar solo after a fashion. He had several hits in the 1940s, but between his wife's death (after which he fell into alcoholism) in 1953 and the decline of blues popularity he fell off the grid. He was briefly a part of the blues revival in the 1960s, though his last actual recoding was in 1960 he toured for a time. He finally passed away in 1981, destitute in Chicago, having never made a major comeback.

A slow moving guitar and harmonica blues set here, a very classic Chicago Blues sound. They did manage to find a bunch of his solo work, not just the several hundred recordings he sat in on as a session musician. Tampa Red can literally be found on almost every major artists recordings sometime in the 30s and 40s, getting his solo stuff is nice. His voice isn't rough, but it's not really the smoothness of Rushing or Rush here, very middle, very good blues.

Next week... Bessie Smith gets her own volume, Huey "Piano" Smith, and Frankie Lee Sims.