Blues, Barrelhouse & Boogie Woogie: 1946-1955

Performer: Amos Milburn
Artist: Maxwell Davis
Distributor: MSI Music Distribution

Notes: Personnel includes: Amos Milburn (vocals, piano); Gene Phillips, Mickey Baker (guitar, bass, drums); Chuck Norris, Johnny Brown, Wayne Bennett, Tiny Mitchell, Irving Ashby (guitar); Leroy Robinson, Paul Williams, Jewel Grant (alto & baritone saxophones); Maxwell Davis (tenor saxophone, guitar, bass, drums); Don Wilkerson, Willie Smith, Bill Hill, Tina Brooks, Noble Watts, Clyde Dunn, Eddie Chamblee (tenor saxophone); Willie Simpson, Joe Evans (baritone saxophone); Arnett Sparrow (trombone); Willard McDaniel (piano); Ralph Hamilton, Harper Cosby, Leonard Sonny Williams, David Bryant, Red Callender (bass); Lee Young, Jesse Sailes, Calvin Vaughns, Lawrence Norman, Oscar Lee Bradley, Eldeen McIntosh, Donald Dean, Bill Douglass, Rufus Jones (drums). Recorded between September 12, 1946 and July 25, 1955. Includes liner notes by Mark Humphrey. Digitally remastered by Kevin Reeves (Capitol Recording Studios). This is part of the Capitol Blues Collection series. Here's a very reasonable compromise between the pricey Mosaic box and EMI's incomplete single-disc treatment of Milburn's Aladdin legacy: a three-disc, 66-song package that's heavy on boogies and blues and slightly deficient in the ballad department (to that end, his smash "Bewildered" was left off). Everything that is aboard is top-drawer, though -- the booze odes, many a party rocker, and a plethora of the double-entendre blues that Milburn reveled in during his early years. The absent 1956 remake of "Chicken Shack Boogie" is a humongous omission, though. ~ Bill Dahl

Down Beat (8/96, p.64) - 5 Stars - Excellent - "...Milburn used chunks of blues and jazz to create the romping elements of rhythm & blues....Milburn burns up the ivory on a selection of his notorious drinking songs... and also on boogie-woogie ticklers like the seminal `Chicken Shack Boogie'..."

Amos Milburn's recordings from the late 1940s and early '50s are among the first vital stirrings of rock & roll. Texas born and bred, Milburn's piano-driven mixture of R&B, blues, and boogie created musical ripples still heard decades after his passing. Unfortunately, Milburn's hard-drinking persona--exemplified in hits such as "Bad, Bad Whiskey" and "One Scotch, One Bourbon, One Beer"--also led to his death at only 52 years of age.

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