V/a / Wolf’s At The Door - Lost Recordings From The Spirits Of The South

Sutro Park

While the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton helped the world rediscover Muddy Waters and Sun House, blues obsessives like Bengt Olsson traveled to America in search of the fringe players who helped define the genre in the 30s and 40s. These masters, many barely recorded, quickly faded into obscurity when their medium left them poor, wolves at the door. What Olsson captured was a robust slice of haunting blues and gospel that would have otherwise been completely forgotten. Ashley Thompson, as a teenager, sang "Mingelwood Blues" with Gus Cannon’s Jug Stompers. But his story ended there until Bengt found him and recorded a set of songs that showcase a Thompson whose voice is now one with the gentle angels. Bishop Perry Tillis left the blues circuit, believing it to be tied with the devil, and went back home to preach. Thee recordings Bengt made of him preserved a legacy that is ever growing today. Jugsmen Dewey Corley and Walter Miller might have been the most well known of Bengt’s subjects, yet there recordings for him carry with them a deep purity that has rarely been heard before. Wolf's At The Door is eerie, celebratory, dark and redemptive, fragile, lonely and scandalous. It is about drunken revelers at a bootleggers house telling dirty jokes while teaching each other a four-part harmony to a gospel standard. It is the underbelly of the underbelly and all these tracks are presented here for the first time ever.  Featuring: Lum Guffin, Walter Miller, Bishop Perry Tillis, Cleo Williams & Howard Williams, Ashley Thompson, Joe Thownsend & Bill Barth, Dewey Corley & Walter Miller, Bootlegger's Quartet, Lattie Murrell, David Johnson & Guitar Sam, Lonnie Fuqua and David Johnson.

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