Very fine song !  - Great interpretation too !

I listen to this song again now - and I ask myself how you make such a groove just with guitar & voice - it´s impressing !

Squeezing the Minutes from the Days

Peggy the Nun

K-Deuce - Foul Play (Produced By Cartoon Villain)

2nd official release from the forthcoming Professing Vol. 2
Shreve + Handbook = Hip Hop
keep up if you're inclined: @seeshreve and @HandbookYork
artwork by kuchi 3star
http://facebook.com/freetheoptimus

C.Shreve the Professor - What They Need (prod. by Handbook)

VORTEX

Playing a gut-bucket slide on his 3-string Cigar Box Guitar while singing and stomping on a tambourine, (Songwriter) Jeff Powers creates his own “gumbo” styled brand of Roots, Blues and Americana. Imagine what would happen if Neil Young joined the Black Keys and then you have an idea what Jeff Powers sounds like!

Juke Joint Jam

This sixth musical poem is about Aunt Lucille, a woman I came to know fairly well. We were all afraid of her at first, because all she did was sit on her porch and laugh when folks passed by. It was a husky laugh. And she could spit a stream of tobacco like any cow-puncher I ever saw. One day, I was just a boy, she called me over to her sagging porch and handed me a quarter, told me to go fetch her a “be-ah” from my uncle’s store. I never feared her again.

The accompanying photo is one of her shanty taken a few years ago. It sits right next to a 100-year old one-room school house, on the national register of historic places, where sharecropper kids attended when not working the fields. She had no electricity, no running water, an “outhouse” out back for “facilities.” Everyone called her Aunt Lucille. I wrote a short story about her where she has the power of “second sight.”

This is a series of several musical poems chronicling the sharecropper era.  Fernando approached me with the idea of a series of little stories that tell a larger one, all put to music. I loved the idea. I had these little poems about the sharecropper era and he thought he could make them work. I think you will agree he did a brilliant job.
I spent all my summers in a little country town in very rural Mississippi called Fort Adams. When I say small, I am talking two streets – Front Street and Back Street.  Wembley Stadium is larger. There were no more than 50 people in town, others lived out in the country – farmers and fisherman. A little one-room school house still exists where the sharecropper children went to school, when they were not working in the field.
My Uncle Cy ran a dry goods store and fishhouse there. He had everything from canned goods, to Nehi soft drinks, feed and seed, to work clothes and boots, and to sewing implements. The fish house processed the fish and chickens that were traded to him. He was a furrier, bought baby turtles to sell to pet shops, anything to turn a buck.
So, as child growing up in the 60s (born in 1956) I got to witness the last vestiges of this sharecropper era. While there are still farmers who work on a share, I am not sure any suffer as these people did. They lived in little one-room shantys that lacked electricity and water. The only heat came from a woodstove that filled the shanty with a woodsmoke odor.The children seldom owned shoes and a second set of clothes was rare.
We would enter town down what was called The Mile Hill Road…a winding road with deep ravines on either side. At one point it travels straight down for a mile in a steep grade. At the bottom of the hill was a row ofshantys pressed hard into the hillside. None had glass in the windows, or doors. The people who lived there sharecropped and lived hard-scrabble lives.
Hopefully these songs tell their story.

John Eagle (@marshmaster-1johneagle)

AUNT LUCILLE
Lyrics - John Eagle
Music - Fernando Gonzalo

Mahogany the color of her laughing face
As if she had a secret no one knew
Her aged breast heaved when she chuckled
We passed her by, just not sure why
A timid wave brought a nod of head

Her eyes were bright as black beans
Her perch on the shanty porch
A near silent rostrum to looming hills
Where a tiny graveyard slanted down
To look over her wintry aura

She beckoned me on a summer day
When the hills smelled of honeysuckle
Smiling was I, my wary approach
To see knarled hands like crape myrtle
Go gets Aunt Lucille a be-ah, chile

She spat a stream of tobacco
Rolled the cud back in her jaw
Smiled and nodded as I left the porch
I could hear her chuckle down the road
A quarter clutched in my small hand

I never feared her beyond that day
And fetched many a beer to her perch
When I passed she waved and smiled
Her laugh familiar as her sagging porch
Our mystery solved, one quarter at a time

© 2013 John Eagle, Fernando Gonzalo

6. Aunt Lucille (lyrics John Eagle)

Catfish Blues

This seventh musical poem is based on two events that actually happened. The first is the story itself, the second being the story being told to me by a dear and late family friend – Cholly Downs. Cholly knew more stories about my family than those in my family. Heck, he was part of the family, worked in my Uncle Cy’s dry goods store for years. He rarely called me anything but “baby.” 

