I guess all songs is folk songs. I never heard no horse sing ’em.
~Big Bill Broonzy
Blues is a natural fact, is something that a fellow lives. If you don’t live it you don’t have it. Young people have forgotten to cry the blues. Now they talk and get lawyers and things.
~Big Bill Broonzy
“Worried Man Blues,” “Hey, Hey” and “How You Want It Done.” From the DVD “A Musical Journey”:
Wikipedia:
Birth name
Lee Conley Bradley
Also known as
Big Bill Broonzy, Big Bill Broomsley
Born
June 26, 1893
Lake Dick, Arkansas, U.S.
Died
August 14, 1958 (aged 65)
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Genres
Folk music, country blues, Chicago blues, spirituals, protest songs
Occupations
Musician, songwriter, sharecropper, preacher
Instruments
Vocals, guitar, fiddle
Years active
1927–1958
Labels
Paramount, A.R.C., Bluebird, Vocalion, Folkways
Associated acts
Papa Charlie Jackson, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger
Big Bill Broonzy (June 26, 1893 – August 15, 1958) was a prolific American blues singer, songwriter and guitarist. His career began in the 1920s when he played country blues to mostly African-American audiences. Through the ‘30s and ‘40s he successfully navigated a transition in style to a more urban blues sound popular with working class African-American audiences. In the 1950s a return to his traditional folk-blues roots made him one of the leading figures of the emerging American folk music revival and an international star. His long and varied career marks him as one of the key figures in the development of blues music in the 20th century.
Broonzy copyrighted more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including both adaptations of traditional folk songs and original blues songs. As a blues composer, he was unique in that his compositions reflected the many vantage points of his rural-to-urban experiences.
When Did You Leave Heaven:
(no.2 on Keith Richards “top 10 reggae and roots songs” – Rollingstone magazine)
Styles & Influences:
Broonzy’s own influences included the folk music, spirituals, work songs, ragtime music, hokum and country blues he heard growing up, and the styles of his contemporaries, including Jimmie Rodgers, Blind Blake, Son House, and Blind Lemon Jefferson. Broonzy combined all these influences into his own style of the blues that foreshadowed the post-war Chicago blues sound, later refined and popularized by artists such as Muddy Waters and Willie Dixon.
In 1980, he was inducted into the first class of the Blues Hall of Fame along with 20 other of the world’s greatest blues legends.
In 2007, he was inducted into the first class of the Gennett Records Walk of Fame along with 11 other musical greats including Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, Gene Autry, Lawrence Welk and others.
Broonzy as an acoustic guitar player, inspired Muddy Waters, Memphis Slim, Ray Davies, John Renbourn, Rory Gallagher, Ben Taylor, and Steve Howe
In Q Magazine (September 2007) it is reported that Ronnie Wood of The Rolling Stones claims that Bill Broonzy’s track, “Guitar Shuffle”, is his favorite guitar music. Wood said, “It was one of the first tracks I learnt to play, but even to this day I can’t play it exactly right.”
Eric Clapton has cited Bill Broonzy as a major inspiration: Broonzy “became like a role model for me, in terms of how to play the acoustic guitar.”
During the benediction at the 2009 inauguration ceremony of President Barack Obama, the civil rights leader Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery paraphrased Broonzy’s song “Black, Brown and White Blues”.
In order to prepare well for an upcoming Neil Young & Crazy Horse concert in Bergen, Norway 10 August, I will post setlists, statistics & different videos in this article.
This post will be updated regularly when the July leg gets going…
Recent concerts:
2013-06-02, Waldbühne, Berlin, Germany
2013-06-03, O2 World, Hamburg, Germany
2013-06-05, Ziggo Dome, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2013-06-06, Le Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy, Paris, France
2013-06-08, Vorst Nationaal, Brussels, Belgium
2013-06-10, Metro Radio Arena, Newcastle, England
2013-06-11, LG Arena, Birmingham, England
2013-06-13, SECC, Glasgow, Scotland
2013-06-15, RDS Arena, Dublin, Ireland
2013-06-17, The O2 Arena, London, England
Upcoming concerts:
2013-07-11, Rockhal, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg
2013-07-12, Lanxess Arena, Köln, Germany
2013-07-14, Moon and Stars, Locarno, Switzerland
2013-07-15, Vienne Antique, Vienne, France
2013-07-17, Le Festival de Nimes, Nimes, France
2013-07-18, Big Festival, Biarritz, France
2013-07-20, Festival Vieilles Charrues, Carhaix-Plouguer, France
Well I’m grinding my life out, steady and sure
Nothing more wretched than what I must endure
I’m drenched in the light that shines from the sun
I could stone you to death for the wrongs that you done
Sooner or later you make a mistake,
I’ll put you in a chain that you never will break
Legs and arms and body and bone
I pay in blood, but not my own
Convocation Center California University of Pennsylvania California, Pennsylvania 13 April 2013
Bob Dylan (vocal, grand piano)
Stu Kimball (guitar)
Duke Robillard (guitar)
Donnie Herron (violin, mandolin, steel guitar)
Tony Garnier (bass)
George Receli (drums & percussion)
Night after night, Day after day
They strip your useless hopes away
The more I take the more I give
The more I die the more I live
I got something in my pocket make your eyeballs swim
I got dogs could tear you limb from limb
I’m circlin’ around the Southern Zone
I pay in blood, but not my own.
