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Blues, Off the Record

Oct 31, 2022 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Music

With Sonny Boy Williamson III

Boos, Off the Record

SB III covering for Stitching Pink. Could get spooky!

10:03 AM		Los Vampiranos El Vampiro El Vampiro: El Paso Rock, Vol. 8 Norton Records Inc. 2013
10:05 AM		Elmer Snowden & Lonnie Johnson Haunted House Blues & Ballads Fantasy Records 1990
10:10 AM		Lonnie Johnson Blue Ghost Blues Lonnie Johnson Vol. 3
10:13 AM		Lonnie Johnson Got the Blues for Murder Only Lonnie Johnson Vol. 6 Document Records 1991
10:17 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
10:19 AM		Robert Johnson Hellhound on My Trail King of the Delta Blues Singers
10:21 AM		Skip James Devil Got My Woman Complete Early Recordings: The Best of Skip James
10:25 AM		John Lee Hooker Graveyard Blues Blues Brother Ace Records 2012
10:27 AM		Helen Gross & The Kansas City Five Undertaker's Blues Jazz & Blues On Edison, Volume 1 Document Records 2006
10:31 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
10:33 AM		Dinah Washington Evil Gal Blues The Best In Blues Verve Reissues 1957
10:36 AM		The Yas Yas Girl (Merline Johnson) Sold It to the Devil The Yas Yas Girl (Merline Johnson) Vol. 1 1937-1938 Document Records 1994
10:39 AM		Bessie Smith Devil's Gonna Git You The Complete Recordings, Vol. 4 Legacy/Columbia 1993
10:42 AM		Laverne Baker Voodoo Voodoo Atlantic 60th: At the Hop
10:45 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
10:46 AM		Eartha Kitt I Want to Be Evil That Bad Eartha RCA/Legacy 1956
10:50 AM		Nina Simone I Put A Spell On You I Put a Spell On You Verve 2013
10:52 AM		Geeshie Wiley Skinny Leg Blues American Primitive Vol. 2 Revenant 2005
10:56 AM		Mary Butler Mad Dog Blues Walter Vinson
10:59 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
11:01 AM		Furry Lewis Furry's Blues In His Prime 1927-1928 Yazoo 1988
11:05 AM		Spark Plug Smith Vampire Woman Spark Plug Smith and Tennessee Tight
11:08 AM		Charlie Burse & His Memphis Mudcats Magic Spell Blues Memphis Highway Stomp Document Records 2009
11:11 AM		Charlie "Specks" McFadden Lonesome Ghost Blues Charlie "Specks" McFadden Document Records 1993
11:14 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
11:17 AM		George Carter Ghost Woman Blues Georgia Blues & Gospel 1927–1931
11:20 AM		Memphis Jug Band Spider's Nest Blues Ruckus Juice and Chittlins
11:24 AM		Blind Lemon Jefferson See That My Grave's Kept Clean American Epic: The Collection Columbia/Legacy 2017
11:27 AM		Cab Calloway St. James Infirmary Jukebox Hits 1930-1950
11:30 AM		Don Hinson & The Rigamorticians Riboflavin-Flavored, Non-Carbonated, Polyunsaturated Blood Monster Dance Party Capitol Records 1964
11:32 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
11:34 AM		Screamin' Jay Hawkins Whistlin' Past the Graveyard Are You One of Jay's Kids?
11:38 AM		Albert King Born Under A Bad Sign Born Under a Bad Sign Craft Recordings 2019
11:41 AM		Howlin' Wolf I Ain't Superstitious 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection: The Best of Blues Classics Geffen 2003
11:44 AM		Johnny Otis Castin' My Spell The Capitol Years Capitol Records 1989
11:47 AM		Set Break: ----------------------------------------------------
11:47 AM		Fred Hall Taint No Sin (To Take Off Your Skin) Halloween Classics: Songs That Scared the Bloomers Off Your Great-Grandma Legacy Recordings 2007
11:50 AM		John Zacherle My Dinner with Drac, pt. 1 Monster Mash / Scary Tales
11:53 AM		Tony & The Monstrosities Igor's Party Igor's Party - Single 1960
11:56 AM		The Ghouls Dracula's Theme Halloween With the Ghouls Capitol Records 2009
11:59 AM		New Orleans Owls White Ghost Shivers Jazz the World Forgot, Vol. 2 Yazoo 1996

Chat is archived.

Boo!

Good morning, Sonny Boy! Happy Halloween to all the ghosts and goblins out there!

