a scrappy match ... but three more points

aston villa 1 v 0 leeds

top ten albums - no. 4

Dear Sheddists,

I've always loved the blues, ever since my music teacher at school played an old 78rpm record which crackled and fizzed all the way down the years from the 1920s.

The song was "That Crawling Baby Blues' and the artist, Blind Lemon Jefferson, one of the founders of Texas blues who died prematurely in his 30's during a bitter Chicago snowstorm. The guitar riff had a baffling time signature augmented by a repetitive thumbed bass pattern over which an eerie vocal floated.  

It stuck in my mind, but it was another twenty years before I really started to explore the world of country blues. Once I got going I just kept digging and digging.  American labels were the best. Arhoolie, Yazoo and Rounder each brought a different take to this haunting and deeply personal music.  From the gentle Piedmont Blues of Mississippi John Hurt to the blistering, feral roar of Howling Wolf the music spoke of universal themes that remain true to this day - love, sex, death, hunger, longing, joy and misery.

The blues have a habit of getting right under the skin.  Just listen to this clip of the legendary Skip James playing Hard Times Killing Floor Blues to hear what I mean.

Many of the original country blues players were recorded during the 1920's for labels specialising in what was then called 'race music', only to disappear for decades in the aftermath of the Great Depression.  It took a new generation of musicologists to rediscover them in the 1960's by turning detective. 

Alan Lomax was the first to track down and record Mississipi Fred McDowell, a diminutive farmer and part-time blues musician who specialised in playing hypnotic, droning single-chord vamps. The record I've chosen for my top ten sees him paired with an old-time friend, Johnny Woods, a colourful harmonica-player who allegedly had to be dragged in for this live recording following a night of corn-whisky.  

Here they are playing 'Red Cross Store'

I defy you to keep your feet still as you listen!  

another rousing victory at villa park

aston villa 1 v 0 cardiff city

top ten albums - no. 3

Dear Sheddists,

our third visit to the record racks takes us to the much sunnier climes of Jamaica.

I was vaguely aware of Jamaican music as a child through early ska hits on the UK Trojan label - the likes of  'Liquidator' by the Harry J Allstars, 'Double Barrel' by Dave and Ansell Collins and 'Al Capone' by Prince Buster - but it was John Peel's fabulous Top Gear Show on Radio 1 that really turned me on to it.

Reggae, like most other established musical forms, is fragmented into a bewildering myriad of sub-genres from rock-steady to ragga. It was, however, dub that really caught my attention.  

I had never heard anything remotely like it before - the hissing hi-hat cymbals, pounding bass, smoky echoed vocals and fractured piano runs that emerged from nowhere only to disappear the very next moment.  I simply had to explore this further.

At first my dub play-list was put together through the medium of a make-shift home-studio. This comprised an Akai twin tape-deck, an FM radio and pillows for sound baffles. It proved surprisingly successful, and two or three times a night I would leap up to press the 'record' button as the latest white label from Jamaica hit the Top Gear airwaves.

I found myself in need of harder stuff and the very first dub album I managed to track down in a local record store was 'Dubbing With the Observer' by the Observer All Stars. Based largely on rhythms showcased by Dennis Brown it's a classic in its own right.

Notwithstanding the strong claims of this album to a place in my top ten I've chosen instead 'King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown' by Augustus Pablo, a masterpiece in the art of dub.  His trademark melodica blows delicate and haunting Far Eastern scales across the entirety of the record.

I have an original Jamaican pressing of this record on the Yard Music label, complete with details on the back cover of the distribution centre at 15 Tangerine Place, Kingston from which it was sold.  Needless to say, it takes pride of place in my vinyl collection.

Here's the title track - don't forget to turn it up loud!