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| | Steppin' on the Blues | | | Music Artist : | | Lonnie Johnson | | Music Style : | | General | | Record Label : | | Sony | | Release Date : | | 1990-08-20 | | Store Price : | | $9.98 | | Artistopia's Price: $9.98 | |
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CD Tracks/Songs
Disc 11. Mr. Johnson's Blues
2. Sweet Potato Blues
3. Steppin' on the Blues [#]
4. I Done Told You [#]
5. Mean Old Bedbug Blues
6. Toothache Blues, Pt. 1
7. Toothache Blues, Pt. 2
8. Have to Change Keys (To Play These Blues)
9. Guitar Blues
10. She's Making Whoopee in Hell Tonight
11. Playing with the Strings
12. No More Women Blues
13. Deep Blue Sea Blues
14. No More Troubles Now
15. Got the Blues for Murder Only
16. 6/88 Glide [#]
17. Racketeer's Blues
18. I'm Nuts About That Gal
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Other Artist Albums
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Customer Reviews of This Album/CD |
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 Mr. Johnson Is In The House
Submitted on: 2008-12-01 |
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Parts of the following have been used in a review of Lonnie Johnson Blues and Ballads CD (hereafter B&B).
Okay, Okay those of you who have been keeping tabs know that I have spend much of the last year, when not doing political commentary or book or movie reviews, reviewing many of the old time blues artists that were the passion of my youth (and still are). So this writer, who thought he had heard virtually all the key bluesmen and women of the old days, got his comeuppance recently when the name of Lonnie Johnson and his version of the classic double-entendre song "Jelly Roll Baker" came up. To name drop just a little, the occasion was a local reunion of Geoff Muldaur and Jim Kweskin of the old Jim Kweskin Jug Band from the 1960's (that also included Geoff's ex-wife and great performer in her own right, Maria Muldaur). They did a stirring rendition of the song and attributed it to the performer under review here. After scratching my head I ran out to get some more of Brother Lonnie's work and as noted above I have fulsomely praised his B&B CD in this space.
Although this CD has merit musically and certainly has historical worth as a comparison of young Lonnie Johnson in the 1920's to the later B&B Lonnie this is one time when aging seems to have created a better body of work. A comparison of "I'm Nuts About That Gal" (really an early version of his classic "Jelly Roll Baker") and the "Jelly Roll Baker" of the B&B make my point succinctly. That said, the noted Johnson guitar work is highlighted on "Guitar Blues", the novelty sassy song in two parts "Toothache Blues" and "Deep Blue Sea Blues". That is why you want this album.
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 Unbelievable
Submitted on: 2008-07-05 |
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| The sheer musicianship, not to mention the excellent crooning and detailed lyrics, that Lonnie Johnson is known for, are enough to warrant this disc a five-star rating. Even though "Toothache Blues" is a bit irritating, this is an incredible disc which everyone should own. Honestly, the one essential Lonnie Johnson purchase is the box set of his which I previously reviewed. However, if you can't afford that, you might want to pick this disc up. This is simply unforgettable stuff. |
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Mr. Johnson's Blues
Submitted on: 2006-04-08 |
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Lonnie Johnson (1899(?) -- 1970) had a long, highly successful career as a blues and jazz singer and guitarist. Johnson was a gifted musician who, when he began recording in the mid-1920s, had already appeared as a performer in England. Johnson's early recordings date from the time in which the women "Classic Blues Singers", including Bessie and Clara Smith, Ma Rainey and others were the predominant voice in the blues. Lonnie Johnson soon joined them and became the best-selling blues artist of his era. His recordings influenced the work of the delta blues singer Robert Johnson, among others. There was a great deal of interplay between the urbane, musically sophisticated style of Lonnie Johnson and the sometimes raw and intense blues that later became legendary with Robert Johnson.
This CD, part of the "Roots and Blues" series includes 19 of Johnson's early recordings and shows him as a singer, guitarist, and accompanist. It is an outstanding introduction to the achievement of Lonnie Johnson. I want to mention some of the tracks on this CD that I enjoyed and that are particularly noteworthy for showing the scope of Johnson's early artistry.
The opening track, "Mr. Johnson's Blues" was part of Johnson's first release in 1925 and is justly famous. The song opens with a rolling instrumental passage for guitar and piano followed by a single short blues verse sung by Johnson. The remainder of the recording features a long instrumental take-off on the vocal by Johnson on the guitar together with the piano. This song already shows great originality in the way the brief vocal section is integrated with the the long instrumental solos.