Hey SB III, this is a treat not a trick 🎃

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III (host) It's frighteningly good to have you on the wavelengths again, even for a couple hours of ghost ghosting ... l mean, of guest hosting. (Hey, that's not much worse punning than "Boos Off the Record"!)

Richard, lol

@ Christine, pledger allegiance I loved "Hey SB III, this is a treat not a trick." :-))

Loving the spooky boos today SB3, Happy Halloween!

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III I never listened closely to Lonnie Johnson's "Haunted House." The singer has been in a haunted house "for six long months today," haunted by the memory -- and even the spirit -- of his deceased beloved, comforted by a sympathetic owl and black cat (usually creatures of menace). He even feels his departed woman's cold embrace and kiss as she declares "Yes, I'm dead and gone, but ...I will haunt the woman who dares, if she don't treat you right." Chillingly powerful!

I love some of those recordings Johnson did in his later career. The sound is great -- and you tend to listen to lyrics more when the sound is better I think!

"I Want to Be Evil" was written by Lester Judson and Raymond Taylor

LOVED Eartha! What a voice!

Can't find much on either!

Nina!

We love Screamin' Jay here at BOTR, but you've got to change it up every once in a while.

(kinda secretly hope you're playing "Go to Hell" next)

@ Janet Crum Yes! A great voice and also a tremendous performer, which makes her recordings -- with "I Want to Be Evil" a stellar exmple -- so special. She really tells and _sells_ that song!

So good to hear you! I would plan my long Monday drives on 206 to coincide with your show.

I've never seen the W.C Handy biopic "St Louis Blues" but I've heard some recordings Kitt did for an accompanying LP of the same name and admired them. Has anyone seen the film?

Happy Halloween to all! En route to NJ and loving this spooky playlist.

Thanks Stitching Pink!

And glad to be back on air Lee!

Safe travels home, SP.

💖🎃💖🎃💖

We have certainly missed you.

Robert Johnson used this same tune on "They're Red Hot"

I'm sure I've heard a song by the Harlem Hamfats that uses it too

Hey SBW III !!!

hi JimBOO!

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III (host) Charlie "Specks" McFadden's "Lonesome Ghost Blues" seems to share some lyrics and plotline with Lonnie Johnson's "Haunted House." Do you know anything about the history of either? Traditional or singer/songwriter composed?

Some direct protest on this one: "White folks, white folks, don't work my brown so hard." The couplet "When you see me coming pull down your window blinds" shows up in Skinny Leg Blues too.

Hm. I'd have to pay more attention to the lyrics on that one. I do know Bessie Smith recorded a "Haunted House Blues" which may be the source of both?

I think that song is credited to J.C. Johnson

Love to hear a Halloween blues show. Hope you're doing well and your family, too!

Thanks Krista!

A happy surprise for the morning, hi SBW-III! Two days in a row of blues 😁

I've seen this lyric transcribed as "Have you ever heard a coffing sound / then you know a poor boy's going down." I'm pretty sure it's "coffin sound." But what is a coffin sound? I think it's the nailing of a coffin shut. Furry Lewis talk about the sound of his coffin being nailed shut on Furry's blues.

Sorry the question is *coughing vs *coffin

I misread that as coffee sound, so that's all I'll hear now

Mention this every year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHraXOoY39U

Riboflavin-flavored BLUD 🩸

That rotoscoped animation is still impressively smooth to this day

There's another one for minnie the moocher

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III (host) Thanks for the "Haunted House" bg info. And yes IMHO it's not "coughing" but "coffin." Yes, the "sound" is likely the nailing shut of the lid but also the clumping and thumping of the long wooden box as it's hauled by wagon to the cemetery and unloaded and lowered into the ground.

Thanks Richard! Reminds me of seeing the phrase 'fore day creep listed in a lyrics sheet as "four day creep"

Screaming Jay 🚬💀✨️

The title of that LP, "Are You One of Jay's Kids?" refers to the fact that he boasted to having fathered 50 children out of wedlock.

Thank you for the music this morning, sir. Always a pleasure :)

Pleasure is all mine!

A show to scare our sonic bloomers off 😱 great hearing you on the airwaves, Sonny Boy III!

Thanks for the spooky tunes sonny boy! 🎃👻

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III (host) A Screamin' Jay friend & biographer set up a website with info on Jay's touring schedule ... so you could see where he was 9 mos. before your birth! Some 33 offspring were i.d.'d, about a dozen attended a 2001 reunion! http://www.jayskids.com/

Unbelievable!

Thanks all!

@ Sonny Boy Williamson III (host) My ghoulish gratitude for today's spook-tac-ular Boos, Off the Record!