Send "Fred McDowell " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 In September 1959, Fred McDowell-- an overalls-wearing, stoop-shouldered, Panola County cotton farmer-- picked up an old acoustic guitar and wandered over to his neighbor Lonnie Young's house. Word had spread that the folklorist Alan Lomax (traveling with the English singer Shirley Collins and a 26-pound, two-track reel-to-reel tape machine) was hunting local artists to record for Atlantic Records. McDowell, who was born around 1904 in Rossville, Tennessee, had grown up imitating the still-nascent sound of the Delta blues, as established by players like Tommy Johnson and Blind Lemon Jefferson, using an old pocketknife (and then a whittled-down bovine rib bone, and finally the squat neck of a Gibson's gin bottle) as a rudimentary slide. By the time McDowell, then 55, cornered Lomax on Young's porch, his scope (and his skill) had broadened, and the sound he made-- a mesmerizing, groove-based blues that both nodded to and defied his Delta predecessors-- instantly captivated Lomax, and eventually the world.Fred McDowell: The Alan Lomax Recordings (available as a download through Global Jukebox, the Alan Lomax Archive's digital imprint, and on LP via Mississippi Records) opens with Bukka White's "Shake 'Em on Down", a song that McDowell appears to enjoy playing more than he enjoys breathing or eating or maybe doing anything else at all. Following Lomax's prompt-- "1, 2, 3, go," he commands in his high, nasal voice-- McDowell locks into a heavy, propulsive groove, while his sister, Fanny Davis, blows into a homemade kazoo that Lomax, in The Land Where the Blues Began, described as "a fine-toothed comb wrapped in toilet paper" (it sure is loud). "Shake 'Em on Down" is a bracing introduction to the cadence of North Mississippi Hill Country blues: McDowell's guitar is disorienting and relentless, so rhythmic and mind-bending that if you were to, say, listen to it while driving down a dark road in the rain, you'd likely veer off into a ditch (and then feel relieved). Davis' kazooing-- itself vaguely lawless-- provides a welcome counterpoint (it's like staring at a fixed point on the horizon while trying not to vomit over the side of a boat), while Miles Pratcher (of the excellent local square dance band the Pratcher Brothers) assaults a second guitar. The result is mystifying and spectacular. McDowell's rendition of "Good Morning Little Schoolgirl" (a deeply fucked-up-- if not particularly uncommon-- ode to little girls, made famous, first, by Sonny Boy Williamson, and then again by the Grateful Dead) is more of a showcase for his nimble guitar work than any rogue sexual proclivities. McDowell's muted delivery of the lyrics ("Good mornin' 'lil school girl/ Can I go home, can I go home with you?/ Tell your mama and your papa/ Lord, I'm a little school boy, too") is merciful; he's politely disinterested, if not fully disengaged. McDowell reserves his howls of longing for slightly less uncouth fare, like "Worried Mind Blues", an unrequited love song he imbues with legitimate anguish ("You make me weak and you make me moan," he groans, sounding broken). Mostly, though, the rhythm is the thing: With his twangy, piercing strums, McDowell establishes himself as a singular player, infinitely more interested in the transcendental than the germane. Somehow, he manages to make the acoustic guitar-- that purveyor of sweet lullabies!-- sound menacing, not familiar....full text |
| Clashmusic |
| For anyone curious about the blues looking for an entry point into the genre, noting the artists covered by the Stones in their prime would be a good place to start. Fred McDowell was so honoured in 1971 when they interpreted his ‘You Got To Move’ on their ‘Sticky Fingers’ album. Though not included here, there’s enough authentic country blues on this collection to demonstrate without reason why he was chosen to join such hallowed company as Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters. Having played guitar for most of his life, McDowell was discovered by the esteemed folklorist Alan Lomax in 1959, aged fifty-five, and recorded for posterity in the Library of Congress. Subsequently, he ventured beyond his native Mississippi to find an audience across the States - especially in the folk blues boom of the early Sixties. These recordings pre-date the relative fame he enjoyed, and therefore reveal the genuine, unaffected sound of a man for whom music was an escape from poverty and the hardships of segregation in the South. This is the music heard from his front porch and from the local juke joints in which he’d ply his trade....full text |
| Roctoberreviews |
| (Global Jukebox/Mississippi) Obviously it would be difficult to argue Mississippi Jack McDowell as the Lomax family's greatest "discovery" (papa John, sons John Jr. and Alan, daughters Bess and Shirley, and several spouses collected over 10,000 field recordings, bringing scores of geniuses to the ears of America, notably Lead Belly), but this digital and vinyl release makes a pretty good argument for him being the best recorded cat in their collection. Of course, the fact that this was recorded in 1959 and not in the 30s has something to do with that, but the clear, striking style of McDowell and his amazing talent were the main factors. More hypnotic and recognizably African than most archival Delta blues stuff, McDowell's resonant minimalist blues songs are discombobulating in their weird power. Known for the Rolling Stones covering one of his tunes and for his folk scene career in the 60s and early 70s, with this collection perhaps McDowell will know be known as a man whose raw, unadorned first recordings stand up to pretty much any blues recorded before or since, and far surpass his pretty great 60s output....full text |
Fred McDowell lyrics
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