Low cards are what I’ve got
But I’ll play this hand whether I like it or not
I’m sworn to uphold the laws of God
You could put me out in front of a firing squad
I’ve been out and around with the rising men
Just like you my handsome friend
My head’s so hard, must be made of stone
I pay in blood, but not my own
Another politician coming out the abyss
Another angry beggar blowing you a kiss
You got the same eyes that your mother does
If only you could prove who your father was
Someone must of slipped a drug in yer wine
You gulped it down and you cross the line
Man can’t live by bread alone
I pay in blood, but not my own
How I made it back home, nobody knows
Or how I survived so many blows
I’ve been thru Hell, What good did it do?
You bastard! I’m suppose to respect you!
I’ll give you justice, I’ll fathom your purse
Show me your moral that you reversed
Hear me holler and hear me moan
I pay in blood but not my own
You get your lover in the bed
Come here I’ll break your lousy head
Our nation must be saved and freed
You’ve been accused of murder, how do you plead?
This is how I spend my days
I came to bury, not to raise
I’ll drink my fill and sleep alone
I play in blood, but not my own
“The record chronicles the post-hippie, post-Vietnam demise of counterculture idealism, and a generation’s long, slow trickle down the drain through drugs, violence, and twisted sexuality. This is Young’s only conceptually cohesive record, and it’s a great one.”
~Dave Marsh (The New Rolling Stone Record Guide)
“Tonight’s the Night is that one rare record I will never tire of.”
~Chris Fallon (PopMatters)
The title cut:
Wikipedia:
Released
June 20, 1975
Recorded
August–September 1973 at Studio Instrument Rentals, Hollywood, CA (except “Come On Baby”: Fillmore East, NYC, March 1970; “Lookout Joe”: Broken Arrow Ranch, December 1972 and “Borrowed Tune”: Broken Arrow Ranch, December 1973)
Genre
Rock
Length
44:52
Label
Reprise
Producer
David Briggs, Tim Mulligan, Neil Young, Elliot Mazer (track 10 only)
Tonight’s the Night is the sixth studio album by Canadian musician Neil Young, released in 1975 on Reprise Records, catalogue MS 2221. It was recorded in 1973 (most of it on a single day, August 26), its release delayed for two years. It peaked at #25 on theBillboard 200. In 2003, the album was ranked number 331 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.
Roll Another Number (For the road):
Content:
Tonight’s the Night is a direct expression of grief. Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten and Young’s friend and roadie Bruce Berry had both died of drug overdoses in the months before the songs were written. The title track mentions Berry by name, while Whitten’s guitar and vocal work highlight “Come on Baby Let’s Go Downtown”; the latter was recorded live in 1970. The song would later appear, unedited, on a live album from the same concerts, Live at the Fillmore East, with Whitten credited as the sole author.
Fans have long speculated that an alternate version of Tonight’s the Night exists. Neil Young’s father, Scott Young, wrote of it in his memoir, Neil and Me:
Ten years after the original recording, David Briggs and I talked about Tonight’s the Night, on which he had shared the producer credit with Neil. At home a couple of weeks earlier he had come across the original tape, the one that wasn’t put out. “I want to tell you, it is a handful. It is unrelenting. There is no relief in it at all. It does not release you for one second. It’s like some guy having you by the throat from the first note, and all the way to the end.” After all the real smooth stuff Neil had been doing, David felt most critics and others simply failed to read what they should have into Tonight’s the Night — that it was an artist making a giant growth step. Neil came in during this conversation, which was in his living room. When David stopped Neil said, “You’ve got that original? I thought it was lost. I’ve never been able to find it. We’ll bring it out someday, that original.”
Here is “Roll Another Number” (unreleased from the Acetate tape):
Tonight’s the Night (unreleased – from the acetate tape):
This should end any lingering doubts as to whether the real Neil Young is the desperate recluse who released two albums in the late ’60s or the sweet eccentric who became a superstar shortly thereafter. Better carpentered than Time Fades Away and less cranky than On the Beach, it extends their basic weirdness into a howling facedown with heroin and death itself. It’s far from metal machine music–just simple, powerful rock and roll. But there’s lots of pain with the pleasure, as after all is only “natural.” In Boulder, it reportedly gets angry phone calls whenever it’s played on the radio. What better recommendation could you ask? A ~Robert Christgau (robertchristgau.com)
Track listing:
All songs written and composed by Neil Young, except when noted.
Side one
“Tonight’s the Night” – 4:39
“Speakin’ Out” – 4:56
“World on a String” – 2:27
“Borrowed Tune” – 3:26 (based on “Lady Jane” by The Rolling Stones)
“Come on Baby Let’s Go Downtown” (Live) – 3:35 (Whitten/Young)
“Mellow My Mind” – 3:07
Side two
“Roll Another Number (for the Road)” – 3:02
“Albuquerque” – 4:02
“New Mama” – 2:11
“Lookout Joe” – 3:57
“Tired Eyes” – 4:38
“Tonight’s the Night—Part II” – 4:52
Musicians:
Neil Young – vocals, piano, guitar, harmonica, vibes
Ben Keith – pedal steel guitar, vocals, slide guitar
