LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 1 • 1928-1929 | DOCD-5134 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Completists, specialists and academics take note -- Document's Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 1 (1928-1929) offers an exhaustive overview of Leroy Carr's early recordings. Less dedicated listeners will probably find the long running time, exacting chronological sequencing, poor fidelity (all cuts are transferred from original acetates and 78s), and number of performances a bit off-putting, even though the serious blues listener will find all these factors to be positive. Thom Owens

The little that is known of Leroy Carr‘s early life was garnered by Duncan Schiedt in the late fifties when he interviewed his sister, Eva Mae, and Francis “Scrapper” Blackwell. Carr was born in Nashville, Tennessee on March 27th 1905, the son of John Carr and his wife Katie Dozier. The family moved to Indianapolis when he was six and his sister recalled that when he was a young teenager a pianist came play at the Pot Roast club and Leroy copied what he’d heard being played at the club on her piano at home. By the time he was twenty he was a proficient singer-pianist. His early life is typically obscure but it is known that he joined a travelling circus and even served in the army at Fort Huachuca in Arizona. Duncan Schiedt was shown a photograph in the possession of his sister of the young Carr in full army uniform holding his discharge papers. At some point a music store owner named Guernsey introduced him to guitarist Francis “Scrapper” Blackwell and they formed a piano and guitar duo. In June 1928 Vocalion sent a field unit to Indianapolis to record, probably, Blackwell who pointed them in the direction of Carr. On 28th June, at the age of 23, Leroy Carr, accompanied by Blackwell recorded My Own Lonesome Blues and How Long How Long which were released two months later on Vocalion 1191. How Long, How Long was the lead side and the record became an instant success. For a record to be successful back then probably meant sales were in the region of ten thousand copies. The tune was unforgettable as was Carr’s mournful vocal even though the lyric had its root in an Ida Cox song and the structure was that of Crow Jane. So popular did the song become that the pair were recalled to the Chicago studio the following month. On 20th July they cut three titles each, none of which saw release, and they returned the following month for another attempt. Of Carr’s eight titles all but two were released and those all maintained the plaintive, nostalgic air, of his first record. “My home ain’t here, it’s in dear old Tennessee”, he lamented in “Tennessee Blues” and to a train rhythm played with the left hand and assorted railroad imitations, Mean Old Train Blues, carried the “How Long” theme further,

“Number One’s at the Station, Number Two out on the road, I keep on wonderin’ where did my baby go”.

Twenty years later the song was successfully re-cut by Cecil Gant as Train Time. For You’ve Got To Reap What You Sow Carr and Blackwell adopted a new melody which prominently featured Scrapper’s guitar. This melody was used two years later by the Mississippi Sheiks for their recording Sittin’ On Top Of The World. That November / December saw a similar pattern of recording – one abortive session followed by a successful retry which included two remodeled versions of How Long. Over the next six years there were to be a further three variations on the How Long theme (which will be covered in future releases in this series). The December session produced Prison Bound, based on his experiences in the Indiana State Farm. In later years the song became synonymous with Josh White and much copied by Piedmont artists. The following February, Carr recorded eleven titles only three, however, saw commercial release one being his crooning rendition of Irving Berlin‘s popular song, How About Me?. Eight of the eleven were remade in March and one of the releases was the two part Straight Alky Blues. For a relatively young man Leroy Carr was an inveterate drinker and his observations on the effect of drinking neat alcohol are frighteningly well observed. His addiction to alcohol was eventually to end his life at the all too young age of thirty.  DOCD-5134
Tracklist :
1        My Own Lonesome Blues    3:02
2        How Long -- How Long Blues    3:05
3        Broken Spoke Blues    2:57
4        Tennessee Blues    3:00
5        Truthful Blues    2:53
6        Mean Old Train Blues    2:59
7        You Got To Reap What You Sow    2:49
8        Low Down Dirty Blues    3:04
9        How Long, How Long Blues -- No. 2    2:44
10        How Long, How Long Blues -- Part 3    3:08
11        Baby, Don't You Love Me No More?    3:11
12        Tired Of Your Low Down Ways    3:10
13        I'm Going Away And Leave My Baby    3:05
14        Prison Bound Blues    3:05
15        You Don't Mean Me No Good    3:13
16        How About Me?    3:26
17        Straight Alky Blues -- Part 1    2:59
18        Think Of Me Thinking Of You    3:04
19        The Truth About The Thing    3:13
20        Straight Alky Blues -- Part I    3:20
21        Straight Alky Blues -- Part II    3:19
22        Lifeboat Blues    2:57
23        Gambler's Blues    3:05
24        There Ain't Nobody Got It Like She's Got It    3:19
Credits :
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Kazoo – Unknown Artist (tracks: 19)
Liner Notes – Alan Balfour
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr

LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 2 • 1929-1930 | DOCD-5135 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

During the 1990s, blues legend Leroy Carr's complete recorded works were reissued in chronological sequence by Document Records Ltd. in six volumes with additional test pressings and alternate takes added to an appendix along with ultra-rare sides by Texas piano man Black Boy Shine. While later editions on other labels may boast of improved audio quality, nobody has ever covered Leroy Carr's recorded legacy more thoroughly or comprehensibly. Document's second volume contains all of his originally issued recordings dating from June 7, 1929 to January 2, 1930. Throughout this seven month stretch, Carr delivered his customary assortment of slow blues and ambling reflections, along with half a dozen upbeat boogie and hokum tunes, greatly spurred by the guitar and singing voice of Scrapper Blackwell. One should never rush into historic blues material looking for instantaneous kicks without stopping to breathe in the majestic honesty of real blues delivered at relaxed tempos without any gimmicks or punch lines. (The slow, thoughtful version of Carr's famous "How Long, How Long Blues" heard on this collection was the first of several sequels, and may be contrasted with a highly sexualized interpretation by Tampa Red's Hokum Jug Band wherein Frankie "Half Pint" Jaxon does a very convincing impression of an aroused woman being steadily tupped by her lover.) For restless individuals who want to dive directly into humorous foot-tapping entertainment, the "upbeat" titles are "Naptown Blues," "Gettin' All Wet," "That's Tellin' 'Em," "Papa Wants a Cookie," "Memphis Town," and "The Dirty Dozen." arwulf arwulf

