Mr. McTell Got The Blues

“Cigarettes is my ruin, whiskey is my crave,
someday pretty women gonna take me to my grave”

A common question I am asked is why are so many early Blues performers blind. Seems to be a matter of simple economics. As Keith Briggs wonderfully understates, “A man born both black and blind in the American south at the beginning of the twentieth century soon discovered his options were limited.” Performing music was one of the only opportunites for autonomy and self-sufficiency. Another factor that complicates things is that Blind Willie McTell was smart enough to game the system and record under many names to avoid contractual obligations to one label. He recorded under is own name for Victor and Decca, Blind Sammie for Columbia, Georgia Bill for Okeh, Hot Shot Willie for Victor, Blind Willie for Vocalion, Red Hot Willie Glaze for Bluebird, Barrelhouse Sammie for Atlantic and Pig ‘N Whistle Red for Regal. For a man with such a singular sound how he did he manage to pull this off? He was yet another widely recorded artist that Alan Lomax “discovered” in 1940. That said, the Library of Congress recordings are amazing. McTell has been copied, name checked, and covered by everyone from Bob Dylan through Kurt Cobain up to the White Stripes – the looks I get when I play the original “Your Southern Can is Mine” – all a testament to his influence outside of blues. I was going to recommend Catfish Record’s Definitive Blind Willie McTell as it was once a budget three disc set of all his recordings under every name up until 1935. It now appears out of print and very expensive. In that case I recommend either The Best of Blind Willie McTell for a great single disk collection or The Classic Years 1927-1940 which has most of the recordings in the Catfish collection plus it has the LoC recordings by Alan Lomax. I can not recommend the Roots-n-Blues series from Columbia as typical with them the noise reduction is done to extremes transforming McTell’s voluminous 12 string sound into a tinny facade of its true tone. I am no audiophile but this is apparent enough on headphones and very apparent through a PA.

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