Living Blues #286 September/October 2023

WHAT'S INSIDE:

Ben Harper

If You Don’t Do You, It’s Not Gonna Be True Blue

By Rod Evans

Multi-instrumentalist Ben Harper has absorbed the wide-reaching influence of the world of music throughout his life. Over his 30-year career he has taken these influences, melded them with his first love, the blues, and produced his own deeply personal sound.

Selwyn Birchwood

Florida Man

By William Wirtz

38-year-old Florida-based blues player Selwyn Birchwood is one of the hottest emerging artists in the blues today. We sit down with him and discuss his road to the blues and his eye on the future.

Lil’ Jimmy Reed

I’m Just a Good Man, Just Love the Blues and That’s It

By Mark Coltrane

Alabama bluesman Lil’ Jimmy Reed has been belting out his take on blues legend Jimmy Reed’s sound for most of his 85 years. When not playing at juke joints around his South Alabama home of Enterprise, he is an overseas favorite. 

Mathias Lattin

In Service of the Music

By Roger Wood

2023 International Blues Challenge winner Mathias Lattin is just 20 years old but his jazz-infused guitar prowess is impressing people far and wide. 

Let It Roll

The Georgia Cotton Pickers: Columbia Records, Atlanta, December 7–8, 1930

By Jas Obrecht

In late 1930, three of Georgia’s best bluesmen gathered in the studio and recorded for Columbia Records as the Georgia Cotton Pickers. The trio of Curley Weaver on six-string guitar, Barbecue Bob on twelve-string playing slide, and Buddy Moss on harmonica laid down just four numbers but what a hot quartet of sides they are.

Record Reviews:

• New Releases: Larry Taylor and the Taylor Family, Bobby Rush, and D.K. Harrell
• Reissues: Fenton Robinson, Ike & Tina Turner, and Delmark Records

Editorial

Blues News

Breaking Out: Greg Sover

Book Reviews

Radio Charts 

Cover photo by Mathieu Bitton
Caption: Ben Harper at the Kia Forum, Inglewood, California, 2022.