What a great film.  The Cohen Brothers at their best in my opinion.  It’s a wonderfully clever retelling of Homer’s Iliad in the style of a 3 Stooges movie set in an alternate universe during a time period much like Depression/Dust Bowl era America.  But as this is not a film blog, I digress and transition into talking about one of the films main tools used in transporting the viewer into the past.  That being music of course.

Now there is the obvious – the soundtrack is pretty damn good.  A fact that is indisputably evident by its critical and commercial success; it’s a little polished for my taste but I really dig the spirit of the project.  The film’s music was written/produced/selected by T-Bone Burnett, who is best known for producing a bunch of pretty successful records by artists most would recognize, but is also a folk revival focused singer/songwriter who has released a few solo records.  T-Bone did a great job transporting us into the past while still keeping the sound fresh.  He did this by re-recording quite a few folk classics by current artists; for example you’ve got an artist like Chris Thomas King doing “Hard Time Killing Floor Blues” which was originally written and recorded by Delta Blues Legend Skip James.  There is a few songs that are included in their original versions on the soundtrack, most notably Harry McClintock’s “Big Rock Candy Mountain” from 1939.

Personally, the most impressive and enjoyable aspects of the film is how they interweave the folklore and history that surrounds the music into the movie.  Here are a few examples.

In the film real life singer/guitarist Chris Thomas King plays a character by the name of Tommy Johnson who is on the run from the law and had just sold his soul to the devil on at the crossroads.  Sound familiar?..  Yes, its just the devilishly clever Cohens working in that old blues fable about the quintessential Delta Blues guitarist Robert Johnson into their film.

During a political event in the film there is a musical act identified as The Brightsiders, singing “Keep On The Sunny Side”.  The group is made up of 2 women and 1 man and is later joined by 3 girls for the song “In The Highways”.  Both tunes are songs by the Carter Family for which the film is so obviously making tribute.

Lastly, I’d like to point out the interesting amalgamation which makes up the character know in the film as Pappy O’daniel.  In the film he is the host of a radio show entitled “Pappy O’daniel’s Flour Hour” which is a reference to a more recent radio program called King Biscuit Flower Hour.  KBFH is based on the original old timey blues radio program called King Biscuit Time which started in 1941 and continues today on WFFA in Helena, Arkansas.  In the film the character is the Governor of Mississippi, and turns out to be loosely based two different real life radio personality/politicians:  Texas Governor Wilbert Lee “Pappy” O’daniel and former Louisiana Governer Jimmie Davis.

Besides the soundtrack, for those that are interested there are a bunch of cash-in projects that came out shortly after the movie and soundtrack became such a hit.  Among those is a live concert featuring the same artists called Down From The Mountain.  Also there are a few compilations featuring selections from female Bluegrass musicians called O Sister! and a few budget imports CD compilations that compile the songs in their original incarnations.

Today’s feature is the 2008 film documentary by dutch director David Kleijwegt about one of my favorite Minnesota bands – Low.  This 70 minute document is a multimedia portrait of an unique American family and band.  The film focuses on the two core members of the band; Alan Sparhawk and his wife Mimi Parker.  Throughout the film you are treated to interviews with both members (although it focuses on Sparhawk), along with snapshots of their daily life (along with their two children), with ample time for live performances.  The locale of the film was mainly Low’s home town of Duluth Minnesota which I found a little peculiar considering I had just vacationed there a week before viewing the film.

Sparhawk is an odd interview subject as he hardly ever makes eye contact with the director or looks into the camera unless he is singing.  Most of his time is spent looking off into the distance obviously caught up in what is going on inside his head.  The film surprisingly tackles the two hot-buttoned issues (if there can be such thing) that surround the band, those being the fact that the two core members are devout Mormons, and Sparhawk’s emotional breakdown in 2005.  The film covers the two issues delicately and both Alan and Mimi answer questions honestly and bravely.  I still was left a little confused by some of Alan’s explanations about his breakdown as he was really unable to answer clearly – but I can imagine that the experience would be the least clear to him.

Considering I grew up in Minnesota, and I have been a huge fan of Low since the late 1990s I may be a little biased on this film.  Overall I thought the film was a perfect companion to their music, having the same emotional properties of their songs – chilling, pensive, minimal, and starkly beautiful.  So obviously if you are a fan of the music this film is a must see.  The film may be a little too quiet and slow for most music fans, so unless you are at least a little familiar with their music I would start with some of their early releases.  If you like that, then you will most likely enjoy the film.  Personally I dream of a world in which everyone is a Low fan, it would be a much better place.

There is also another Low documentary out there called Low In Europe which was released on DVD in 2005.

