Grady Champion’s biography reads like a TV movie. Starting his musical career in the early 1990s as a rapper named MC Gold, he changed his style when he discovered the blues. After incorporating blues samples into hip hop for a while, Champion decided to sing instead of rap, and to learn to play harmonica as well. Immersing himself in the music of the major blues artists of the past, most notably Sonny Boy Williamson (the Rice Miller one), whom he acknowledges as his greatest influence, Champion eventually became a more than capable blues artist. You’d never guess he hasn’t spent his whole life playing this music.
Champion released three records between 1998 and 2001, but has been left out of the studio since then. However, on July 7, 2007, the digital recording equipment was working at the 930 Blues Café in his native Mississippi. A live album was released on GSM Records in 2008, but has now been reissued by Earwig Music.
Grady Champion's Back In Mississippi Live
Smart enough to surround himself with talented players, Champion’s band includes keyboardist and arranger Calvin Wilson, bassist Marquis Champion (presumably one of his 27 siblings) and drummer Frank White. Oh, and the most exciting guitar talent to burst on the blues scene in the last ten or so years, Eddie Cotton, Jr. You may remember him from his astounding debut record Live at the Alamo back in 2000, though his national profile has been fairly quiet since then.
The live album obviously contains some overdubs, as there is no way Champion can sing and play harmonica at the same time, and there a couple of songs where Cotton is playing both acoustic and electric guitars simultaneously. But it definitely has a live feel, and an energy that only comes when a band is playing in front of an enthusiastic audience. Inexplicably, though, four of the fourteen songs end with fade-outs, in each case at completely inappropriate moments. There’s not much more disappointing than hearing Eddie Cotton start a blistering solo only to have it faded out just as he gets warmed up.
Blues Standards
Four of the songs are blues standards – Muddy Waters’ “I’m Ready,” Howlin’ Wolf’s “Spoonful,” B.B. King’s “Why I Sing the Blues,” and a medley of two from Jimmy Reed, “Baby What You Want Me to Do” and “Bright Lights Big City.” At best, these are impeccably played bar-band blues which practically line shots up on the bar by themselves. The Reed medley in particular shines, with Champion’s gentle, country-styled harp solo a nice contrast to Cotton’s tougher, more powerhouse guitar playing.
But “Spoonful,” despite an interesting take by Cotton on Hubert Sumlin’s familiar guitar licks, comes off forced and unconvincing as Champion tries to emulate the Wolf’s growl. And “Why I Sing the Blues” is played like a feel-good song at a clip too fast to really engage with the lyrics – King’s original strikes a perfect balance between the friendliness of the sound and the anger of the words; the first verse is, after all, an indictment of slavery, while the second is about poverty. This does have Champion’s finest harp solo, a nice long and eloquently stated series of melodic ideas, and Cotton pays a cool tribute to King on his short solo, bending notes and leaving space a la the master, though still sounding like himself.
Lonesome Bedroom Blues
Still, the majority of songs in Champion’s repertoire are lamentations or celebrations of love. The album’s absolute highlight is “Lonesome Bedroom Blues,” originally recorded by pianist Curtis Jones back in 1962, but here given majestic and devastating life through the combination of Cotton’s masterful and highly individualistic take on the traditions of slow blues, and Champion’s singular ability to sell the sorrow of the lyrics. These two are a match made in blues heaven, and Wilson’s smart arrangement gives them both plenty of room to shine.
Love and Memories
Champion’s originals range across a wide variety of styles, and the band follows him wherever he wants to go. “Love and Memories,” which sings of the love Champion has for his late mother, benefits from a gorgeous gospel feel. Champion excels at this particular type of vocal, and there is a beautiful and subtle vocal harmony accompanying him here. Of course, Cotton adds completely original guitar licks weaving underneath him, though this cut is also the first heartbreaking case of a fade-out taking us right out of the moment when Cotton really starts soaring on a solo.
“You Got Some Explaining To Do” is a catchy minor-key blues funk tune co-written with Dennis Walker, who worked this type of thing so well with Robert Cray early in his career. Champion sounds truly invested in the situation here, covering his hurt at the excuses of his woman with an aggression that just sounds on the verge of tears.
Blues On Christmas
“Brother, Brother” and “I’m Yours” sound different than everything else, calling to mind the soulful rock of the Black Crowes as much as anything else one could mention. On the former (which dates back to Champion’s 1998 self-released debut album Goin’ Back Home), he even sounds a bit like Chris Robinson when he sings. It should come as no surprise that Cotton can handle himself in this genre just as well as he does everywhere else he goes; he even takes the rock cliché of hammering triplets over and over again to a new and interesting place.
