The thread for discussing the amazing Life Is A Problem comp on MISSISSIPPI records

oh god that crumb brothers song is so satisfying

where is there?

i could be wrong, but it looks to me that copies are available here:

http://www.bompstore.com/servlet/Detail?no=8044

and here:

http://new.honestjons.com/shop.php?pid=32386

and here:

http://www.deecoo.de/product_info.php?info=p130803_various---life-is-a-problem--lp-7-----LP-UK.html

Mike:

Yes, Caleb is an ultimate bro. One of my tightest pals for real.
Anyway, good work to all involved. Maybe Caleb & I will play somethin' from the comp on our radio show this week.

And to speak to God Punch To Hawkwind, whose actual name I can't remember right now: It probably made it to the shops (you're in Philly?) but there were definite problems, at least for us, in keeping it in stock. We'd order ten copies, sell them in two days, then not be able to restock from F0rc3d Exp0sure until THEY re-stocked from Mississippi, I guess. Part of our decision to order direct.

Saw Eric today and we spoke of repressing it this year just with a different color scheme to the cover (and w/o the Bongo Joe 7" sorry).

We also talked about what the sequel's gonna be like. Basically, where the first one was hard and intense the second one will be spooky and strange -- the same kind of intensity but a really different vibe.

Best news I've heard all day

Mississippi can do no wrong! I'd like to see a repress of the early blues comp they put out which disappeared at precisely the same time that I discovered the label.

There are still copies at Honest Jon's (London). I ordered mine one week ago.

Kid from the Crumb Brothers has an incredible voice.

Professor Johnson's way of pronouncing "zone" is quite remarkable.

Zo-an

beautiful lps, folks. thanks. btw the lonnie farris stuff on a document cd is amazing, but document does a bad job keeping their stuff in print. i should post that to a blog some day -- it's not like anyone's getting royalties off of it anyway. the guy who wrote the liner notes isn't even sure when lonnie farris died.

if you like the stuff on the "life is a problem" comp id' recommend two cds on american odeon, both are reissues of long o.o.p. lps. the guy behind this label produced sony's defunct roots 'n' blues series (i forget his name); he founded a new label a few years back with lots of ambitious plans but i don't know that much has come of them.

anyway, the two cds are:

- a night with daddy grace
http://www.amazon.com/Night-Daddy-Grace/dp/B000AA4GI2/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1200191022&sr=1-2

and

- harlem congregation
http://www.amazon.com/Harlem-Congregation-Live/dp/B000BKUX6A/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1200191017&sr=8-2

...two of the most-slept-on reissues of the past few years. get to it!

also see

http://50milesofelbowroom.com/new.html

AWESOME NEWS, Miss. Records fans -- Eric just met with Warren this past weekend and they're going to try to get all the back stuff in print again -- the Wash Phillips, Thai Orchestra, Love is Love, and then our Life is a Problem LP, everything -- all in the next few months! Eric also has some super great projects in the works. I'm not sure what I can say and what I can't at this point, but rest assured it's all going to be awesomeness.

As to the liner note writer not knowing Rev. Lonnie Farris's exact DOD -- it can be really hard to find out the particulars of some people's lives, and I mean look at what Harry Smith wrote in the notes to the anthology (excuse me The Anthology) re: Blind Willie Johnson -- 50 years ago he wrote that there was nothing known about him. Then Sam charters tracked down one of his ex wives and got a lot of info. Then people realized that it was likely his other wife who sang on the tracks, and etc.

This stuff takes so much time and hard work -- and there's been so little research into this particular field for various (weird to me) reasons. And as we've seen with Corcoran's work on Wash Phillipps, the little bits of info. we all know may be totally wrong, to boot. This is something I'm highly concerned with in working on my book on sanctified blues/ gritty gospel -- in order to exactly fact check everything I'd need a huge trust fund and a shit-ton of time to go digging through records in muddy basements across the country. Since for so many artists this was never done in the first place, that's what would be ideal, but fuck it -- my list of Crucial Artists keeps growing weekly; it's up to 7 dozen or so now.