The DVD also features 6 audio tracks that were especially recorded during the filming of the documentary as a special feature titled “At Home with Low”.  Preview them below… (click here if you do not see the playlist)

Take a moment to realize the huge influence this man has had on Rock N Roll and popular music as a whole.  In 1962 The Rolling Stones formed in England taking their name from his 1950 song “Rollin’ Stone”.  In 1967 Jann Wenner created Rolling Stone Magazine after that same song.  Along the way he has influenced countless British and American Rock & Blues musicians, not to mention his direct involvement in turning up the volume of blues with the introduction of electronically amplified instruments.

When you think of Muddy Waters you probably think of his Chess Records hits.  Most people don’t realize that Muddy first recording was in 1941 while living on cotton farm in Mississippi way before the guitar had been amplified electronically – he was playing good old acoustic country blues from the Mississippi Delta.  He was recorded by none other than Alan Lomax (& John Work III) the famous American field recordist for the Library of Congress.  Once Muddy moved to Chicago in the mid 40s his first records were with the Chess brothers original record label, Aristocrat records.  Muddy didn’t officially record for Chess Records until 1950 when the label was born.  From 1950 – 1975 Muddy records many sides and albums for Chess but the majority of his best songs come from the years 50′ – 58′.  After Chess was sold to a few different companies in the 70s Muddy recorded a few albums for CBS/Sony, most notable are Hard Again and I’m Ready.

I put together a playlist of my favorite Muddy Waters tracks spanning his whole career.  Keep in mind you will be unable to find an official release that compiles all his best songs spanning his whole career because of licensing rights.  The best compilation of Muddy’s overlooked original Lomax recording is called The Complete Plantation Recordings.  The best career retrospective compilation (believe me there are many) that I could find is called The Anthology released in 2001 by MCA Records.  This 2 CD set features Muddy’s best tracks from his Aristocrat recording in the late 40s and all his best stuff from his many years at Chess Records.  Lastly a few songs from his best CBS/Sony recordings which I mentioned above are also included.

If you don’t see the embedded playlist below, follow this link.

Published in 2002 and written by author Robert Gordon, Can’t Be Satified is a biography of Muddy Waters.  The book is a loose chronological telling of Muddy’s life which is broken up into 15 chapters, each featuring a set number of years.  Gordon does a great job piecing together the history of a man for which there wasn’t many living subjects or decent records.  The author does his best with what remained which included old news paper & magazine articles, recordings, video, and interviews with any and every living relative, friend or business colleague.  The book is mostly given in story form but breaks from this quite a bit to include references to other related notes, or excerpts from actual interviews or sources.

Through out the book Gordon takes time to flesh out many of the supporting cast including his influences and Delta Blues founders like Son House, Robert Johnson, Big Bill Broonzy, Blind Lemon Jefferson, and Sonny Boy Williamson.  You get a little closer look at the many musicians that made up Muddy’s band members and fellow Chess Records artists including Willie Dixon, Son Simms, Otis Spann, Little Walter, Jimmy Rogers, Howlin’ Wolf… just to name a few.  Gordon takes a lot of time exploring Muddy’s career as a recording artist and performer but also takes time to flesh out his family life.  He documents what he could of his relationship with all his wives and what childern that he claimed from those marriages and from other affairs.

At first glance the book is fairly thick and unless you page through the end you will be surprised to find out the last quarter is actually just notes, acknowledgements and an index.  Included are a detailed bibliography, chapter by chapter notes, guide to Muddy’s recordings, and a few other interesing tidbits.

Here are some interesting facts about Muddy Waters:

• His real name is Mckinley Morganfield which he changed to Muddy Water later in life and then finally to Muddy Waters after a record company misprinted his name on one of his early recordings.
• It was not a secret that Muddy was a womanizer.  Through Muddy’s life he married 3 times and had many children with his wives and other women (I could not find an exact number).  One of his children is Blues musician Big Bill Morganfield.
• Obviously Muddy’s Chicago shows were highly sexually charged, so much so that its said that Muddy would frequently expose himself to the audience after being goaded into it by the ladies in audience.
• One New Years Eve, Muddy obviously getting a little out of control partying it up accidentally shot his friend and employee Bo (Andrew Bolton) in the leg.
• Shortly after the death of Leonard Chess in 1969, while on tour in 1970, Muddy got into a bad car accident in which left 3 people dead including tour mate John Warren.   Muddy suffered 3 broken ribs, a broken pelvis, sprained back and a shattered hip; he was bed ridden for months.

Check out more about Muddy Waters at the following links.

Muddy Waters Allmusic.com page

Muddy Waters Wikipedia page

www.muddywaters.com

There is also a companion video to this book called Muddy Waters – Can’t Be Satisfied released in 2003 on DVD.  It’s not great but it does the trick if you want to see footage of Muddy or if you just want a quick overview of his life.  There was also supposed to be a companion CD released which would compile the authors favorite tracks across Muddy’s whole career but I don’t think he was ever able to work out all the licensing.  If you are interesting in hearing Muddy’s best, check out my related post about Muddy’s music featuring a embedded playlist with all of Muddy’s best stuff (career spanning) here.