The Nasty Blues

Bawdy Blues Songs With Biographies, Lyrics and Guitar Chords A celebration of crude and lewd songs by the best bluesmen and women in history, including Bo Carter, Bessie Smith, Irene Scruggs, Lil Johnson, Georgia White, Charlie Pickett, Lonnie Johnson, Ethel Waters, Dirty Red, and more. 30 songs in all, including: Sam, The Hot Dog Man * I Need A Little Sugar In My Bowl * Send Me A Man * Empty Bed Blues * One Hour Mama * and more.

Selected stories inspired from the recorded gems of the Delta blues, Chicago blues, Memphis blues and Texas blues. Called "the Devil's music," the stories of the blues goes beyond jump turns, slow drag ditties, reel, jigs, minstrel songs, ragtime, or the buzzard lope. These lyrics connected to these stories celebrate heartache, separation, distrust, betrayal, lust, but they promise a healing love of revival and renewal. It's a celebration of the present, of the now, and it's totally mad at the past and suspicious of the future. But who are kidding? Let us tell the truth. Really, the themes of this raucous collection often wallow in carnal pain, in the weakness of the flesh, and the temptation of sin. Taboo love, forbidden love. Sometimes it's just plain nasty. All of the good stuff. In Too Much Boogie, the spirit of the blues afflicts everybody. Within the emotional pull of the lyrics and its stirring music, there is a common language of the heart and the soul. Although the blues were born and bred in the land of Jim Crow by black people, it has nothing to do with class, color, or category. Even the rich get the blues and do dumb things. The book shows there is a pulse beating within each of us and that pulse is the blues. 1. The Things I Used to Do by Alegra Verde 2. For Love or Money by Alice Sturdivant 3. Rocking Chair Blues by Jayme Whitfield 4. What's in the Box by Kalamu ya Salaam 5. Mother's Milk by Kevin James Breaux 6. Ask the Heart by Akua Lezli Hope 7. She Had to Go and Lose It at the Astor by D. L. King 8. The Summer of Bobby by Jolene Hui 9. Can't Be Satisfied by Gary Phillips 10. Midnight Special by Victor J. Banis 11. Tricked by Zander Vyne 12. Come for Me, Dark Man by Anne Tourney 13. Heaven is a Blues Caf by Hzal 14. Red Eye by Lisabet Sarai 15. The Backup Singer by Rebecca Kyle 16. Hole by Remittance Girl 17. Once You Go Black by Amanda Fox 18. Goodbye Blues by Thomas S. Roche 19. Effects of Moonshine by Dorla Moorehouse 20. It's Tight Like That by Cole Riley 21. The Principal of the Thing by Savannah Stephens Smith 22. P.K. by Art Nixon 23. Warming Up by Maxmilian Lagos 24. My Strongest Weakness by C. Dennis Moore 25. Head Games by Robert Buckley 26. Sunday Morning by Dean Jean-Pierre 27. The Room by Nick Nicholson 28. Hurricane Love by Alicia Night Orchid

A quietly influential force in African American literature and art, Clarence Major makes his Penguin Classics debut with the twenty-fifth-anniversary edition of Dirty Bird Blues The PRH Audio book of Dirty Bird Blues by Clarence Major won a 2022 EARPHONE AWARD. Narrated by Dion Graham. A Penguin Classic Set in post-World War II Chicago and Omaha, the novel features Manfred Banks, a young, harmonica-blowing blues singer who is always writing music in his head. Torn between his friendships with fellow musicians and nightclub life and his responsibilities to his wife and child, along with the pressures of dealing with a racist America that assaults him at every turn, Manfred seeks easy answers in "Dirty Bird" (Old Crow whiskey) and in moving on. He moves to Omaha with hopes of better opportunities as a blue-collar worker, but the blues in his soul and the dreams in his mind keep bringing him back to face himself. After a nightmarish descent into his own depths, Manfred emerges with fresh awareness and possibility. Through Manfred, we witness and experience the process by which modern American English has been vitalized and strengthened by the poetry and the poignancy of the African-American experience. As Manfred struggles with the oppressive constraints of society and his private turmoil, his rich inner voice resonates with the blues.