This CD includes several instrumental selections, and the two I want to note are "How to Change Keys (to Play these Blues)" and "Guitar Blues" in which Johnson teams with the white guitarist Eddie Lang (playing under the name "Blind Willie Dunn"). These are outstanding complex guitar solos, showing Johnson's virtuosity on his instrument. The first is a slow, drag with many changes of key while "Guitar Blues" is more uptempo.
The two-track "Toothache Blues" shows Johnson singing with Victoria Spivey, one of the "Classic" blues singers. Spivey had a light voice, and she was known for performing songs with strong sexual innuendos. Her collaboration with Johnson on this song fits that pattern.
Finally, two tracks in which Johnson accompanies the singer Texas Alexander deserve mention for the contrast they show between Johnson's urban blues and country blues. Texas Alexander performed in a country style of the sort that in our day has become better known that the urbane blues style of Lonnie Johnson. One scholar of the blues has written of this collaboration between Alexander and Johnson:
"[Texas Alexander] sang a lot of songs in a loose field holler style, which meant he didn't worry about what the guitar was supposed to be doing. Among the musicians who accompanied him on record was Lonnie Johnson who was one of the finest blues and jazz guitarists of the 1920s. The songs Alexander recorded with Lonnie were brilliant examples of how a guitarist can fill behind a singer who isn't bound much by regular rhythmic patterns."
This CD shows Johnson's musical gifts as vocalist, guitarist, and accompanist, as well as his gifts in developing a blues line and lyric in songs such as "Racketeer's Blues" and "I'm Nuts about that Gal". For listeners wanting to explore the blues and its place in American music, this CD is an excellent choice.
The quotation about Lonnie Johnson's recordings with Texas Alexander is taken from Samuel Charters's recent book, "Walking a Blues Road" (2004) page 221.
Robin Friedman |
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Every Blues fan needs this record
Submitted on: 2003-10-23 |
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| Lonnie Johnson was the first great blues guitarist, along with his partner Eddie Lang, he was the first great Jazz guitarist, he remained a song writer and a vocalist able to hit the charts with R & B hits well intothe late 1940s. He was class as both a jazz and blues folk revivalist when he was "refound" in the 1960s and was popular in the US, Europe, and Canada.
Robert Johnson obviously studied Lonnie's Work pretty well. In fact, Robert Johnson would lie and tell people that he was a cousin of the great Lonnie. Lonnie's records sold in the hundreds of thousands into the 1940s, while Robert Johnson never sold more than 2000 records while living on any tune. Lonnie was the antithesis of the false folkie-based stereotype of a blues performer. He was a professional performer as a kid violin virtuosi in vaudville touring the world before he ever learned to play the guitar! While born in New Orleans, he based himself in Chicago and New York during his playing career Johnson was not refound in some Mississippi Cotton field, but as a janitor in Philiadelphia. he went on to open his own night club in Toronto, Canada where he was killed byu complications after an automobile accident. What we see here in these records is a master musician. The guitar playing is unbelievably good, sweet, hot,and very very clean. The singing is always on key, professional, and cuts like a razor. The richness and saltiness of the verses ios tremendous. In the 20s, Johnson once bet someone he could play and compose 300 different blues, and he did with no difficulty and recored most of them! Even without their historical importance--this is what Blues performers aspired to--the records are just fun as expression and entertainment. I would also recommend the great records Johnson made with Lil Hardin Armstrong and others in Bluebird's Chicago stables in the 1940s, as well as the Verve Folkways recordings he made in the late 1960s. Heck, I would recommend you listem to birdcalls if Lonnie Johnson had recorded them! |
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technique ain't everything
Submitted on: 2003-10-06 |
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| This is a great CD, and so are all of Robert Johnson's records. This debate about their relative merits is rather pointless, and driven by the "better technique means better music" school of thought. Consider this; perhaps the most awesome blues song ever recorded is "Moanin in the Moonlight" by Howlin' Wolf. The Wolf sings paranoid lyrics to a blues melody, singing the chord changes, and Willie Johnson and Destruction play a recurring hypnotic riff behind the singer that stays ON ONE CHORD! They never leave the dominant chord. In my mind it cuts anything by either of the Johnsons, great as they were, and yet technically it is probably mediocre at best. Doesn't mean it ain't great. If you view blues as simply "fast playing", go watch the rubbish movie "Crossroads." |
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