Anyway, I'll look into those other records -- I have one CD in that "series" 'cause Opal Nations did the notes and sent me a copy, never thought to look into it more for some reason. I love when people re-use old, early record label names that went away (ie Am Odeon, Perfect) -- it's about time for someone to resurrect Herwyn, no?

But I do stand by our little list that was included in the liner notes as being the records that I think most jibe with the raucous tone and post-ww2 content of the 'LIAP' comp.

In very much the same vein of course will be the next Case Quarter releases, the book/ CD about/ by Rev. Utah Smith -- that's gonna be AMAZING.

:-)

revenant was set to release a lot more stuff in this vein but it seems like dean blackwood slowed their release schedule to a crawl within a few years (around when fahey died), so i don't expect anything from them...

revenant's list of future projects was always great, yes -- among them was a rev. lonnie farris reissue that they were going to call "a night at the house of prayer" after the track of the same name. since they did everything so beautifully i'm def. bummed that never happened, in particular.

but the vinyl versions of their reissues that came out a few years ago were a swell treat -- reminds me i think i slept on a few of those -- they're probably out of print already?!

American Primitive is def. OOP on vinyl.
exciting news about these reissues, maybe I can go up to Portland and get a copy this time!

The only Revenant vinyl that's still around is the Stanley Bros. LP, I believe.

I thought I was pretty complete on my Mississippi discog, but I must have missed "Love is Love." What's that one all 'bout?

'Love is Love' is one of the African comp.s -- As the first one it relies the heaviest on Original Music material, but all the O.M. LPs are crazy hard to find these days and it really is an amazing comp. in and of itself.

This is amazing.

man, will need to pick up that repress. the only african one i got was lipa kodiya city council.

Forced Exposure has more copies of the Washington Phillips LP.

Still blowing minds in this home.

What exactly is the legality of these Mississippi records? Mike up there talked about having to change names of songs and I was wondering if all of these records are being done on the downlow because some of these recordings have been on other cds, like the Professor Johnson stuff on Document and the Washington Phillips cd Yazoo, which make no mentions. And specifically with the Phillips record, things like missing all the tracks (most of us would probably have spent the extra on a 2xlp) or the recent uncovering of new info about his life, etc. Great stuff, either way, just wondering how certain parties are getting compensated.

Listen to this and the I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore comp all the time all the time all the time. Haven't migrated to the stacks since I bought 'em. Missed Love is Love and Washington Phillips - need to get digging, I guess.

New Orch. Regional de Kayes is good - maybe less than mind-blowing.

x-post: My understanding with music from this era, from the 20s and 30s and often even later, it is incredibly difficult to track people down. If you wanted to pay for Washington Phillips royalties, I don't even know how you could. If you notice, Miss. LPs are very inexpensive, and they always attempt to license songs.

The two songs that were changed are the only instance of this happening, and I do not think is something that will happen again.

All the LPs will soon enough be in print. Or if they go out of print they'll be back if you're just a little patient.

The sequel to 'Life iss a Problem' is just starting production now, FYI -- I didn't compile nearly as much of this one but then again I have a 3 CD set to get together for Tompkins Square next fall, as well as the CD that will accompany my gospel book, so I am not bummed about that.

People in NYC who do not have LIAP: It's on sale for only $10 at Kims right now -- they have a chart and it's listed as their #2 best seller for the week? Or it was when I dropped by there the otehr day. That totally made my week.

ps: to th ebest of my knowledge, a number of mississippi records have been either officially "cleared" of the need for royalties -- as w/ the latest african disc, that one was fully public domain, or have a very high percentage of royalties going to the artists, as with the philip cohran album.

yaow! there's an article here that namedrops an imminent reissue of michael hurley's armchair boogie on mississippi. i actually sat around yesterday wondering why people haven't reissued this.

i think the tjo to trace a raveling ep/s is as good as anything on mississippi.

unfortunately I have heard, off the record from an employee, that lawyers are preventing that reissue. which sucks.

f'kin jerks. I hate those guys.

aw. i saw michael hurley a couple of weeks ago and was asking the merch guy if you could get any of his stuff on lp, which seemed as if it was so dumb a question as to be funny, they're long gone. gnomonsong? have just put out his last record, so that's something.

a skip james record?, and represses of love is love & thai orchestra are happening/have happened, apparently, but i've no idea where one would ascertain such things outside of forced exposure or honest jon's, and there's nothing there yet.

