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If you noticed blunt omissions, mis-interpretations or even out-and-out errors,
please let me know:
Arnold Rypens
Rozenlaan 65
B-2840 Reet (Rumst)
Artist: Tommy Johnson
Author: Tommy Johnson
Label: Victor
Year: 1928
Bluesman from Mississippi in the early days along with Charley Patton and Willie Brown; vaguely related with Lonnie Johnson. Influenced The Mississippi Sheiks, Howlin' Wolf and Canned Heat (see also: Stop And Listen Blues). Ralph Peer recording. His falsetto singing tapped directly from field hollers and blue yodels. Tommy Johnson is portrayed (by Chris Thomas King) in Brothers Coen film O Brother Where Art Thou.
Covers:
Mississippi Mudder [as Going Back Home]
Willie Lofton [as Dark Road Blues]
Floyd Jones [as Dark Road and as On The Road Again]
Canned Heat [partly as On The Road Again]
Rory Block [who cut his Bye Bye Blues on this same cd]
Canned Heat credit Floyd Jones for borrowing that title (On The Road Again) and some lyric lines (from his Dark Road). Both songs are slight variations on Tommy Johnson's Big Road Blues. Besides, Canned Heat must have been familiar with Johnson too, while Canned Heat Blues was one of his trademark tunes (covered by Rory Block).
If you noticed blunt omissions, mis-interpretations or even out-and-out errors,
please let me know:
Arnold Rypens
Rozenlaan 65
B-2840 Reet (Rumst)