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GOOD FOR WHAT AILS YOU Before motion pictures... before radio... before television... the traveling medicine shows brought entertainment to America. Flamboyant pitch doctors roamed the land, hawking their tonics, elixirs, and miracle cures, and with them came a host of singers, dancers, comedians, banjo pickers, blues shouters, jug blowers, string ticklers, and minstrel men. The shows died out by mid-20th century, but not before a handful of seasoned veterans left their musical legacy on phonograph records. Here are 48 classic performances by such colorful names as Pink Anderson, Daddy Stovepipe, Shorty Godwin, Gid Tanner, Banjo Joe, the Three Tobacco Tags, and many more—well over two hours of this extraordinary music. A 72-page color booklet details the fascinating history of the medicine shows with a profusion of rare photographs, artifacts, illustrations, full discography, and song descriptions. Three years in the making, the new release from Old Hat Records is a groundbreaking survey of music from the American medicine show, that peculiar form of theater that merged entertainment with merchandising. Good For What Ails You is a two-CD set that delivers a generous mix of 48 songs, many available nowhere else, first recorded nearly 80 years ago and now remastered with digital clarity. http://www.oldhatrecords....d1005.html =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Excerpt from the booklet... "Four gasoline torches blazed in the gathering darkness and dripped splashes of flame on the grass below. They stood at the corners of a raised wooden platform on a vacant lot near Main Street. A short stout man puffed and wheezed as he leaned out to adjust the valves of the torches. He was dressed in white satin trousers and a scarlet frockcoat, and wore a tall silk hat balanced precariously on the back of his head. His face, covered with black grease paint and with huge lips outlined in white, looked curiously solemn as he went about his tasks. We who watched him knew that in a short time he would turn into the personification of gaity, quips falling from his lips as he danced and sang rollicking songs to the accompaniment of a banjo. Now he moved heavily about the platform, the boards creaking under him as he opened wooden cases and spread their contents on tables. "It was a quiet, sultry evening, the silence broken only by the sputtering of the torches and the distant piping of the frogs in the swamp across the river. The town was dozing after its supper. We who watched the minstrel at his preparations were first-nighters at the medicine show.." So wrote Thomas J. LeBlanc in 1925, recalling his boyhood fascination with a traveling medicine show at the close of the 19th century. In those days, before the advent of electronic mass media, such live performances were eagerly anticipated by rural and smalltown audiences across America. A medicine show, with its music and comedy, offered a rare taste of professional entertainment, and promised relief from the daily routine. Even better, the show was free. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Daddy Stovepipe & Mississippi Sarah... ...The Spasm Bogus Ben Covington... ...Adam & Eve in the Garden Carolina Tar Heels... ...Her Name Was Hula Lou Jim Jackson... ...I Heard The Voice of A Pork Chop Music for adventurous listeners tA  Tribal Records"Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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Interesting sounds tA
I've heard of Daddy Stovepipe and it was fun to hear him and his wife Mississippi Sarah. I love how on some of these oldtime records, you can tell they're trying to get through the song quick so it's not too long for the 78rpm record
Having wikied about Daddy, he was apparently still playing and recording in 1960 at the good ol age of 93!
Daddy had a partial namesake called Sweet Papa Stovepipe who recorded a classic song called 'All Birds Look Like Chicken To Me which can be heard here http://www.youtube.com/wa...H05OchRoiY .
Who needs super-sounding 'production' when you got good ol time 'hiss' | |
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Good to hear from you!
Glad you enjoyed it. Something different. Part of the "Pop" music scene of its day.
Music for adventurous listeners
"Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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