"it's about time for someone to resurrect Herwyn, no?"

didn't Matt Valentine & Erika Elder do a take-off on this, Heroin, for one of their CDR imprints?

as i emailed Mike this, J. Spaceman rrecently did a two-page spread in Vice about MS Records, with Life is a Problem getting a half-page gush on it.

and along the same lines, Spring Fed Records recently put out the John Work Tapes, Recording Black Culture, which includes the crucial recordings of Frazier and Patterson. no one seems to be talking about this disc, but it was originally slated to come out on Revenant. or at least when i interviewed Dean Blackwood back in the late '90's, he put it on a short list alongside The Anthology Vol. 4 and their pre-war gospel second volume comp.

i have a couple of boring mississippi recs qs:

on love is love, the second song's by s.e. rogie, who also pops up on city council. he's written down as s.e. rogers, which i think he's also credited as on the comp the track's from, africa dances. is there anything behind this?

and, also, there's another blues comp, apart from life is a problem and not i don't feel at home ..., called something like everything is o k. has anyone got it/can you get it, etc? what's it like?

i missed that love is love comp. is it worth buying (ie i can get it for $45)?

yaow, well, it's really good?, and all. it was just reissued and then apparently stopped through an injunction, so it's around but not for sale. volcanic tongue in glasgow had some this week, for sure. it's really great, more straightahead juju & highlife than the city council comp, which was all over the place. it's really nice.

i wonder whether i'm confused about the other comp. there's a little discography here. the only thing i know of that isn't there's something that popped up on forced exposure a while ago; a comp of a late musician and friend of the mississippi dudes that they had a few spares of. i can't remember ... any details about it.

oh wait:

SPOOKY DANCE BAND Scary Reality Nightmare Fantasy: A Retrospective (Mississippi Records & Friends) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT.
The Spooky Dance Band were an offshoot of Belligham's legendary funereal garage folk blues outift The Reeks And The Wrecks. The tragic death of Reeks guitarist Orion Satushek ended several brief but gloriously productive musical collaborations. The Reeks were gone, leaving a recently finished album, released earlier this year on Andee's tUMULt label, as well as a record by the Spooky Dance Band a group that featured Orion, his Reeks bandmate Jason Sands and his good friend Caroline Buchalter. (...)

from aquarius, who've also got love is love for cheap x

volcanic tongue in glasgow had some this week

thanks for that! going to head down there right now.

man, i love ilm! i was just about to order this from the states and now i find i can get it five minutes from my house at half the price. they do have it in stock. yay! thanks schlump.

ha ha. i almost didn't say because i saw you were writing in dollars. it is pretty useful. it was worth the money for the volcanic tongue bag, which i now leave draped around my room as a conversation piece, and to imply that i am knowledgeable enough to buy records from there. they've pretty much got all the available mississippi stuff in stock. monorail are good for ordering in mississippi stuff too, so you know.

yup, i usually get the mississippi stuff in monorail. i have no idea why it didn't cross my mind to try volcanic tongue. in fact, i have no idea why i don't go in there more period.

i know. i did the same thing, it was only one of team monorail that pointed me in the right direction. my enduring memory of vt is going in there and actually not recognising any of the records whatsoever, so getting that shelf inspector feeling i get when i stumble into dance music shops full of anonymous white labels by accident. but it looked pretty great, a few rows dedicated to vaguely mississippi archival kind of things, and new charalambides-y stuff as well.

