Good songs from the harmonica master. The earliest takes.
02/16/1999
(4 out of 5 stars)
"The earliest takes of Sonny Boy at the Trumpet Recordings. Powerfull style and quality. Good songs."
A wonderful collection of previously unreleased recordings
Docendo Discimus | Vita scholae | 01/31/2004
(5 out of 5 stars)
"These sixteen tracks are split equally between Sonny Boy Williamson II and pianist Willie Love, who befriended each other in the early 40s, and recorded a number of sides for Trumpet records.
All eight Sonny Boy-numbers are previously unreleased, and the fidelity is very good, better than on Trumpet's other Sonny Boy Williamson-releases. Rice Miller (Sonny Boy) is backed by various electric combos...three cuts feature Willie Love on piano, and Miller's harp blowing is augumented by the presence of a saxophone player on five tracks.
Here are early vesions of "Keep It To Yourself" and "I'm Not Beggin' Nobody", as well as a great "Shuckin' Mama" and the piano-driven boogie of the title track...well, everything is great, actually.
And it's no surprise that Miller's playing and singing is every bit as impressive as on his later Chess releases...he was in his fifties when these sides were recorded, fully developed as an artist, and had of course been a playing partner of Robert Johnson more than fifteen years before.
The underexposed and sadly underrecorded Willie Love was an energetic boogie piano player who died at 46 in the summer of 1953, just a few months after recording the latest of the eight tracks that are included here.
Little Milton Campbell, Joe Willie Wilkins and saxist Otis Green are among the musicians backing him, and he lays down excellent, swinging renditions of "Little Car Blues", "Take It Easy Baby", "Lonesome World Blues" and five other songs, all of them more than worth a listen.
If you want more, the Mimosa label's March, 2000 CD "Greenville Smokin'" contains all of Willie Love's recordings for the Mississippi-based Trumpet label. And I suppose you already have the rest of Sonny Boy Williamson's Trumpet sides on "King Biscuit Time" and "Goin' In Your Direction" :o)
4 3/4 stars - highly recommended."
Track Listings (16) - Disc #1