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. Indianapolis bluesman Pete “Guitar” Franklin‘s mother, Flossie, used to have Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell “rooming” at her house and he recounted to Art Rosenbaum in 1960 that of the two Blackwell was the one with the aggressive temperament – which had originally led his grandfather nicknaming him “Scrapper”. It seems that as Carr’s career began to blossom, so Blackwell started to harbour a resentment that his own recording career was suffering at the expense of Leroy’s success. Apparently their manager, Guernsey, spent much of his time smoothing over the differences between the mild mannered Carr and the volatile Blackwell, especially when they had been drinking; “Drunk or sober, Leroy was nice. Scrapper was a damn fool drunk or sober”, was Pete Franklin‘s recollection of the relationship. Leroy and Scrapper returned to the studios in June and July 1929 and, perhaps for some of the reasons described or simply because conditions weren’t conductive to successful recording, of the twenty-two titles cut many songs were repeated and in the event only three, That’s All Right For You, Wrong Man Blues and the unique Naptown Blues, were released. However this wasn’t necessarily an indication that Carr was getting stale or running out of ideas – as had been the case with other heavily recorded blues artists – far from it. The recordings made in August that year and January the next year bear witness to Carr having mined a new vein of material; material that not only had variety but also was moving away from the formulaic sound of his earlier recordings. He attempted some Tampa Red / Georgia Tom type hokum pieces with the nonsense lyrics to match, a genre which was very popular with black audiences of the time. Duetting with Blackwell he performed light-hearted numbers like, Getting All Wet, That’s Tellin’ Em, Papa Wants A Cookie and Memphis Town. Interestingly the meter of all four is based on that of the well-known Dirty Dozens which Carr also cut at the same session. Carr’s fondness for this particular melody was probably inspired by the enormous success that Speckled Red enjoyed with the number for Brunswick four months previous. Indeed, Carr’s own rendition of The Dirty Dozen is so reminiscent of Red’s, even down to the boogie piano, that it’s probably a fair assumption that Leroy Carr learnt it either from having heard the song on radio or from the record itself. It has been reported that both Carr and Blackwell had, at one time or another, separately served prison sentences for bootlegging. Therefore they were no strangers to prison conditions or the effect incarceration had on relationships. The sessions in August 1929 and January 1930 witnessed Leroy Carr recording three blues whose central theme was incarceration and the problems it caused. The double-sided release Christmas In Jail – Ain’t It A Pain / Prison Cell was supposedly dedicated to a friend who had experienced such a jail term, while Workhouse Blues found Carr at his most lyrical:
Please Mister Jailer, please unlock this door for me, (x 2) This jail is full of blues, I know they done come down on me. If I had done like my baby told me, (x 2) I would not be in the jail with six long months to stay. I’m a hard working prisoner, sentenced without a trial (x 2) My heart is almost breaking, must be that last long mile. It was 1930 and Leroy Carr‘s “last long mile” into alcoholism had already begun; something he was well aware of as his subsequent recordings attest. DOCD-5135
Tracklist :
11        That's All Right For You    3:13
2        Wrong Man Blues    3:12
3        Naptown Blues    2:44
4        The New How Long, How Long Blues    3:04
5        Love Hides All Faults    2:59
6        I Know That I'll Be Fine    3:19
7        Gettin' All Wet    3:23
8        Rainy Day Blues    3:18
9        Blue With The Blues    3:23
10        Just Worryin' Blues    2:49
11        Baby, You Done Put That Thing On Me    3:18
12        I Won't Miss You When You're Gone    3:11
13        Don't You Get Tired Of Riding That Same Train All The Time?    3:04
14        I'm Going Back To Tennessee    3:12
15        Christmas In Jail - Ain't That A Pain?    3:10
16        Prison Cell Blues    2:46
17        That's Tellin' 'Em    2:58
18        Papa Wants A Cookie    2:43
19        Memphis Town    2:47
20        Don't Say Goodbye    2:53
21        I Ain't Got No Gal    3:10
22        Goodbye Blues    2:45
23        The Dirty Dozen    2:50
24        Workhouse Blues    3:13
Credits :
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Liner Notes – Alan Balfour
Piano – Leroy Carr
Vocals – Leroy Carr (tracks: 1 to 6, 8 to 16, 20 to 22, 24)
Vocals [vocal duet] – Leroy Carr (tracks: 7, 17 to 19, 23), Scrapper Blackwell (tracks: 7, 17 to 19, 23)

LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 3 • 1930-1932 | DOCD-5136 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 3 (1930-1932) continues Document's exhaustive overview of Leroy Carr's recordings for Vocalion between 1928 and his death in 1935. Though Carr produced a few classics during the year and a half covered by this volume (including "Alabama Women Blues" and "New How Long How Long Blues, Pt. 2"), the vast majority of listeners will have trouble working through this material, much of which sounds very similar. Still, it's the only way to hear the complete work of this important bluesman, which is more than enough for serious blues fans. Thom Owens