In the past two weeks I've basically stumbled into copies of Life is a Problem and the Thai Orchestra LP. This shit rules. Thanks, this thread.

get yourself a copies of "I Don't Feel At Home In This World Anymore" and "Last Kind Words" PRONTO.

yeh. the african comps too, lipi kodi ya city council particularly - it's all over the place & really beautiful.

i'm going to keep bumping this thread until mississippi put out something else to enthuse about: has anyone heard the other side of the straight street group forty-five that's on life is a problem? the song on there's incredible: like the standard trundling gospel guitar chug but played ten times faster, like a gospel ramones. also, any other o.m. terrell stuff?

straight street group has proven to be one of kevin nutt's greatest finds in a few years, yes. more about that when i can say more.

just finished up the tracklist for the sequel to 'life is a problem' -- was one third compiled dby myself, a third by mr. nutt and a third by warren and eric the two label heads of mississippi.

it's going to be the launch of my new label with mississippi, social music! am so psyched. yay. lots of cool new and old stuff in the works.

officially excited here.

for real. the trundling, jamming first side of life is a problem's such a great sequence of music. good news about the label.

i meant to nip in here and post the other day: there's a new seven inch on mississippi, at forced exposure and honest jons; it's one of a series of singles they're putting out of stuff recorded in portland with a social twist, with a sign on the back saying it's going to be four singles a year.

oh & i'm totally expecting straight street group LIVE FROM FMU any day now. i seriously can't believe some musician hasn't totally ripped them off, that style of fast-chugging guitar playing.

that single is out of print already, so i suggest buying it right up! can't wait to hear more of those 7"s.

i guess the rats lp is finally mastered and okay'ed and about to happen soon so it's mentionable now? that's the first album by the pre dead moon band, the rats -- supposedly awesome and i don't doubt it.

eric is responsible for the sequencing of 'life is a problem,' fyi -- he's great at that stuff...

nice ... I think there were actually three Rats lps? I have to check my archives ... I think that I have at least two if not three of those Rats LPs .. just can't recall which ones without digging out my crates

Obv the Zipper Lp is the one that all us Dead Moon heads want .. I have the original CD ...

one of those Rats lps ( again there were either two or three ... I am pretty sure there were three) .. was originally on blood-red vinyl ... rock that, MS!

i think it's the first rats record but am not sure. i'm playing catch up with my dead moonology.

thankfully eric is pals with those guys and regularly turns up tombstone records dead stock (no pun intended) -- just yesterday there were two lp and one 7" sized boxes sent from them to the shop. could be pierced arrows stuff but maybe not?

soooo glad i live near miss. records -- such a great shop.

i have only spun hasabe once but it sounds great, btw. i am enjoying this, too; a mix of ethiopian 45s, starting with this super-sweet astatke-arranged slow take on tezeta. the guitar playing's consistently so beautiful, the music has its own pace.

hey anyway so here is a super vague question. there is a gospel jam in my head that i can't place - i felt like it was on one of the 3cd tompkins square post-war gospel comps, neither of which i have to hand, & then wondered if it was maybe on a mississippi comp. it's sung like a duet, over a very minimal electric guitar backing, with a woman singing falsetto and a guy singing a lower part, but still kinda high, & i feel like it ends with the main line being something like "do you nee-ed pow-err", kinda straining, repeated, very slow, the voices in and out of sync. i'm skimming tracklists & can't find anything: does anyone know what i'm talking about? post your phone number & i'll call you & sing the gospel to demonstrate.

is hasabe available anywhere except vinyl?

it's all sourced from the ethiopiques series but the comp's just vinyl

Did they get permission from the Ethiopiques folks and will the artists ever see any money

i would be mega surprised if they didn't, bc i think that's their MO, now, but really if you wanna know i guess write eric, or bump the other thread & let's avalanche into five hundred posts of reflexive suspicion

btw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayA4Qb23eQk

Life is a problem/I'm gonna whine it/All night long

All the new Ethiopian releases of Eric's Mississippi are licensed through Ethiopiques, and will finally reach some the artists he's releasing. I was really upset though to see that the last comp Hasabe was spelt Halale in Amharic, and the frontcover with a photo of Mulluqen Mellese has absolutely nothing to do with record as he has no songs on it. Afraid that he's way too much in a rush creating these albums..

