New CD releases: Foree Wells & D.C. Bellamy

STACKHOUSE RECORDING COMPANY
http://stackhouse-bluesoterica.blogspot.com
3516 Holmes Street
Kansas City, MO 64109
(816) 931-0383
Stackhouse232@aol.com

SEPTEMBER 2006 RELEASES (Street date Sept. 19)

SRC-1913: D.C. BELLAMY:
GIVE SOME BODY TO SOMEBODY

D.C. Bellamy’s influences range from the soulful music of his half-brother, Curtis Mayfield, to the basic blues beat of Jimmy Reed, from the humor of Bobby Rush to the tight blues ensemble work of the Muddy Waters band. Yet he sounds like none of those greats (except, on occasion, for Muddy, when he digs down deep for a roaring blues delivery) – D.C.’s music is refreshingly original, buoyed by a flair for catchy musical hooks, clever turns of phrase, sparkling guitar licks, and songs that make you pay attention to his keen insights into human nature.

Micajah Ryan, noted engineer whose credits include albums by Bob Dylan, Guns N’ Roses, John Prine, and Megadeth, among others, recorded D.C.’s new album at the audiophile facility Blue Heaven Studios in Salina, Kansas, and was so inspired by the originality of D.C.’s blues that he also wanted to write the liner notes. As he wrote: “I began to realize that this was no ordinary blues artist. Sure, the form was the same, the keys were familiar and the songs were instantly recognizable as the blues, but there was something different happening here. . . . Not massively different, just different enough to make it fascinating. . . . It is fresh at a time when I did not think that the blues genre could be fresh again.”
(UPC 049998 191321)

SRC-1912: FOREE “GUITAR” WELLS & THE WALNUT STREET BLUES BAND:
IT’S A NEW DAY, BROTHER!

Foree Wells traveled from Kentucky to Memphis to jam on Beale Street and play guitar on a Sun Records session with Rosco Gordon in the 1950s. Back home in Louisville, he emerged as the leading force on the local blues scene, mentoring a number of musicians including his three sons who worked with him in the Walnut Street Blues Band. Wells sported a guitar style influenced by Gatemouth Brown, B.B. King, Pee Wee Crayton, and Louisville’s Eggie Porter (guitarist on Hank Ballard and the Midnighters’ early sides).

Those influences are evident on It’s a New Day, Brother!, along with tracks that dip into vintage Santana and Allman Brothers territory. This, Wells’ only album, was first scheduled for release on the Rooster Blues label but when Foree died in 1997 and the label changed hands, the CD remained unissued – until now.

(A release was announced in 2001, and it was listed for sale by a number of dealers, but no CDs were ever manufactured by the new Rooster Blues ownership. At last, Stackhouse Recording Company is proud to release this historic CD, by arrangement with Rooster Blues and with the sponsorship of an organization that Foree Wells helped to found in Louisville, the Kentuckiana Blues Society.)

The album's spark and originality stand as a tribute to an outstanding artist who would have been internationally recognized as a major blues talent had he lived to celebrate its release.

(UPC 049998 191222)



FEBRUARY 2006 RELEASES

SRC-1910: KEEP IT TO YOURSELF: ARKANSAS BLUES, Volume 1 – Solo Performances (Various Artists)

Selected as an Outstanding Folk Recording by the Library of Congress’ American Folklife Center, Keep It To Yourself follows in the tradition of field recordings conducted by Library of Congress folklorists of decades past. Producer Louis Guida scoured the fields, hills, front porches, prisons, and juke joints of Arkansas to record these blues performances in 1976. Most tracks are downhome guitar blues, most notably by the crippled Pine Bluff singer who plays slide guitar with a butter knife, CeDell Davis (well known in blues circles for his subsequent Fat Possum recordings). Eight other performers are featured, including Cummins Prison inmate Reola Jackson, whose a cappella moan was recorded while a prison door slams in the background. (Previously released in the U.S. on LP only, Rooster Blues R7605).
(UPC 825346 558325)


SRC-1911: MEMPHIS GOLD: PRODIGAL SON

Memphis Gold calls his music “Sanctified Beale Street Urban Gutbucket Blues,” and with the national release of Prodigal Son he stakes out his claim to this special realm of blues turf, which extends from his Memphis birthplace to his present home in the Washington, D.C. area. Memphis Gold (singer-guitarist-harmonica player Chester “K.D.” Chandler) performed on Beale Street as a child and learned from the legendary blues and gospel guitarist Reverend Robert Wilkins, who recorded the seminal version of Prodigal Son that the Rolling Stones once copied. Memphis Gold is joined on this CD of fresh, soulful and original blues by D.C. area musicians such as harp players Phil Wiggins and Charlie Sayles and Nighthawks drummer Pete Ragusa. Memphis Gold first released this CD on his own, to enthusiastic reviews and airplay, but with no distribution, so Stackhouse Records and City Hall are proud to bring this hidden treasure into the light.
(UPC 049998 191123)


Distributed in North America by:

CITY HALL RECORDS
101 Glacier Point, Suite C
San Rafael, CA 94901
PHONE: (415) 457-9080 FAX: (415) 457-0780 www.cityhallrecords.com

Mail orders: $12.98 per CD. Postage & handling for one CD: $3.75 (US), $7.50 (Canada, Europe & South America), $10.00 (Asia, Africa & Australia), plus $1.00 for each additional CD.

Send orders to: STACKHOUSE, 3516 Holmes St., Kansas City, MO 64109 with a check or money order in U.S. dollars, or send payment over the Internet by PayPal to e-mail Stackhouse232@aol.com.