BIG JOE WILLIAMS THE MASTER BLASTER OF MISSISIPPI BLUES

Before i get started on Big Joe Williams and the brilliant live
album i have of his featuring some of the best delta blues in
recorded history, allow me to say that the blog game at the
present time, at least in Australia, has really hit a brick wall
of apathy as far as readership goes. Times are tough and on-
ly the tough will survive the advent of newspaper editions on
iPad and other forms of mainstream media saturation which
News Ltd. especially is attempting to exert upon the popula-
tion to the point where people dont even bother reading any
blogs. So the pressure is on me and dozens of other blogwri-
ters to step up to the challenge and offer a quality product
which is free, and you`ll never get that from a mainstream
media outlet. OK, talking about Big Joe Williams, who was a
quite obscure but incredibly talented guitar picker from way
down in Missisippi. Joe was born in 1903 and passed away in
1982, he was one of the few `country bluesmen` to not take
up an electric rhythm and blues style after World War 2. He
didn`t need to actually, because his acoustic strumming was
electrifying without an amp. By the mid 1940`s, Joe was big
in Chicago and was performing in clubs alongside the likes of
Muddy Waters and Sonny Boy Williamson No. 1, not Sonny
Boy Williamson No. 2 for all you blues buffs out there. The
manner in which he made a guitar talk was no less hypno-
tising than Blind Willie McTell or the much more celebra-
ted Robert Johnson. The thing which arguably made Joe
even better than Johnson was his more upbeat approach
to mix rhythm and blues chords with pure Delta picking
melody. Eric Clapton often sights Robert Johnson as be-
ing the quinessential Delta bluesmen, maybe Slowhand
himself hasn`t listened to Big Joe Williams properly. If
he had i`m sure he would have to put him in the same
elite category which he put Johnson in long ago. Big Joe
generally didn`t deviate too much from his simple style
of picking the blues with little or no accompanyment, he
did make an album which was a bit unique in 1965 that i
have got in my collection, it`s called `Back to the Country`,
and it features Jimmy Brown on fiddle and guitar and also
Willie Lee Harris on harmonica. Like the album sleeve de-
scribes it, `Back to the Country` has a country dance hall
feel to it, like the way blues was played back in the 1920`s
and 1930`s, before electric came to being in Chicago in the
1940`s. Really old fashioned stuff and even on CD is sounds
like you are playing a 78, or maybe it`s because this album
is one of the worst watermarked CD`s i have in my collec-
tion, re: Badrick Unadulterated post about the great com-
pact disc deception going back a week or so if you want to
know more about that. Anyway, `Back To The Country`
is a good introduction to ancient country delta blues, but
my favourite Big Joe Williams recording is one which on-
ly cost me $4.95 at HMV years ago and whats more the
CD isn`t watermarked, yippy doo! `Back to the Country`
cost me $40 and the CD itself isn`t worth a cracker any-
more. The definitive Big Joe album, in my opinion, goes
by the name `Blues From The Southside`, and it come
out on a shitty record label called Golden Blues, and the
company which made the CD was called Pilz Entertain-
ment. As i said, it cost me $4.95 and it has become one
of my favourite blues CD`s over the years. The album
is a recording of a live Big Joe gig in the 1960`s, it just
sounds so acoustic, the clapping of the audience alone
which made it onto reel is incredibly acoustic and you
feel like you are there with them after listening to the
first song. I dont think i have ever heard of a live per-
formance which draws you in and makes you feel like
you there with the performer like this magical Big Joe
gig that became the album `Blues From The Southside`.
And just so you know, Big Joe Williams is not the slick
Kansas City bluesmen Joe Williams. I love him as well,
but their style of blues was worlds apart. Joe Williams
was the `Black Sinatra`, he was a blues singer, smooth
as silk and normally with a be-bop jazz accompanyment
behind him playing jazz while he sung the blues. I don`t
think there was anything too sophisticated about Big Joe
Williams, but not many people could a strum a guitar like
he could. Simplicity alone was his magical ingredient.