jankp's Full Review: Blues to the Bone by Etta James
NOTE – Dr. Freudine is my fictional psychiatrist/alter ego who helps me review mostly books and movies. 29th_Candidate is now called “Irish” because user names of this site won’t be included. For past reviews please see my profile.
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As I turn into Irish’s narrow driveway, I immediately sense something is wrong, even though everything seems to be in place. Maybe it’s just because of the strangeness of the entire day, though, that’s keeping me off center, and so I try the side door to find it locked. Well, maybe he’s not expecting me this late, no big deal. I take out my key, unlock it and am closing it when a jouncy dance tune with a driving beat starts up.
“I’ve got my mojo working..., but it just won’t work on you. I love you so much I don’t know what to do...”
A mannish voice I’ve never heard before. Is it a man or woman? A black, obviously, and a blues artist. I don’t think I’ve listened to many female blues singers, except in movies, and often enjoy B.B. King, Ray Charles, Albert Collins, Stevie Ray Vaughan and so on.
“Irish? Who’s that singing?” I demand of the house, striding in and tossing my bag. A plaintive meow answers me as Bengal scurries out of his master’s open bedroom to greet me. Now I’m getting concerned. I duck into the kitchen and almost miss the letter on the table. The depressing lyrics to that song now crush me with the weight of them and I stagger to the table, stunned by the horror of what I’m sure awaits me. The song, that wiry, deep voice, twists into my heart and I collapse into a chair as it ends.
“Don’t start me talking. I’ll tell everything I know...”
This next song seems to be about gossiping. Women being abused by men, lying about it. Guitar and harmonica burning up and down the scale. The singer seems to be tired of the whole scene and wants to put a stop to it. I barely glance at the letter, just to see that it’s addressed to me, and drop my head wearily into my arms crossed on the table.
“Hush hush baby, don’t believe a word...”
Now I know this singer has gotten fed up with talk, with her man’s excuses (a female singer then!). The harmonica squeals so, it reminds me of something in pain, raspy, crying, maybe like iron being twisted under fire. The guitar is more chatty, though. “...yakkety yak all the time. If you don’t stop yakking, you’re going to drive me right outta my mind.”
“Gotta a little red rooster, too lazy to crow for days, keeps everything in the barnyard, upset in every way…if you see my little red rooster, please drive him on home...”
I can’t help but smile at these provocative lyrics. This gutsy gal tells it like it is and has fun doing it. The harmonica plays along lustily with the guitar strumming very nicely to highlight her howling voice. I find myself tapping my toes and ignoring the letter; then the next song happens.
“You told me, baby, once upon a time if I’d be yours you’d be mine. That’s all right. I know you love another gal, but that’s all right…you gone and left me here without a man...sometimes I wonder who’s loving you tonight...”
Oh my gosh, does this mean that Irish loves another? And this singer knows and just accepts her man’s cheating? I couldn’t do that! What a downer of a song. There’s nothing remarkable about it besides the shockingly wimpy lyrics with little energy from the guitar or harp coming forth. I wait the next selection with some dread.
“He’s a crawlin’ king snake and he sure nuf sure nuf rules his den...”
This one is a growly, seductively rhythmic song about a jerk who uses women only and knows how to “rule his den.” Now the singer is complaining? Maybe it’s from a later perspective that enables her to see him more clearly.
“...gonna write a letter, phone every man I know, something about dusting my broom...I believe my time ain’t long, gonna leave my baby and break up my happy home...”
I catch my breath, tears springing to my eyes. Maybe it’s already happened, his breaking up our happy home, dusting his broom whatever that means. The harmonica seems to be taunting me, helping my tears to fall. I like the sound of it, warbling along, but please won’t you shut up?
“The sky is crying, look at the tears roll down the street…gotta bad, bad feeling my baby don’t want me no more...”
This is not what I wanted to hear! I then recognize this one as one also covered so brilliantly by Stevie Ray Vaughan (with a wailing guitar) and now wonder if all these songs are remakes. Getting up from my chair I head for the stereo in the other room to discover the answer. I spy an open disc cover and grab it. The singer, Etta James, looks older and rather classy on the cover of her Blues To The Bone album. On the inside, unfolding the liner notes, I find not the lyrics, but a letter from Lithofayne Pridgon, a friend, about how the album came about.
“Hoo hoo! Smokestack Lightnin’ shinin’ just like gold; why don’t you hear me cryin’...”
I try to ignore the wailing and groaning of Etta and read the letter. The gist of it is that this friend showed Etta the liner notes she wrote for the Jimi Hendrix CD, part of Martin Scorsese’s seven-part, PBS documentary “The Blues.” Hmm. Interesting guy. He also filmed the last electrifying concert of The Band with their many guests, but The Last Waltz was more rock and roll except for the Muddy Waters one, I think. Maybe some others were bluesy rock.
“You shook me, baby, all night long...you moved me, sweetheart, like an earthquake...”
So Etta, a Los Angeles, California native “was quite impressed, and regretted not having been able to participate” in the Scorsese effort because of illness. She was eager to pay tribute to the Blues in her own way and…I notice that the song she’s grooving to now is much more appreciative of her man, but still it depresses me to be reminded of what I’m missing. Anyway, her way is to update some choice songs sung first by “the music generation who helped pave the way for today’s soul singers” like herself.
“My baby don’t have to worry, don’t have to rob and steal; I’ll pay for everything, I am his driving wheel...”
In control here, Etta, hmm? Oh, then these songs, I see, were written and sung first by men. Etta gave them her own treatment to show the woman’s perspective. Not many women could sound as tough, saucy, hot and audacious as she does to pull off her tribute to...
Preston Foster (Got My Mojo Working)
Sonny Boy Williamson (Don’t Start Me Talking)
Jimmy Reed (Hush Hush)
Willie Dixon (Lil Red Rooster)
Jimmy Rogers (That’s Alright)
Bernard Besman – John Lee Hooker (Crawlin’ King Snake)
Robert Johnson (Dust My Broom)
Elmore James – Clarence Lewis – Morgan Robinson (The Sky Is Crying)
Chester “Howlin’ Wolf” Burnett (Smokestack Lightnin’)
Willie Dixon – J. B. Lempir (You Shook Me)
Roosevelt Sykes (Driving Wheel)
Sam “Lightnin’” Hopkins (Honey, Don’t Tear My Clothes)
“...you can push and pull me all night long; baby, don’t you tear my clothes...”
The album closes with a lighter, breathier-voiced song with more provocative lyrics, saying that, in essence, she finally has her mojo working and gets her man. What this says to me, as well as the heartbreaking or reflective ones, is that Blues To The Bones goes deep to the heart, reveals the struggles of life and where we have come from. It makes us all survivors and winners, no longer victims or losers. Etta James, a Rhythm and Blues singer who began singing in the fifties and took on heartache and drug addiction, has here taken on blues songs that once belonged to legendary men and has powerfully, compellingly, made them a tribute, both to the men and herself.
As the song ends, I note the picture on the other side of the liner notes, showing her back-up band with sons Sametto and Donto (recording engineers as well as bass and drums), Josh Sklair on guitar and John “Juke” Logan on harmonica. Brian Ray on guitar teams up with Etta, though, and Bobby Murray on guitar helps out on two songs, plus a couple guys on vocals. Great job, everybody! It’s a smokin’ album. I’d have liked it even more if I hadn’t thought Irish was...
The letter. I look towards the kitchen and take a big breath. I don’t know what to expect: good-bye and good luck or I miss you. Well, if Etta James can be a survivor, so can I. Rising I make my way to the letter as calmly as possible.
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