01. Pardon Denied Again
02. This Wild Old Life
03. Just Tippin' In
04. Louise
05. Church On Fire
06. Texas Blues
07. I'm Blue As A Man Can Be
08. Up And Down Blues
09. So Much Is Happening In This Wicked World
10. Come Here Baby
11. Levee Camp Blues
12. Two Wings
13. Angola Special
14. Motherless Children Have A Hard Time
15. Please Lord, Help Me On My Way

Robert Pete Williams – guitar, vocals

Robert Pete Williams' music had the striking lyricism and highly individualized sound of the great Delta blues masters, but it was made well after the heyday of that style. Williams improvised considerably in his performances, using blues' language but varying his approach. These songs were mostly recorded at the Angola State Penitentiary. While Williams sings mournful, anguished blues with spectacular impact, he also can turn around and do more joyous fare effectively. His vigorous accompaniment, especially on six-string guitar, is just as creative and stunning as his vocals. This 15-cut disc, which has five bonus cuts, is most welcome. ---Ron Wynn, Rovi

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01. Free Again
02. Almost Dead Blues
03. Rolling Stone
04. Two Wings
05. A Thousand Miles From Nowhere
06. Thumbing A Ride
07. I've Grown So Ugly
08. Death Blues
09. Hobo Worried Blues
10. Hay Cutting Song

Robert Pete Williams – guitar, vocals

In 1959, blues singer/guitarist Robert Pete Williams was residing in Angola Prison, serving a life sentence for a murder he claimed he committed in self-defense, when he was discovered by blues researchers Harry Oster and Richard Allen. Immediately struck by the power of Williams' blues, the pair commenced the recordings that would appear on the collections Robert Pete Williams, Vol. 1 & 2 (including the stunning "Prisoner's Talking Blues"). Subsequent efforts by Oster and Allen led to Williams' release. No longer surrounded by the bars of Angola, the singer found himself trapped instead by the strict rules and regulations of his harsh parole. Thus on Free Again, the singer walks the streets like a stranger with death on his mind. "You know I walk along and talk to myself," he declares in "Death Blues," remembering his confinement. "Sometimes I have a mind to leave this place/But they say, you know you're doing time." In "A Thousand Miles From Nowhere," Williams finds himself alone on the streets of a "one horse town." Settling down for the night, he sings with a "tombstone for my pillow and the fairground for my bed." Sitting on the roadside in "Thumbing a Ride," he finds that the cars just pass him by as if he didn't exist. Despite the constant, restless movement of Williams' guitar lines, these recordings have a stillness to them, as if the reverberation of his blunt, heavy attack might be the only sound for miles around. Intimately recorded by Oster himself, these ten solo guitar and vocal performances represent some of the finest of Williams' career and some of the best the blues has to offer. ---Nathan Bush, Rovi

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[4:07] 1. Woman You Ain't No Good
[4:13] 2. Come Here, Sit Down On My Knee
[7:08] 3. Angola Penitentiary Blues
[3:17] 4. Late Night Boogie
[3:30] 5. Goin' Out Have Myself A Ball
[5:03] 6. Poor Girl Out On The Mountain
[2:46] 7. Graveyard Blues
[4:23] 8. You're My All Day Steady And My Midnight Dream
[4:50] 9. Keep Your Bad Dog Off Me

Robert Pete Williams (vocals, acoustic guitar).

Among the last of the great old country blues players discovered in the '60s, Robert Pete Williams was easily the most unique. His ragged griot approach to the blues paid little attention to standard rhymes or blues forms, allowing him to spin personalized stories of tremendous emotional power, even when he was working off of traditional pieces, and his songs take on the feel of a nakedly open journal. The recordings collected here were originally released as part of Samuel Charters' Legacy of the Blues series in 1973, and they carry an incredible intimacy, like all of Williams' work. They also feature some beautiful and ghostly acoustic slide guitar playing, a skill Williams picked up from his friend and fellow blues festival performer Mississippi Fred McDowell. Two songs in particular from this set encapsulate Williams' unique approach to country blues, the riveting and autobiographical "Angola Penitentiary Blues" and the beautifully poetic "You're My All Day Steady and My Midnight Dream," which, even though it makes use of stock blues lines, manages to be a deeply personal song that is every bit as haunting as it is lovely. Williams' songs are so eccentrically his that it is difficult to imagine anyone else doing them, and there is no more singular performer in the history of the country blues. Harry Oster's 1961 field recordings of Williams, Angola Prisoner's Blues, if you can find it, would be a logical place to start exploring Williams' body of work, but everything he recorded has the same insular intimacy, and this set is as good as any other in demonstrating this one of a kind bluesman's fascinating appeal. --- Steve Leggett, Rovi

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A1 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Free Again 	5:01 	
A2 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Almost Dead Blues 	4:03 	
A3 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Rolling Stone 	4:48 	
A4 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Two Wings 	4:51 	
A5 	Robert Pete Williams – 	A Thousand Miles From Nowhere 	5:17 	
B1 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Thumbing A Ride 	4:37 	
B2 	Robert Pete Williams – 	I've Grown So Ugly 	2:49 	
B3 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Death Blues 	5:14 	
B4 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Hobo Worried Blues 	4:11 	
B5 	Robert Pete Williams – 	Hay Cutting Song 	4:16 	
C1 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Mama Don't You Tear My Clothes 	1:54 	
C2 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Mailman Passed 	2:34 	
C3 	Snooks Eaglin – 	I'm A County Boy 	2:24 	
C4 	Snooks Eaglin – 	I've Got A Woman 	3:07 	
C5 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Alberta 	2:33 	
C6 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Brown-Skinned Woman 	3:37 	
C7 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Don't You Lie To Me 	2:07 	
D1 	Snooks Eaglin – 	That's All Right 	2:07 	
D2 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Well, I Had My Fun 	3:50 	
D3 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Bottle Up And Go 	2:47 	
D4 	Snooks Eaglin – 	The Walkin' Blues 	3:10 	
D5 	Snooks Eaglin – 	One More Drink 	2:43 	
D6 	Snooks Eaglin – 	Fly Right, Baby 	3:51

Robert Pete Williams – guitar, vocals
Snooks Eaglin – guitars (6-string and 12-string), vocals

Rural Blues pairs two sets, the first by Robert Pete Williams and the second by Snooks Eaglin, and it's a fine combination. In particular, Eaglin's vocals and playing were seldom more disciplined and exciting. ---Ron Wynn, Rovi

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