The accompanying photo was taken of Cholly a few years before he passed away. He lived down in Fort Adams his whole life, save for 1951 and 1952 when he worked the docks of New Orleans as a longshoreman.  He returned to work in my uncle’s store and never left Fort Adams again. There was no way to call Cholly as he had no phone. So, one of my biggest fears was to drive to Fort Adams to see him, and find him gone. I finally made that trip one day, finding I missed him by a couple weeks. He had already been buried. He worked tending cattle til the day he died.

This is a series of several musical poems chronicling the sharecropper era.  Fernando approached me with the idea of a series of little stories that tell a larger one, all put to music. I loved the idea. I had these little poems about the sharecropper era and he thought he could make them work. I think you will agree he did a brilliant job.

I spent all my summers in a little country town in very rural Mississippi called Fort Adams. When I say small, I am talking two streets – Front Street and Back Street.  Wembley Stadium is larger. There were no more than 50 people in town, others lived out in the country – farmers and fisherman. A little one-room school house still exists where the sharecropper children went to school, when they were not working in the field.

My Uncle Cy ran a dry goods store and fish house there. He had everything from canned goods, to Nehi soft drinks, feed and seed, to work clothes and boots, and to sewing implements. The fish house processed the fish and chickens that were traded to him. He was a furrier, bought baby turtles to sell to pet shops, anything to turn a buck.

So, as child growing up in the 60s (born in 1956) I got to witness the last vestiges of this sharecropper era. While there are still farmers who work on a share, I am not sure any suffer as these people did. They lived in little one-room shantys that lacked electricity and water. The only heat came from a woodstove that filled the shanty with a woodsmoke odor. The children seldom owned shoes and a second set of clothes was rare.

We would enter town down what was called The Mile Hill Road…a winding road with deep ravines on either side. At one point it travels straight down for a mile in a steep grade. At the bottom of the hill was a row of shantys pressed hard into the hillside. None had glass in the windows, or doors. The people who lived there sharecropped and lived hard-scrabble lives.

Hopefully these songs tell their story.

John Eagle (@marshmaster-1johneagle)

THE HAINT
Lyrics & voice: John Eagle
Voice & guitar: Fernando Gonzalo

You ask me if I seen haints?
Well, I reckon I has.

Bloodshot eyes squint
Through the wood smoke
An over-grazed patch of land
Looks like black-eyed peas and okra

Been long time ‘go,
I wadn’tnothin’ but a boy.
Was livin’ with that gal, Mar’jane,
Up the hill next t’ the crick.

He ran an coarse hand
Over his black Irish potato face
Then pointed to a place
Where a building once stood

I come outta that jernt
That was right thar
And it was dawk, dawk,
Couldn’t hawdly see mahhaynd.

He closed his eyes as if to see
Opened them and spat
Found a red kerchief in his overalls
Wiped the wine from the corners of his mouth

Heard somethin’ back in the brush
Like two menstusslin’.
I say: “What is that? Who thar?”
Then I hear a pistol shot. A man gruntin’.

He leaned his neck back as if to peer at the sun
Then looked forward with moist, close-set eyes
And shook his head at the memory
Spat three times, crossed his heart

Mar’janecome out. “You hear that?”
“Yeah,” she say, “what’s that?”
“I seen it,” I says, “but I doan believes it”
Was ole man Strickershootin’ that one-arm man.

He laughed without his heart
A crow cawed in a high tree
He shuffled his feet on the dry dirt
And looked out through the wood smoke

I seen it. I knows as sure as you sittin’ thar.
Ole man Stricker kept him a black woman.
She was with that one-armed man. He black.
Ole man Stricker got what he wanted.

The wine was nearly gone
He spat, looked over in the brush
Tilted his head when the crow cawed
Braced his hands on his knees

That happen. It happen longtime  ago.
Befo’ I was borned.
 Ole man Stricker, he kilt that man
Befo’ I was borned.

You ask me if I seen haints.
Well…I reckon I seen ‘em.

© 2014 John Eagle, Fernando Gonzalo

7. The Haint (lyrics John Eagle)

Lyrics: John Delk
Music, Vocals, Guitar, Production: edro
John Delk wrote some superb lyrics for this one! I came up with all sorts of ideas, but in the end an acoustic 12-string and vocals seemed to fit them best.

