A1 	Good Road Camp Blues 	3:47
A2 	Little Cow And Calf Is Gonna Die Blue 	3:20
A3 	Devil Got My Woman 	5:10
A4 	Look At The People Standing At The Judgement 	2:58
A5 	Worried Blues 	5:55
A6 	22-20 Blues 	3:50
B1 	Mistreating Child Blues 	3:54
B2 	Sickbed Blues 	4:05
B3 	Catfish Blues 	4:35
B4 	Lorenzo Blues 	4:17
B5 	Careless Love 	3:59
B6 	Illinois Blues 	3:15

Skip James - vocals, piano, guitar

rec. March 22-24, 1967 in New York City 

The 1968 Vanguard follow-up to Today! has another dozen semiautobiographical or entirely personalized traditional songs that attest to his almost unparalleled artistry. As is his wont, women figure prominently in his poetic piques. More mandatory listening: 50 Years: Mississippi Blues in Bentonia, 1931-1981 (Wolf import CD), James's eighteen existing sides from 1931 along with five songs by kindred spirit Jack Owens in 1981. -- © Frank John Hadley 1993, amazon.com

Skip James made his original reputation with 17 recordings that he cut during February 1931, when he was 28. Although fluent on both the guitar and (to a lesser extent) the piano, James was most notable for his storytelling lyrics, his haunting high-pitched voice, and his distinctive interpretations of the Delta blues. James was rediscovered 33 years after his early recordings, in time to appear at the 1964 Newport Folk Festival. He was quite active during 1964-1966, making the music on this solo CD (his last record) three years before his death in 1969. One can easily hear the influence that Skip James' music had on the then flourishing folk music movement, and he still sang his country blues with great intensity. ---Scott Yanow, AllMusic Review

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1. Devil Got My Woman
2. Cypress Grove Blues
3. Little Cow And Calf Is Gonna Die Blues
4. Hard Time Killin' Floor Blues
5. Drunken Spree
6. Cherry Ball Blues                   play
7. Jesus Is A Mighty Good Leader
8. Illinois Blues
9. How Long "Buck"
10. 4 O'Clock Blues
11. 22-20 Blues                         play
12. Hard Luck Child
13. If You Haven't Any Hay Get On Down The Road
14. Be Ready When He Comes
15. Yola My Blues Away
16. I'm So Glad
17. What Am I To Do Blues
18. Special Rider Blues

Skip James (vocals, guitar, piano).

The Complete Early Recordings CD showcases a true guitar virtuoso who was no slouch on the piano either. His break on "Illinois Blues" is almost off-putting in the nonchalance with which he twists the notes around, and "How Long 'Buck'" features him giving forth some funky piano in an almost playful manner. This is a remastered edition of an earlier Yazoo collection, and features the same 18 songs that appeared on Document's Complete Recorded Works, but the sound quality is still a problem at times. High-quality sources for "What Am I to Do Blues," "4 O'Clock Blues," and several other of the numbers here are simply not known to exist, but these are the best-known editions of the songs until better 78 discs happen to turn up (if ever). Regardless of the surface noise, it is a delight listening to James' rippling guitar run on "4 O'Clock Blues" or his piano improvising (and improvising the percussion by pounding away with his feet) on "20-20 Blues." And his fiercely intense original rendition of "I'm So Glad" makes the repopularized version by Eric Clapton and Cream from the 1960s seem like easygoing pop. Actually, James' vocals tend to suffer under the weight of the surface defects far more than his playing -- the source discs distort on high-volume passages, which mostly occurs with his singing rather than his playing. Therefore, fans of blues guitar or piano need have no hesitation in picking this disc up. -- Bruce Elder

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01. Hard Times Killing Floor Blues  3:21
02. Crow Jane  2:57
03. Washington D.C. Hospital Center Blues  4:10
04. Special Rider Blues  5:08
05. Drunken Spree  2:47
06. Cherryball  4:24
07. How Long  2:55               play
08. All Night Long  5:00
09. Cypress Grove  4:18
10. Look Down The Road  3:14     play
11. My Gal  6:05
12. I’m So Glad  1:54

Skip James– Vocals, Guitar, Piano
Russ Savakus– Bass (on “How Long”)

After Skip James laid down some of the spookiest, most resonant tracks of the first wave of Delta blues, he fell off the radar for years, but like many of his contemporaries, he was “rediscovered” in the ’60s by folk/blues historians and given a second phase of his career. The 1965 release TODAY! is perhaps the finest moment of James’s latter-day work. Incredibly, his haunted voice and hypnotic guitar style seem to have magically avoided the ravages of time. Hearing him revisit some of his greatest tunes, such as “Hard Time Killin’ Floor Blues” and “Special Rider Blues” (and even a contemporary composition, “Washington D.C. Hospital Center Blues”), is like seeing a spirit long-gone revisiting the world to wail some ghostly plaint once more.

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1. All Night Long [2:57]
2. Rock Island Blues [3:01]
3. Little Boy How Old Are You [2:11]
4. Four O'clock Blues [3:41]
5. Black Gal [3:38]
6. Little Cow and Calf [3:09]
7. How Long Blues [4:23]
8. Vicksburg Blues [3:26]
9. Lazy Bones [3:51]
10. Walking The Sea [2:30]
11. 22-20 Blues [3:41]
12. Special Rider Blues [3:25]

Skip James - Composer, Guitar, Organ, Piano, Vocals

Skip James displays his four tool skills on piano, organ, guitar, and vocals on 12 traditional Delta Blues numbers, and employs his whining, age weakened falsetto on every cut. There's nothing fancy -- just James accompanying himself and emoting his heart out on a myriad of earthy tales like "Black Gal," "Lazy Bones," "Vicksburg Blues," and "Special Rider Blues." The release is a true reflection of the leading purveyor of the Bentonia Blues style named after James' birthplace, Bentonia Mississippi. ---Andrew Hamilton

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1. Hardtime Killing Floor Blues - 3:28
2. Sick Bed Blues - 3:40
3. Washington D.C. Hospital Center Blues - 4:19
4. Devil Got My Woman - 6:20
5. Illinois Blues - 3:41
6. I Don't Want A Woman To Stay Up All Night Long - 4:45
7. Cherry Ball Blues - 3:54
8. Skip's Worried Blues - 4:22
9. Cypress Grove Blues - 4:08
10. Catfish Blues - 3:33
11. Motherless And Fatherless - 4:08
12. All Night Long - 4:57

Personnel:
Skip James - Guitar (Acoustic), Guitar, Vocals

Shortly after his triumphant resurrection at the 1964 Newport Folk Festival, Skip James returned to the recording studio for the first time in over three decades to cut the 12 sides which comprise the superb Greatest of the Delta Blues Singers, a career-capping overview which reprises some of the songs from his 1931 Paramount sessions and introduces a half-dozen new compositions as well. Although his guitar skills have lost a step in the intervening years, the passage of time has only made James' vocals that much more expressive; his new material is especially devastating, in particular "Sick Bed Blues" and "Washington D.C. Hospital Center Blues," both detailing the fight with cancer that eventually led to his death. ---Jason Ankeny, Rovi

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