Thanks for the update.

So Mississippi finally got a website going:

https://sites.google.com/site/mississippicsr/

Didn't know if I should post here or the Tompkins Square / Takoma thread, but I've really been enjoying the new Marisa Anderson. Not sure I dig it as much as The Golden Hour quite yet - it seems this time the brevity of the tunes doesn't always work in her favor, which I guess means I wish all of these songs were twelve minutes long. Anyway, shes terrific. What do you guys think? Anyone seen her live? She was here a while back but I was out of town, unfortunately.

oh i'm gonna pick that one up. i didn't buy the golden hour but dipped into this one on bandcamp & really liked it. i'm glad mississippi have her, & that killer tjo release, it's a nice angle in their catalogue.

dying to pick up a ton of new MR releases in general. did anyone hear the michael hurley 7"?

I have it sitting in front of me, gimme an hour or so

beautiful cover on the Hurley single... do we really need another version of "Wildgeeses"? I guess so, this one is good. B-side has a nice guitar sound, gonna come back to that one again.

i went to this tonight - http://qujunktions.com/artists/i-dont-feel-at-home-in-this-world-anymore-film-stories-images-from-the-mississippi-records-and-alan-lomax-archive

it was a fantastically entertaining 90 minutes and highly recommended if it comes your way. my already big respect for eric isaacson has sky rocketed.

yeah seconded (saw it a few weeks ago). much of the archive footage is :O and I like how he is candid abt Lomax being kind of a dick in many ways

Here's the Crumb Brothers recording. Just incredible. 10 years old, really?
However, one of the YouTube comments says this is actually by The Hightower Brothers. And sure enough, the song is listed on one of their compilations at AMG. Can anyone shed any light on this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZGduzdOi1Q

been listening to the life is a problem comp a lot lately

what an incredible song! thank you

Just got the DeZurik Sisters LP on Mississippi and it's crazy fun if you like old 78s of sisters who sing like birds:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNYDyXn6qso

*PLEASE KEEP AN EYE OUT!* Eric Isaacson from Mississippi Records had a break in at his home today and had about 100 really rare blues and folk records stolen. A-M of his collection. Stuff like Cat Irons, rare Skip James, Fred McDowell, One String Jones, cannons jug stompers, etc. If you have any info, please call him at 503-954-2686. Thank you!

maybe it's the underprivileged reappropriating their culture?

where'd you see that, sleeve?

Hey that's a good way to get people calling you with rare records they find.

https://katu.com/news/local/community-rallies-to-clean-up-portland-oregon-beloved-mississippi-records-music-store-after-suspected-arson

https://www.reddit.com/r/Portland/comments/16wcpb6/mississippi_records_arson_fire/

bizarre

https://www.mississippirecords.net/csr

They're still cranking out records and have some sort of community support plan. I still have concerns about the label's ethics that folks spelled out on the other Mississippi thread. Is the label more trustworthy now?

well keep in mind the label has new owners and is now Chicago-based, the shop in Portland OR is different. I believe they kept the rights to Michael Hurley and Dead Moon but sold everything else to the Chicago people.

the new label was selling straight bootleg Arthur Russell tapes on Bandcamp so I think the attitude is the same

Did they release any Arthur Russell music? The tapes I saw were were collections of singles that he owned, 1 disco and 1 Italian pop (of course, unlikely to be licensed).

Can't speak for all their main label releases (vs. the tape series), but their newsletters discuss working with musicians and/or their families. Most recently, how they came in contact with Bizimungu Dieudonne's daughter after a reissue had stalled. C. who's running the label now seems like good people and they continue to put out great stuff.

ah ok I stand corrected! I just saw the title

I assumed it was like Loose Joints 12"s and such

yeah the current owners are good people & concerned with keeping things above board ime