Having Fun: Live Meeting

Louisiana Red & Carey Bell

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Cat No: JSP3026

Release Date: 10 March 2023

Label: JSP

Packaging Type: Jewel Case

No of Units: 1

Barcode: 0788065302627

Genres: Blues Blues

Description
Louisiana Red and Carey Bell play with Lurrie Bell, Steve Bell, Tyson Bell, James Bell and Lucky Lopez Evans at the 1990 Burnley Mechanics Blues Festival. It was a family affair. Thirty two years later it's a set of superb real blues all professionally recorded and now given a top class remastering to make the sound even more powerful.
Touring and promoting shows for any kind of roots music is a perilous business both logistically and financially. But sometimes events align and the opportunity to bring together an amazing set of talents and people in one place with a sufficient budget and the facilities to properly showcase them comes together. The Easter Weekend of 1990 was one such time and place. These recordings were originally made for a compilation CD released which promoted the Burnley Mechanics Blues Festival. Thirty two years later what we have here is a set of superb real blues. These are talents that we will not see the like of again. All professionally recorded and now given a top class remastering to make the sound even more powerful.
Let's look at the talents involved here.
Louisiana Red can genuinely be thought of as the youngest of the 'first generation' of post war electric bluesmen. At a very young age he was playing with the likes of Elmore James and Muddy Waters. Familiarity with Red's years living in Europe, when he played and toured regularly, should not blind us to the magnitude of his talent. Here he plays and sings in that rocking Electric Delta/Chicago style. He mangles the words a bit a couple of times and we could have tidied that up with the scalpel of the editing suite (which we did on some of the other tracks, but that's a trade secret). But I find it rather endearing, this is enthusiasm and raw energy!
Carey Bell was simply a blues harmonica maestro. Beautiful tone and great ideas. A sharp witted guy too - he had to be - given life then in the Chicago ghetto and the profession of freelance musician. I spent a lot of time with Carey on his solo tours for me, and working together he never put on a less than top notch show. He had a real knack of getting an audience to adore him without in any way adding spurious showmanship or playing to the gallery.
John Stedman, JSP Records

Louisiana Red: guitar/vocals tracks 1-5. Carey Bell: harmonica and vocals tracks 9-11, 13. Lurrie Bell: guitar tracks 1-12, vocals track 12. Lucky Lopez Evans: vocals tracks 4 and 7. Steve Bell: harmonica tracks 1-9, 12. Tyson Bell: bass tracks 1-12. James Bell: drums tracks 1-12
Tracklisting