Big 3 Trio

The Big Three Trio, Willie Dixon | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 20, 1990)
• Original Release Date: August 28, 1990
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B000002751
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #270,474 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Big 3 Boogie

2. If the Sea Was Whiskey

3. I Ain't Gonna Be Your Monkey Man

4. 88 Boogie

5. Money Tree Blues

6. Big 3 Stomp

7. Since My Baby Gone

8. Hard Notch Boogie Beat

9. No One to Love Me

10. Don't Let That Music Die

11. It's All over Now

12. Tell That Woman

13. Got You on My Mind

14. Etiquette

15. You Don't Love Me No More

16. Come Here Baby

17. O.C. Bounce

18. Cool Kind Woman

19. Juice-Head Bartender

20. What Am I to Do

See all 21 tracks on this disc

Editorial Reviews

From Grove Press Guide to Blues on CD

Twenty-one enjoyable light blues and pop numbers from 1947 to 1952 sway, sashay, or boogie~compliments of Leonard Caston on piano, Bernardo Dennis or Ollie Crawford on guitar, and Dixon on bass fiddle. The three harmonize capably. -- © Frank John Hadley 1993

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Meaty, beaty, big and bouncy., August 4, 2008

By 

Yaakov (James) Mosher (Connecticut, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Big 3 Trio (Audio CD)

Once upon a time, before he took to laying the cornerstone of Chicago blues, Willie Dixon was part of a well-paid touring group known as the Big Three Trio. Flanked by friends Leonard "Baby Doo" Caston and Ollie Crawford (who replaced Bernardo Dennis early on), the group's instruments act as tools unleashing the anxiety left over from World War II. This is especially true of conscientious objector Dixon's bass, thumping like Big Ben over war-torn London, offering constancy and hope of recovery.
Dixon's genius can be glimpsed as metaphorically he squares the circle. While his instrument offers consistency (respectability, if you will) his lyrics contain humor, playfulness, and pathos. The froggie sound of "Tell That Woman" links Dixon with the Delta blues, showing his range. Besides being a rock-ribbed blues standard, "Cool Kind Woman" hints at the promiscuity and divorce currents that would swamp post-WWII America, doing their most severe damage to the black community.
"Money Tree Blues" reflects Dixon's personal creative dilemma as well as that of the nation after the war. Money kept Dixon (later king of Chess Records) distant from some parts of the blues world. As he told Don Snowden in his 1990 biography "I Am The Blues" - (this comment is reprinted in the CD's linear notes) - "We could make all the big clubs, but they couldn't hire us on the blues circuit because we were asking...Hell, we started making about $375 a week!" (Think in 1946 dollars).
The national manifestation is summarized in William Faulkner's 1959 novel "The Mansion" when ex-convict Mink Snopes asks about America's WWII opponents. A truck driver responds - "If they had let us lick the Russians too, we might a been all right. But they just licked the Krauts and Japs and decided to choke everybody else to death with money."
While using three-part harmony singing and playing on paradoxical energy created by battle fatigue (several songs have the words "boogie" and "stomp" in their titles) in satisfying the mainstream, Dixon winked to his lesser-paid brothers and sisters in the blues and jazz worlds, showing he was still one of them. Thanks partly to Caston's piano and Crawford's guitar, Dixon pulls off the binocular feat by recording two songs by another great genre straddler - Duke Ellington (a.k.a. the Duke of Elegance). Big Three Trio versions of "Etiquette" and "You Don't Love Me No More" are alone worth the price of this important CD (part of the Roots N' Blues series).
Upon hearing "Juice-Head Bartender" blues fans will say "case dismissed" to any suggestions Dixon polluted himself by playing to mass audiences as part of the Big Three Trio. Lastly, a postcard to Dixon in Heaven - "Good name for a group - Big Three Trio. But isn't that redundant?"

2 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Blues, Great Boogie, Great Willie, March 16, 2000

By 

Jorge Velasco Cruz (Florida) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Big 3 Trio (Audio CD)

Es el principio del gran Willie Dixon como un contrabajista excelente y como el gran compositor que se consolidaría más tarde. Si bien varias de las canciones que aparecen aquí pueden pecar de dulzonas o simples, lo cierto es que no por ello dejan de ser profundas y con melodías pegajosas y agradables. "The Big Three Trio" fue una buena banda que refleja el tiempo en que vivió. La destreza de sus componentes queda manifiesta en cada canción. La química entre ellos se trasluce y eso es lo que hace que el album no tenga desperdicio en este collage de blues, jazz, boogie y seudo rock and roll. Willie, como de costumbre, está fenomenal.