Experience music history with this memoir by one of the last of the genuine old school Blues and R&B legends, the Grammy-winning dynamic showman Bobby Rush. This memoir charts the extraordinary rise to fame of living blues legend, Bobby Rush. Born Emmett Ellis, Jr. in Homer, Louisiana, he adopted the stage name Bobby Rush out of respect for his father, a pastor. As a teenager, Rush acquired his first real guitar and started playing in juke joints in Little Rock, Arkansas, donning a fake mustache to trick club owners into thinking he was old enough to gain entry. He led his first band in Arkansas between Little Rock and Pine Bluff in the 1950s. It was there he first had Elmore James play in his band. Rush later relocated to Chicago to pursue his musical career and started to work with Earl Hooker, Luther Allison, and Freddie King, and sat in with many of his musical heroes, such as Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed and Little Walter. Rush eventually began leading his own band in the 1960s, crafting his own distinct style of funky blues, and recording a succession of singles for various labels. It wasn't until the early 1970s that Rush finally scored a hit with "Chicken Heads." More recordings followed, including an album which went on to be listed in the Top 10 blues albums of the 1970s by Rolling Stone and a handful of regional jukebox favorites including "Sue" and "I Ain't Studdin' Ya." And Rush's career shows no signs of slowing down now. The man once beloved for performing in local jukejoints is now headlining major music/blues festivals, clubs, and theaters across the U.S. and as far as Japan and Australia. At age eighty-six, he is still on the road for over 200 days a year. His lifelong hectic tour schedule has earned him the affectionate title "King of the Chitlin' Circuit," from Rolling Stone. In 2007, he earned the distinction of being the first blues artist to play at the Great Wall of China. His renowned stage act features his famed shake dancers, who personify his funky blues and his ribald sense of humor. He was featured in Martin Scorcese's The Blues docuseries on PBS, a documentary film called Take Me to the River, performed with Dan Aykroyd on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, and most recently had a cameo in the Golden Globe nominated Netflix film, Dolemite Is My Name, starring Eddie Murphy. He was recently given the highest Blues Music Award honor of B.B. King Entertainer of the Year. His songs have also been featured in TV shows and films including HBO's Ballers and major motion pictures like Black Snake Moan, starring Samuel L. Jackson. Considered by many to be the greatest bluesman currently performing, this book will give readers unparalleled access into the man, the myth, the legend: Bobby Rush.

The Other New York provides the first comprehensive look at New York State's rural areas during the American Revolution. This county-by-county survey of the regions outside of New York City describes the social and cultural conditions on the eve of the Revolution and details the events leading up to the conflict, the battles and campaigns fought within the state, the hardships civilians experienced while creating new local governments and supplying the war effort, and postwar reconstruction efforts. It also chronicles the impact that the war had on the European Americans, Native Americans, and African Americans. These groups endured years of strife yet went on to create New York State.

A comprehensive dictionary of blues lyrics invites listeners to interpret what they hear in blues songs and blues culture, including excerpts from original interviews with Dr. John, Bonnie Raitt, Hubert Sumlin, Buddy Guy, and many others.

Sky’s small town turns absolutely claustrophobic when his secret promposal plans get leaked to the entire school in this witty, heartfelt, and ultimately hopeful debut novel for fans of What if it’s Us? and I Wish You All the Best. Sky Baker may be openly gay, but in his small, insular town, making sure he was invisible has always been easier than being himself. Determined not to let anything ruin his senior year, Sky decides to make a splash at his high school’s annual beach bum party by asking his crush, Ali, to prom—and he has thirty days to do it. What better way to start living loud and proud than by pulling off the gayest promposal Rock Ledge, Michigan, has ever seen? Then, Sky’s plans are leaked by an anonymous hacker in a deeply homophobic e-blast that quickly goes viral. He’s fully prepared to drop out and skip town altogether—until his classmates give him a reason to fight back by turning his thirty-day promposal countdown into a school-wide hunt to expose the e-blast perpetrator. But what happens at the end of the thirty days? Will Sky get to keep his hard-won visibility? Or will his small-town blues stop him from being his true self?

"Lanie Price, a 1920s Harlem society columnist, witnesses the brutal nightclub kidnapping of the "Black Orchid," a sultry, seductive singer with a mysterious past. When hours pass without a word from the kidnapper, puzzlement grows as to his motive. After a gruesome package arrives at Price's doorstep, the questions change. Just what does the kidnapper want--and how many people is he willing to kill to get it?" -- Publisher.

A Blues Bibliography, Second Edition is a revised and enlarged version of the definitive blues bibliography first published in 1999. Material previously omitted from the first edition has now been included, and the bibliography has been expanded to include works published since then. In addition to biographical references, this work includes entries on the history and background of the blues, instruments, record labels, reference sources, regional variations and lyric transcriptions and musical analysis. The Blues Bibliography is an invaluable guide to the enthusiastic market among libraries specializing in music and African-American culture and among individual blues scholars.