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. By 1930 Leroy Carr‘s physique was already beginning to show the effects of his alcoholism and for a man still in his twenties this was not a good sign. As early in his recording career as February 1929 he had sung of drinking; Straight Alky (DOCD-5134) even then managing to conjure up images of impotency and loss of sexual drive with the startling vividness of a mature adult. The session in September 1930 began with Carr soloing on both the maudlin Let’s Make Up And Be Friends Again and the pleading Let’s Disagree (“I know we can’t agree, so let’s disagree”) – both songs directed at a woman he had fallen out with. Given Scrapper’s absence at the start of this session, perhaps it’s not too fanciful to suggest that the songs were veiled references to a disagreement with Blackwell prior to the session and this was Carr’s way of communicating an apology or truce. Whatever the reasons behind Scrapper’s absence, he returned for the remaining eight songs. In fact the two that immediately followed, Sloppy Drunk Blues and Hard Times Done Drove Me To Drink, saw Carr revelling in passing on his drinking experience to his record buying public.
“I’d rather be sloppy drunk than anything I know. Give me another half a pint then baby I must go”, he boasted on the former with Blackwell playing some muscular, almost angry, snapping guitar phrases, while on the latter Carr sang “My mind keeps on rolling, three thousand things on my mind, I just keep on drinking to pass away the time”.

The years 1931 and 1932 saw only limited recording activity due to the Depression – just one session in January 1931 and two short ones in March the following year. Perhaps in attempt to bolster sales in a flagging market Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell made two further versions of How Long. The first, rather appropriately, changed the central theme for one of desertion to that of hard times and the second, How Long Has That Evening Train Been Gone, returned to its original theme. This latter version was cut in Vocalion’s New York studios and must have been quite popular because of all the copies by numerous other blues singers of the How Long theme, it is invariably this version that is sung. This was to be his last attempt at the number. Another song from that period which also spawned a myriad of copies was the double-timed, Low Down Dog, which was adopted by blues shouter Big Joe Turner and became synonymous with him. Other themes Leroy Carr returned to were, at one extreme, imprisonment (Jail Cell and Big House Blues) and, another, hokum (Papa’s On The House Top, Carried Water For The Elephant, Papa’s Got Your Water On and Papa Wants To Knock A Jug) most of the latter with Scrapper duetting on the choruses. Generally, however, the emphasis was placed on up-tempo material presumably not only as an antidote to the times but also to ensure sales. DOCD-5136
Tracklist :
1    Leroy Carr–    Let's Make Up And Be Friends Again 3:08
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
2    Leroy Carr–    Let's Disagree 2:50
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
3    Leroy Carr–    Sloppy Drunk Blues 2:55
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
4    Leroy Carr–    Hard Times Done Drove Me To Drink 3:25
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
5    Leroy Carr–    Long Road Blues 3:10
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
6    Leroy Carr–    Jail Cell Blues 3:08
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
7    Leroy Carr–    Four Day Rider 3:00
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
8    Leroy Carr–    Alabama Women Blues 2:48
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
9    Leroy Carr–    Papa's On The House Top 2:54
Vocals [vocal duet], Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals [vocal duet], Piano – Leroy Carr
10    Leroy Carr–    Carried Water For The Elephant 3:01
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
11    Leroy Carr–    Low Down Dog Blues 2:45
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
12    Leroy Carr–    Nineteen Thirty One Blues 2:56
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
13    Leroy Carr–    Love Crying Blues 2:56
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
14    Leroy Carr–    Papa's Got Your Water On 3:10
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
15    Leroy Carr–    Big House Blues 3:00
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
16    Leroy Carr–    New How Long, How Long Blues - Part 2 2:45
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
17    Leroy Carr–    What More Can I Do? 3:03
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
18    Leroy Carr–    Papa Wants To Knock A Jug 2:29
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
19    Leroy Carr And Scrapper Blackwell–    How Long Has That Evening Train Been Gone 2:50
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
20    Leroy Carr And Scrapper Blackwell–    Quittin' Papa 3:08
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
21    Leroy Carr And Scrapper Blackwell–    Lonesome Nights 3:02
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
22    Leroy Carr And Scrapper Blackwell–    I Keep The Blues 2:54
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr

LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 4 • 1932-1934 | DOCD-5137 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

People living in the early 21st century would do well to consider complete immersion in more than an hour's worth of vintage Vocalion blues records made during the darkest days of the Great Depression by pianist Leroy Carr and guitarist Scrapper Blackwell. Vol. 4 in Document's Complete Recorded Works of Leroy Carr contains 23 sides dating from March 1932 through August 1934, with three takes of "Mean Mistreatin' Mama" (suffused with a mood that almost certainly inspired Big Maceo's sound) and an extra version of Carr's beautifully straightforward "Blues Before Sunrise." This is not a "get up and shake your butt" kind of collection, and anyone who complains that it isn't has missed the entire point of historic blues appreciation altogether. In order to connect with this music you need to take a few deep breaths and let these men work on your nervous system with songs that hover and contemplate existence in the middle of the night (as in "Midnight Hour Blues"' "when the blues creep up on you and carry your mind away"), sometimes upgrading to the purposeful lope or the brisk walk, depending on what kind of real-life stuff is being processed. "Hold Them Puppies" and "You Can't Run My Business No More" seem to pulse with energy born of the friction that sometimes arises between two people who don't always see eye to eye. "Court Room Blues" is a boogie with complications in the air; "Take a Walk Around the Corner" is a boogie with murder in its eye. "I Ain't Got No Money Now" is a handsome cousin to Clarence "Pinetop" Smith's "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out." As for "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," Carr has borrowed the title from the bedrock of African-American spirituals, but the song itself, like "Hurry Down Sunshine," "Moonlight Blues," and more than half the material on this collection, is a slow bluesy rumination on the difficulties of life in the world. arwulf arwulf

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. Vocalion did no further recordings with Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell until February 1934. However, the March 1934 session which produced The Depression Blues also gave rise to one of Leroy Carr‘s most memorable songs, Midnight Hour Blues. To the tune of Betty and Dupree, Carr wistfully sang of loneliness and abandonment, throughout the number constructing such very real images as, “In the wee midnight hours, long ‘fore the break of day, (x2) when the blues creep up on you and carry your mind away” or “Blues why do you worry me why do you stay so long, (x2) you came to me yesterday, stayed with me all night long”. superbly complemented by Blackwell sympathetic, snapping guitar phrases.

It was in St. Louis where Carr and Blackwell eventually returned to recording via a Vocalion field unit who had set up a mobile studio in the city in February 1934. Over a two day period the unit recorded ten sides by Carr, two by Blackwell and ten religious items by Elder Oscar Saunders and his congregation. The sessions witnessed the partnership of Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell at its most intuitive. The guitar playing of Blackwell created a complete fusion of feeling with, and understanding of, Carr’s mellow piano and plaintive vocals. Their perfect unison and comprehension of one another’s musical needs were never better displayed than on reflective numbers like, Mean Mistreater Mama, Hurry Down Sunshine and Shady Lane. If any song from that period encapsulated the sheer perfection and musical heights the pair had attained then, above all, it was the exquisite Blues Before Sunrise. After a further six month gap, the duo was back in the New York studio but in the interim fate had taken a hand. A rival company, Bluebird, had, intentionally or otherwise, discovered an artist with much of Carr’s appeal and many of his vocal qualities. In April 1934 Joe Pullum recorded Black Gal What Makes Your Head So Hard? which on release proved to be as big a success as Carr’s How Long, How Long six years previous. The record out sold most releases in any record company catalogue – even Leroy Carr‘s. Ironically, Black Gal, in exactly the same manner as How Long, spurned several follow-ups and numerous copies by other artists. Carr himself wasn’t immune to the success of the number, recording his own version (see DOCD-5138) in an attempt to capitalise on its popularity! DOCD-5138
Tracklist :
1        Gone Mother Blues 3:00
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
2        Midnight Hour Blues 3:03
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
3        Moonlight Blues 3:08
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
4        The Depression Blues 3:02
Guitar, Speech – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano, Speech – Leroy Carr
5        Mean Mistreater Mama 3:03
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
6        Mean Mistreater Mama 2:53
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
7        Mean Mistreater Mama No. 2 3:26
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
8        Court Room Blues 3:10
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
9        Hurry Down Sunshine 3:32
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
10        Corn Licker Blues 3:40
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
11        Hold Them Puppies 3:35
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
12        Shady Lane Blues 3:41
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
13        Blues She Gave Me 3:00
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
14        You Can't Run My Business No More 3:10
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
15        Blues Before Sunrise 3:30
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
16        Blues Before Sunrise 3:33
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
17        I Ain't Got No Money Now 3:07
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
18        Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child 2:41
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
19        Stormy Night Blues 2:35
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
20        Take A Walk Around The Corner 3:04
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
21        Baby, Come Back To Me 2:27
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
22        Blue Night Blues  2:55
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
23        My Woman's Gone Wrong 2:29
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr

LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 5 • 1934 | DOCD-5138 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Vol. 5 in Document's Complete Recorded Works of Leroy Carr focuses upon one of his last great periods of recording activity, from mid-August to mid-December 1934, providing the listener with 19 titles and three alternate takes. In addition to his main man Scrapper Blackwell, Carr is heard with guitarist Josh White on this collection, which is as strong as any other volume in Document's meticulously thorough Leroy Carr retrospective. Most of this music moves at an easy and unhurried pace, which is ideal for expressing simple intimate truths about loneliness, heartbreak, and interpersonal relationships. The ambling "George Street Blues" is more or less a sequel to Carr's "I Ain't Got No Money Now," and both songs are distantly related to Clarence "Pinetop" Smith's "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out." While the instrumentation is almost invariably confined to piano and guitar, "Big Four Blues" is punctuated with blasts from a hand-held imitation train whistle. As is the case with almost everything Leroy Carr ever recorded, most of these songs describe passions, habits, and full-blown addictions unflinchingly. "Hustler's Blues" contains Carr's famous line "Whiskey is my habit, good women is all I crave," while "Eleven Twenty-Nine Blues" offers a concise account of how "My gal got arrested and they put her in the county jail." Performances with extra rhythmic punch are the brisk "Barrelhouse Woman," the boogie-based "Bo Bo Stomp," "Don't Start No Stuff," and "Muddy Water," during which an unnamed river overflows its banks and meets Leroy Carr at his doorstep. arwulf arwulf

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. By mid-1934 Leroy Carr‘s health and general demeanour were in sharp decline. Unbeknownst to him, but later confirmed by his death certificate, he was suffering from kidney failure. In an attempt to dull the pain that this was causing, he drank even more excessively. Whatever the drinking might have been doing to Carr’s health it didn’t seem to have any adverse effect on the quality of his recordings. If there was any noticeable change it was more in the element of foreboding expressed by his blues. It was as if he could almost foresee that he was headed for an early grave “this old life I’m living sure ain’t gonna last me very long”-, but just how early would’ve probably surprised even Leroy Carr: His perennial problem of coming to terms with unsuccessful relationships were also becoming more focused during that period. In Cruel Woman Blues he sang with renewed bitterness:
All of this schooling education didn’t mean a thing to me (x2) When I met a good looking woman that was the end of me This woman treated me mean, she’s the cruellest I’ve ever seen (x2) The house is always dirty and her cooking I swear it didn’t clean

