Real Folk Blues / More Real Folk Blues [Original recording remastered]

Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 12, 2002)
• Original Release Date: 1960
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Label: Chess
• ASIN: B000062YBL
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #132,232 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

The biography of Sonny Boy Williamson is something of an enigma, even to ardent blues fans. Indeed, he isn't even the "real" Williamson; a shrewd businessman simply gave singer-mouth harpist Aleck "Rice" Miller the name after the 1948 murder of popular blues artist John Lee Williamson. Still, Miller/Williamson's remarkable career literally bridged Robert Johnson and Eric Clapton, both his music and life embodying a free-wheeling, hard-living lifestyle that became something of a rock and blues cliché. After considerable local radio success in the Delta, Miller/Williamson ended up at Chicago's Chess Records in the mid-1950s, where all but one of these two dozen tracks originated in the early '60s. But by the time Chess originally issued the first of these ill-timed collections (belatedly compiled to cash in on a waning '60s folk boom), Williamson was six months dead. Listen and it's not hard to hear why a generation or two of blues-smitten rockers held him especially dear, be it the Allmans (the original "One Way Out," with longtime partner Robert Lockwood Jr. supplying the familiar guitar licks) or Zeppelin (a lugubrious, boogied-up take of Willie Dixon's "Bring It On Home"). Punctuated by harp blasts that could turn from sharply staccato to lyrically wrenching, Williamson's leathery voice muses over his being "Too Young to Die" or "Too Old to Think" with the self-deprecating indifference that became a trademark. Though these tracks are the cream of his last years, they're more boozy celebration than elegy. --Jerry McCulley

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A very interesting collection of latter-day Chess sides, August 14, 2004

By 

Docendo Discimus (Vita scholae) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Real Folk Blues / More Real Folk Blues (Audio CD)

MCA/Chess' "The Essential Sonny Boy Williamson" remains the ultimate Rice Miller-compilation, with "His Best" in second.
But this twofer-CD, which brings together all 24 tracks from Miller's two "Real Folk Blues" albums, doesn't make a bad supplement. It does repeat eight songs from "His Best", but it also has 16 songs which can't be found on that collection. Conversely, if you have the more extensive "Essential" anthology, you'll find only eight songs here that you don't already have.

The overall standart of this material is high, with "The Real Folk Blues" being slightly stronger than its companion volume.
"Help Me", "Bring It On Home", "Nine Below Zero", "Down Child", the supremely tough "Checkin' Up On My Baby", and the punchy "One Way Out" are all among Rice Miller's best most familiar songs, and numbers like "Too Young To Die", "Decoration Day" and "My Younger Days" are equally excellent. Rice Miller was by far the best songwriter of all the Chess greats of the 50s and early 60s, an awesome lyricist whose highly personal songs express sentiments ranging from pure joy to the deepest, darkest despair. Willie Dixon's way with words was impressive, but Rice Miller is something else:

"When I first met the lil' girl / I didn' know what I was doin' /
Now we all tied up / And my life is ruined!
I'm scared o' that child / I'm scared o' that child /
I'm scared o' that child / I'm too young to die!"

She's a cute lil' girl / She got such a wonderful mug /
When she start to talk / Her voice but stone jug /
I'm scared o' that child...

We had a date and I couldn't make it / That's what made 'er mad /
Now I'm lookin' at two brown eyes / They turned greenish-gray /
So I'm scared o' that child...

I called my baby / And I told 'er I would be late /
'Time my baby opened the door I looked in the barrel of a .38 /
I'm scared o' that child..."

23 of these 24 songs are from the 60s, and they are significantly better than Miller's 60s recordings for Delmark, even if this collection doesn't quite maintain the magnificent level of quality of MCA/Chess's main Sonny Boy-compilations.
Among the best lesser-known songs are the funky, playful "Peach Tree", Willie Dixon's swinging "That's All I Want", and the slow "Got To Move" from Miller's first LP, "Down & Out Blues". "Stop Right Now", "The Goat", "Close To Me" and a couple of other great songs will be familiar to those who own "The Essential Sonny Boy Williamson", but not to those who "only" have "His Best". ("Sad To Be Alone", on the other hand, is on "His Best", but not on the "Essential" collection.)

Newcomers will be better off with "His Best", but this CD is a really fine addition to that compilation...the sound is very good, and the liner notes get a B+ as well.
4 1/4 stars. Definitely recommended.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A TRUE MASTER OF THE GENRE, May 4, 2008

By 

Joel Morris "JEM" (CAMBRIDGE, MA.) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Real Folk Blues / More Real Folk Blues (Audio CD)

SONNY BOY II, AKA RICE MILLER. THE MOST SOULFUL OF THE CHICAGO BLUES ARTISTS. THERE WAS NO OTHER LIKE HIM. HE IS BY FAR MY FAVORITE OF THE "TRUE FATHERS OF ROCK & ROLL, NOT TO MENTION, R&B." THIS CD HAS MOST OF HIS BEST, BUT IT IS MISSING A COUPLE OF MY FAVORITES, LIKE, "DON'T START ME TALKING", AND "I DON'T KNOW." OTHER THAN THAT, IT IS FULL OF GREAT BLUES THAT HAS BEEN REMASTERED BEAUTIFULLY. GREAT BUY!!

5.0 out of 5 stars "SOMEBODY HELP ME" !!!!! I'M CRAZY 'BOUT SONNY BOY !!!!!, February 26, 2010

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Lonnie P. Fredette (PLATTSBURGH, NY, US) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Real Folk Blues / More Real Folk Blues (Audio CD)

Who doesn't just LOVE this man?! I've been a devotee for over four decades, I still remember like it was yeaterday coming home with the "One Way Out" and "Bummer Road" lps! That voice and harp blew me away then and it still does to this very day! This is a great collection of well and lesser known classics: "Bring It On Home" and "Peach Tree" are good examples of this. It would be difficult for me to cite a weak track as I'm not sure Sonny Boy EVER recorded one! You will enjoy this all to short overview and it should prompt you to go alot further! 'Nuf said!