Well this old job don’t pay enough
The bills are far behind
And the benefits, ain’t no better
No, they ain’t worth a dime

But it takes more than money
To make our world go around

Love, that’s the power
And greed can’t slow it down
Love, that’s the power
Greed can’t slow it down

And I know I’d be a rich man, if loving you would pay
And you know I’d give you anything, anything you’d say
I’d take you, all around the world, each and every day
Cause I know I’d be a rich man, if loving you would pay

We could fly across the sea
To an island in the Sun
Take a cruise on the oceans
Everyday we'd have fun

If Loving You Would Pay (lyrics: John Delk)

The eighth installment of the Sharecropper series is about Scott Dunbar, who was a blues player from the area who I got to see play on his front porch on many occasions. Scott was the son of an ex-slave and worked as a fishing guide on Lake Mary, an oxbow lake (originally part of the Mississippi River) that shows up on maps as Old River Bend.

The accompanying photo was pulled offline and is exactly how I remember seeing him on his porch so many times.

Dunbar, who never went more than 100 miles from home, actually recorded an album – From Lake Mary. Curiously absent was the song he was most noted for – Baby Please Don’t Go – which I have sung the chorus of very poorly on this song. He had a unique voice in that he could sing very high or very low, and his picking was both unorthodox and amazing.

This song is about one of these impromptu performances he was noted for. If passersby saw him on his porch with his guitar, inevitably they would stop to listen and soon a crowd was gathered. He loved playing before people and would stomp his boot heal so hard it nearly sounded like a bass drum.

Below is a link to a short biography on him at Fatpossum Records.  His album, which I have a pristine copy of in vinyl, is still available on Amazon.

http://www.fatpossum.com/artists/scott-dunbar

This is a series of several musical poems chronicling the sharecropper era.  Fernando approached me with the idea of a series of little stories that tell a larger one, all put to music. I loved the idea. I had these little poems about the sharecropper era and he thought he could make them work. I think you will agree he did a brilliant job.

I spent all my summers in a little country town in very rural Mississippi called Fort Adams. When I say small, I am talking two streets – Front Street and Back Street.  Wembley Stadium is larger. There were no more than 50 people in town, others lived out in the country – farmers and fisherman. A little one-room school house still exists where the sharecropper children went to school, when they were not working in the field.

My Uncle Cy ran a dry goods store and fishhouse there. He had everything from canned goods, to Nehi soft drinks, feed and seed, to work clothes and boots, and to sewing implements. The fish house processed the fish and chickens that were traded to him. He was a furrier, bought baby turtles to sell to pet shops, anything to turn a buck.

So, as child growing up in the 60s (born in 1956) I got to witness the last vestiges of this sharecropper era. While there are still farmers who work on a share, I am not sure any suffer as these people did. They lived in little one-room shantys that lacked electricity and water. The only heat came from a woodstove that filled the shanty with a woodsmoke odor.The children seldom owned shoes and a second set of clothes was rare.

We would enter town down what was called The Mile Hill Road…a winding road with deep ravines on either side. At one point it travels straight down for a mile in a steep grade. At the bottom of the hill was a row ofshantys pressed hard into the hillside. None had glass in the windows, or doors. The people who lived there sharecropped and lived hard-scrabble lives.

Hopefully these songs tell their story.

John Eagle (@marshmaster-1johneagle)

THEM DUSTY, DUSTY ROADS
Lyrics & voice: John Eagle
Voice & guitar: Fernando Gonzalo

The roads were dusty, dusty roads.
I heard Scott Dunbar’s guitar late last night,
Could feel his boot heel stomp the earth.
I saw his face, dark as the pines,
His eyes were Leadbelly’s own.

It was dusty and dry that day.
The late sun was on the backs of our necks,
We raised chins and closed our eyes
And heard a voice low, and deep
It came from the swamp
And on to his porch
 
Baby please don’t go
Baby please don’t go
Down to New Orleans
You know I loves ya so

His words were like thunder
His guitar like wind through the pines
The dust swirling in the draft of his song
And the sun would shine forever

The porch creaked below his weight
And the pines of Lake Mary sang behind us
Their cold, cold rush
High above them dusty, dusty roads.

© 2014 John Eagle, Fernando Gonzalo

8. Them Dusty, Dusty Roads (lyrics John Eagle)

Rory Gallagher - Too Much Alcohol (live Montreux Jazz Festival 75)

Drunk & Alone (Where'd You Go)

Slow Dance Home

That's What You Can Call It (Home)

Wait For Me



"I make this song
For the Lord of the World
Who has everything in the world
except this song"- Leonard Cohen

I hope these are good

You'll find us wherever horses talk under moonbeams and trailers are joined with cabins. Where short creeks ripple on forever and so are called long. We are Del and Major and are also the tag team champions of the world. And we make a mean biscuits and gravy and welcome our friends to join the festivities so long as we get paid.

Peggy the Nun

nicholas george harvey

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