In early August, Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell had made a “guest” appearance at a Josh White session as his accompanists. Four songs were cut, two of which, not unnaturally, were Leroy Carr numbers. One was Carr’s 1932, Gone Mother, while the other was the recently recorded, Mean Mistreater, which had also been covered on Bluebird the previous June by Tampa Red covered on Bluebird the previous June by Tampa Red. The collaborations with White were subsequently released as by Pinewood Tom And His Blues Hounds and this brief liaison may well account for White’s appearance as second guitarist at two of Carr’s sessions in December 1934. The first of which was held on 14th December and it would seem that it was far from successful, as of the numbers recorded only half were commercially released; those that weren’t required more than one attempt to achieve the desired result. Even then these didn’t come up to the Company’s expectation despite the driving interaction between Josh White’s facile guitar and that of Scrapper’s string-slapping on numbers like Broken Hearted Man. One song that was issued from the session was the prison blues Eleven Twenty Nine but its subject was quite unlike his earlier Prison Bound or Christmas In Jail; it was far from the perspective of a girlfriend sent to the chain gang:
Now I’m gonna see the judge and talk to him myself (x2) Tell him that he sent my gal to the county road and left me by myself. Then I heard the jailer say, „Hello prisoners fall in line (x2) I’m also talkin’ about that long-chain woman that got 11.29

It was a common, though rarely remarked upon, occurrence for chain gangs to be of mixed sex and, perversely, it was the older women who did the labouring while the younger ones performed less strenuous tasks like carrying shovels etc, hence Carr’s well observed reference to the jailer’s comment of, “also talkin’ about that long chain woman that got 11.29” – 11.29 being a year. DOCD-5138
Tracklist :
1        Southbound Blues 2:48
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
2        Barrel House Woman 2:51
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
3        Barrel House Woman No. 2 2:38
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
4        Florida Bound Blues 2:44
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
5        Cruel Woman Blues  2:55
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
6        Muddy Water 2:43
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
7        I Believe I'll Make A Change 2:55
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
8        Black Gal (What Makes Your Head So Hard?) 3:01
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
9        Don't Start No Stuff 2:58
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
10        George Street Blues 3:02
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
11        Bo Bo Stomp 2:51
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
12        Big Four Blues 3:04
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
13        Hard Hearted Papa 3:05
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
14        Hard Hearted Papa 3:00
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
15        You Left Me Crying 2:57
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
16        You Left Me Crying 3:07
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
17        Broken Hearted Man 2:45
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
18        Evil-Hearted Woman 2:46
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
19        Good Woman Blues 2:56
Guitar, Speech – Josh White
Speech – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
20        Hustler's Blues 2:35
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
21        Eleven Twenty-Nine Blues 2:57
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
22        You've Got Me Grieving 3:08
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr

LEROY CARR — Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order ★ Volume 6 • 1934-1935 | DOCD-5139 (1992) RM | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Some 60 years after his passing, Leroy Carr's complete issued recordings were chronologically compiled and released on compact disc by Document Records, Ltd. The sixth and last installment in that exhaustively complete series picks up the trail on December 17, 1934, and follows his remaining Vocalion recordings with a spate of Bluebirds waxed on February 25, 1935. Almost every song heard on this collection moves slowly and deliberately, as if to support an extra load of Weltschmerz. Although "Bread Baker" is a robustly hedonistic hymn to physical pleasures, "It's Too Short" cooks like a boogie, and "Just a Rag" is upbeat, throughout most of this collection Carr's subject matter is far from uplifting. "Tight Time Blues" is about abject poverty; "Rocks in My Bed" (the inspiration for one of Duke Ellington's greatest laments) describes the ordeal of insomnia; "Arlena" seems to convey Carr's fear of being abandoned; and "Longing for My Sugar" and "When the Sun Goes Down" are studies in heartache and loneliness. Grimmer still is "Suicide Blues," with its description of brains being blown out of his skull with a gun fired by his own hand. The chilliest title of all is "Six Cold Feet in the Ground," an unmistakable premonition of his own impending demise. During the last months of his short life, Leroy Carr was not at all well. Years of heavy alcohol consumption combined with a case of what appears to have been tuberculosis wore him down and finished him off somewhat abruptly, for on April 29, 1935, 30-year-old Leroy Carr checked out far ahead of schedule in Indianapolis, the town where he had made his first record with guitarist Scrapper Blackwell back in 1928. arwulf arwulf

