BLIND BOY FULLER: COMPLETE RECORDED WORKS, VOL. 6 (1940)
1) Blue And Worried Man; 2)
Passenger Train Woman; 3) Shake It, Baby; 4) Somebody's Been Talkin'; 5) Three
Ball Blues; 6) Little Woman, You're So Sweet; 7) Harmonica Stomp; 8) Good
Feeling Blues; 9) You Can't Hide From The Lord; 10) Twelve Gates To The City;
11) Crooked Woman Blues; 12) I Don't Want No Skinny Woman; 13) Bus Rider Blues;
14) You Got To Have Your Dollar; 15) Lost Lover Blues; 16) Thousand Woman
Blues; 17) Bye Bye, Baby; 18) When You Are Gone; 19) No Stranger Now; 20) Must
Have Been My Jesus; 21) Jesus Is A Holy Man; 22) Precious Lord; 23) Night
Rambling Woman.
Fuller's last two sessions date from March and
June 1940, both of them in the company of Sonny Terry on harmonica and Bull
City Red on washboard. The three of them gel best under conditions of complete
democracy — ʽHarmonica Stompʼ is a lot of fun, with Fuller adding bits of
semi-scat falsetto for rowdiness' sakes — unfortunately, these conditions are
rarely met, and most of the time we just get more rehashes of the same old
blues and ragtime stereotypes.
The only notable change is that both times,
Fuller adds gospel to the repertoire: starting with ʽTwelve Gates To The Cityʼ,
originally popularized by the Rev. Gary Davis, and ending with the spiritual
rave-up of ʽJesus Is A Holy Manʼ. This comes off as a bit of surprise, since
appeals to the Lord were not a known part of the man's repertoire — in fact, he
usually preferred sin to repentance. It is
possible, that with his steadily failing health and all, he was trying to get a
last minute ticket. None of these gospel covers, however, would fare all too
well in restoring his position at the Lord's knees: Fuller's voice is too weak
to stir up religious enthusiasm, and his guitar tricks are much better suited
for fun-oriented songs than serious praise-the-lord material.
He does develop a tired, worn out, «authentic»
rasp towards the end of the last session, suggesting total exhaustion — but
maybe he was just tired on that particular evening. Overall, the session was
quite Robert Johnson-ish in nature, all dark, depressing blues with nary a
single good time rag stomp to be found. Blind Boy Fuller's death date is
usually cited as February 13, 1941, but it is also known that he underwent a
serious surgical operation in July 1940, which probably explains all this descent
into bleakness and preachiness. Alas, I cannot honestly say that either of
these translates into great music — they just add a few logical final touches
to the portrait.
Altogether, as is already evident by now, the
six CDs that are needed to cover all of Blind Boy Fuller's legacy are murderous
overkill: my intuitive best-guess estimate is that he recorded every single
melody in his repertoire at least three or four times, and some of them as much
as ten or twelve. Yet the very fact that he actually got the chance to record
so much — a chance that was never available for quite a few of his superior
colleagues — is quite telling: he was treasured for sheer reliability. Most of
his major achievements may already be found on the first two volumes of this set
— but each and every volume is fully listenable; even in his last year, Fuller
never showed any decline in professionalism. For six steady years, his blues
machine rolled on without a hitch, and it might have rolled on for decades
longer, had not God suddenly felt an acute desire to hear ʽLog Cabin Bluesʼ
live. Must have worn out his stack of 45s.
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