The two County CDs Jon mentioned are, of course, also available from County Sales. I
haven't actually checked, but they tend to have the best prices in town. Regarding
the differences in the two CDs - as Jon points out, "Sand Mountain Blues" is culled
from the best of the Delmores' King sides. As to which is prettier, I'd say it's
about even. They started doing that hillbilly boogie nearly right from the start.
There,are great versions of an old-time ballad "The Frozen Girl" on both of these
albums (recorded about 10 years apart). I'd challenge anybody to tell me the
difference. One thing that is different, though, is that in the late forties, the
Delmores teamed up with harmonica players Wayne Raney and Lonnie Glosson. Their work
is all over a few of the King sides. About this time, Syd Nathan started to
occasionally augment the Delmore Brothers' basic sound by adding an electric guitar
here and another rhythm guitar, a string bass and drums there, giving some of the
records a real different sound. Is that what you meant by "rockin'" Jon? And, if
you can find it in a used bin someplace, Bear Family put out an LP featuring about 18
of these Wayne Raney/Delmore collaborations. Very nice. On the other side of the
coin, the Delmores toured and recorded with Uncle Dave Macon in the mid-1930s. Some
of the records made during that time have been reissued by County on an Uncle Dave
Macon CD called "Travelling Down The Road." While I'm at it - there are also a
couple of CDs of material by the Brown's Ferry Four currently available. This group
was put together by Syd Nathan to record sacred material for King and consisted of
Alton and Rabon Delmore, Grandpa Jones, and either Merle Travis or Red Foley,
depending on the session. Very, very nice quartet singing.
Jim Nelson
>>> "Jon Weisberger" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 04/13 2:40 PM
County Records' two collections, Brown's Ferry Blues and Sand Mountain Blues, are
pretty widely available (MoM lists them both in their catalog, and I just found them
in stock at both CD Now and CD World). The former covers recordings from the 30s and
early 40s, the latter is a selection of King recordings made between 1944 and 1949.
There's also a British import called Freight Train Boogie that's in the same vein as
Sand Mountain Blues, but with a few more cuts. The earlier stuff is prettier, the
King stuff more rockin'.
