Blind Dog Radio

She-Wolf by Jessie Mae Hemphill

Label: French Vogue
Release Date: 1981
Recording Time: 56 minutes
Releases: January 13, 1998 (Hightone Music Group / High Water Music / Shout! Records); April 1, 2014 (Shout! Records); August 14, 2015 (High Water Music / Hightone / Select-O-Hits)
Recording Date: July 28, 1979 - December 5, 1980

Styles: Delta Blues, Regional Blues

This compact disc reissue gathers up all the original tracks from Jessie Mae's 1980 debut album for the French Vogue label along with four remixed bonus tracks, all seeing their first domestic release. Recorded by folklorist Dr. David Evans (who also contributes second guitar on 13 of the 15 tracks here) in various locales around Memphis and Mississippi, the music stays down-home and primal throughout. There's a strong sense of rhythm that permeates this record, whether it comes from the fife and drum-derived percussion work of Calvin Jackson and Joe Hicks or simply Jessie Mae's own foot-operated tambourine driving the beat home. Highlights include "Jessie's Boogie" and "Standing In My Doorway Crying" (both sides of her first 45 single, underwritten by the National Endowment for the Arts), "Honey Bee," "Boogie Side of the Road," "Crawdad Hole," "Lovin' In the Moonlight," "Married Man Blues" and the title track. The blues, real and raw.
by Cub Koda

Credits: Paul Compton - engineer; Dr. David Evans - engineer, guitar, liner notes, producer; Jessie Mae Hemphill - composer, diddley bow, guitar, liner notes, primary artist, tambourine, vocals; Joe Hicks - drums; Calvin Jackson - drums; Matthew Kosel - mixing; Ian Marks - mixing, remastering supervisor; Minnie McCoy - composer; Cindy Pascarello - cover design; Jerry Thompson - engineer; Traditional - composer; Bob Vinisky - engineer; Danny Wildman - engineer; Tom Wofford - photography.

Tracks: 1) She-Wolf; 2) Standing in My Doorway Crying; 3) Jump, Baby, Jump; 4) Take Me Home With You, Baby; 5) Black Cat Bone; 6) Boogie 'Side the Road; 7) Hard Times; 8) Crawdad Hole; 9) Married Man Blues; 10) Honey Bee; 11) Overseas Blues; 12) Loving in the Moonlight; 13) Bullyin' Well; 14) Jessie's Boogie; 15) My Lord Do Just What He Say.