Louisiana Red will turn 80 years old in just three months. He’s lived through most of the recorded history of the blues, and recorded hundreds of songs over a career which dates back to 1949. There is nobody else who sounds quite like Red; in fact, Louisiana Red is so good because he’s Louisiana Red – in other words, so highly idiosyncratic, so deftly unconcerned with imitation that he can’t imagine being anything else but himself on vocals and guitar.
Red was born Iverson Minter back in 1932, and his biography emphasizes the sparse facts of his early tragic losses. His mother died shortly after he was born, and his father was lynched by the Ku Klux Klan when he was five. But Louisiana Red’s music is not steeped in tragedy. His blues are about carrying on in the face of adversity, about looking for the next experience which is just around the corner.
Louisiana Red's Memphis Mojo
After all these years of singing and playing the blues, Louisiana Red still has plenty to share with his listeners. Memphis Mojo is the second collaboration with producer Little Victor, who this time around brings his own Little Victor's Juke Joint band into the mix. Since Red is one of the last electric blues players who cut his teeth playing solo, it can be something of a task for any band to keep up with his somewhat personal approach to rhythm guitar, but these guys pull it off nicely throughout the new record.
The album kicks off with a ramshackle feel for “Goodbye Blues,” with the band doing its best to follow Red’s lead. “Take a cab, children, a cab that ain’t mine / That’s alright, Eileen, you’re driving me out of my mind.” Great lyrics tumble out of him, and he sings with an off-handed yet ingratiating and well-toned delivery. It sounds as though he’s just speaking what’s on his mind, yet in a more artful way than most people could manage. “I Had Troubles All My Life” is one of many reminders that Red grew up absorbing the traditional Delta-based blues; his “Owooo” cry comes from the same place as Howlin’ Wolf’s. It is strange to hear him sing here of the desire to return to Mississippi and pick cotton, though this could be said to demonstrate the difficulty of the life of troubles he’s trying to describe, that something so harsh could be better. Oddly, the desire will come up again as the album goes on.
Little Victor's Juke Joint
All the songs on Memphis Mojo were written by Red, sometimes in collaboration with Little Victor, except one. He covers Blind Lemon Jefferson’s “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean,” mingling fear with pride and respect, belting out the lyrics as if he understands them clearly for the first time. His slide-guitar playing on this cut is exquisite, an ethereal, spooky approach which bears little relation to any of the familiar collection of blues licks we’ve heard a million times. He really owns his own style of playing which has rarely, if ever, been imitated.
Desperation rears its head in “No More Whiskey,” an urgent, one-chord plead for a lover to stay and give him the chance to become the better person he needs to be. “No more whiskey, no more wine / No more boozin’ and women all the time / No more drinkin’ whiskey and beer / I’m gonna stay in the house right here / You know I love you too much / I’ll take anything you want to give.” That’s a man who isn’t ready to lose what’s important. The next two songs, “Yolanda” and “Just Take Your time,” are less immediately powerful, but are played and sung with more than enough passion and nuance to keep our attention.
Boogie Woogie Woogie
“Your Lovin’ Man” is terrific, a slippery groove with all the instruments sliding around the drop beat, and Red crying out in anger and confusion about his replacement. “I wonder who is your lovin’ man / I wonder who’s gonna be the man put a ring on your hand.” His slide-guitar simply wails on this cut, too. This is followed by “Boogie Woogie Boogie,” a song which is as repetitively brilliant as its title. It’s haphazard, but so darned infectious that it doesn’t matter. “I’m Gettin’ Tired” returns to the idea of moving back to Mississippi and picking cotton; Red does a terrific job of playing with note length, holding them an extra beat for emphasis, or cutting them to showcase his restlessness. He says he’s tired of moving and wants to settle down, but the way he sings reveals that for Red, there has to be a dream of something outside his norm, whatever that norm is.
For “So Long So Long,” the drums sit out, allowing Red even more latitude rhythmically with his vocals. He starts off way behind the beat, so tired, but then he jumps ahead of the beat, taking control of his destiny at last. “Why Don’t You Come On Home” asks a simple question, but may be more a matter of wanting control over something than a desire for this particular woman to return. The album ends with the haunting “Grandmother’s Death,” a slow, mournful blues in which Red makes us feel the totality of his loss, and his strong desire to have what was taken back with him.
Steve's Bottom Line
Louisiana Red is showing no signs of slowing down, still writing new material, still playing shows in Europe, where he lives, and in America, where he travels. Memphis Mojo is the kind of record that reminds us just how varied and how original the blues can be in the hands of somebody who completely internalizes the form, and creates something only he can share. (Ruf Records, released September 13, 2011)
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