Low Down Blues

Performer: Hank Williams
Producer: Colin Escott; Kira Florita
Distributor: Universal Distribution

Notes: LOW DOWN BLUES is a collection of Hank Williams songs inspired by the blues and other forms of black music. Personnel includes: Hank Williams (vocals, guitar). Recorded between 1946 and 1952. Includes liner notes by Robert Palmer. Digitally remastered by Suha Gur (PolyGram Studios). Personnel: Hank Williams (vocals, guitar). Liner Note Author: Robert Palmer. Recording information: Castle Studios, Nashville, TN (11/07/1947-07/11/1952); Herzog Studios, Cincinnati, OH (11/07/1947-07/11/1952). As Robert Palmer makes clear in this album's excellent liner notes, Hank Williams never sang the blues, per se, but there's no doubt that he had them. Thus, LOW DOWN BLUES is an interestingly programmed after-the-fact concept album of Williams' songs and performances in which the blue feeling is ever present, even if structurally the songs are closer to Tin Pan Alley pop than to Robert Johnson's "Hellhound on My Trail." Unsurprisingly, some of the most interesting things here are lesser-known demos, with just Williams on acoustic guitar and vocals. A great version of "Honky Tonk Blues," for example, is so intense that it practically leaps out of the speakers.

Entertainment Weekly (9/20/96, p.83) - "...This collection of 16 tracks from 1947-1952 not only reaffirms his position as country music's greatest singer but also proves he was a first-rate blues-man..." - Rating: A

The Robert Johnson of country, Hank Williams was a troubled visionary who hung around just long enough to change the face of American music forever. He added electric instruments and touches of Western swing and proto-rockabilly to the post-hillbilly sound of his idol Roy Acuff, writing a wealth of unforgettable tunes along the way. In the late 1940s and early '50s, Williams rose to fame with a series of these chart-topping hits, including "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" and "Hey, Good Lookin'." Though Williams' hard living caught up with him in 1953, his legacy lives on in his timeless songs and the legions of musicians he inspired.

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