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell made their last sides for Vocalion over the two day period 17/18 December 1934 and if Carr’s choice of material was any indication of his mood, then it was indeed a sombre one. Titles like the mournful Black Wagon (you gonna ride when that black wagon comes), the rolling Shining Pistol (“gonna get me a brand new pistol, with a long shiny barrel”) and the all too real images conjured up by his startlingly matter of fact approach to suicide, were abundant:
Took me a Smith an’ Wesson and blew out my brains (x2) I didn’t take no poison, I couldn’t stand the strain l ain’t no coward and I will tell you why (X2) I just tired of living, but wasn’t afraid to die

Due to its subject matter the song, Suicide Blues, not surprisingly failed to get a release while the up-tempo, almost barrelhouse, It’s Too Short, with its suggestions of sexual inadequacies

Baby I can’t play too long, I’m just a skinny fellow and I ain’t very strong

did favour release. Then Leroy Carr’s contract with Vocalion ended, Tampa Red, who was recording for rival company Bluebird, has claimed that he was responsible for persuading them into changing labels. Apparently Tampa took them to the Bluebird studios but during the signing of the contract a dispute broke out between Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell concerning its terms and conditions, with the latter becoming jealous because Leroy’s fame was getting him the lion’s share of the royalty payment. Despite the antagonism they proceeded to record but after the first four numbers Scrapper became angry again and, depending on which source is to be believed, was either ejected from the studio or departed of his own accord. In hindsight, it is far more likely that the session supervisors, rather than abandon the recording date, chose to calm matters down by placating Blackwell with suggestions of his own session in an adjoining studio (where he cut two instrumentals), leaving Carr to complete the one they had started. Following the altercation, Leroy resumed the session with a ferocious sounding Just A Rag (one can almost envisage the recording engineer asking Carr for the title of the number and being greeted with the frosty retort, it’s just a rag!) but he then lapsed into three introspective blues, each becoming more lachrymose than its predecessor until ending the session with the prophetic Six Cold Feet In The Ground:
Just remember me baby when I’m in six feet of cold, cold ground (x2) Always think of me mama, just say a good man has gone down. Don’t cry for me baby, baby after I’m gone (x2) I jest a good man loved you and ain’t done nothing wrong. Just lay my body baby in six cold feet of ground (x2) Well I have been the loser when the deal done gone down.

Three months later, while at an all-night party, Leroy Carr suffered a severe attack of nephritis and he died on Monday morning 29 April, 1935, just one month into his thirtieth year. His passing was mourned by many musicians some, like Bumble Bee Slim and Little Bill Gaither, cut tributes but the most poignant of these was recorded for Champion the month after his death – My Old Pal Blues by Scrapper Blackwell (BDCD-6030). DOCD-5139
Tracklist :
1        Bread Baker 3:01
Guitar, Speech – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
2        Tight Time Blues 2:55
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
3        Longing For My Sugar 2:53
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
4        Black Wagon Blues 3:03
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
5        Shinin' Pistol 2:54
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
6        Arlena 3:01
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
7        Arlena 3:02
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
8        It's Too Short 2:53
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
9        It's Too Short 2:54
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
10        My Good For Nothin' Gal 2:37
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
11        Suicide Blues 2:58
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
12        Rozetta Blues 2:51
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
13        Church House Blues 2:46
Guitar – Josh White, Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
14        Rocks In My Bed 3:05
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
15        When The Sun Goes Down 2:56
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
16        Bad Luck All The Time 2:46
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
17        Big Four Blues 3:08
Guitar – Scrapper Blackwell
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
18        Just A Rag 3:09
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
19        Ain't It A Shame 3:09
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
20        Going Back Home 3:13
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr
21        Six Cold Feet In The Ground 2:59
Vocals, Piano – Leroy Carr