Byther Smith biography, Byther Smith discography
Id + " Text: " + targetLink.Gospel Travellers for a time.During the years Byther Smith has toured all over the world.Holland, Belgium, Germany, France, Norway, Sweden and the UK.Blues) was released in March 2001 on Black and Tan Records.Black and Tan) in Dec 2003.The band, crowded onto a small stage tucked into a corner of the bar, locks into a rollicking, Chicago blues groove.Otis Rush's Keep On Lovin' Me Baby like commands.Stratocaster, turning the dancers into watchers, and the watchers into people standing, whistling, and applauding.Later in the set, during a song reminiscent of Elmore James' Crossroads, Smith seems to be playing slide, the notes rolling and tumbling together, only he uses no slide, just his bare hands.Imagine Magic Slim crossed with Otis Rush.Muddy Waters' Mannish Boy, J.The images are bleak and violent.Yet offstage, he is affable and approachable, though no less intense."This is what I search for in my heart all the time," Smith said, "to try to get something across to the people, to get them to feel what I feel."One of his sisters died in a house fire, the story of which would later become a song and an album title for Smith.The boy was raised by an aunt and uncle on a farm, which he left at 15 to work throughout the South in construction.When he experienced his first boxing defeat, his aunt bought him a Fender bass and told him to focus on music, and stop boxing.You got to stop what's in front of you."The youth also learned harmonica and drums.Smith is a cousin to the idiosyncratic Chicago bluesman J.Lenior, on his mother's side.In Chicago, he got to hear and even sit in with many artists he admired, including Lenior, Muddy Waters, Otis Rush, and Chuck Berry.He held this post for about six years in the 70s, and he ran Junior's band, which became the regular band at Theresa's.Baby, CJ, Cruz, Apex, and BeBe.Smith recorded a full album for BeBe in 1976 that was never released.He also recorded behind Sunnyland Slim and Bonnie Lee for Slim's Airways label.Material from the sessions was leased to Red Lightnin' in England and to the Mina label in Japan.Rounder Records reissued Housefire on CD on its Bullseye Blues label in 1991.Smith's 1989 session with his regular road band The Nightriders was released on the British JSP label as Addressing The Nation With The Blues (reissued in 1994).The new Nightriders have been together about four months, and the nucleus of the group backed Smith on his latest recording, to be released soon on the legendary Chicago blues and jazz label Delmark Records."What I write has happened to somebody.Lots of songs come to me in my sleep."Smith retired in July 1995 after working 25 years as a machinist at Economy Folding Box Company, having put his six daughters through college."If people write about me after I'm gone," Smith pondered, "I wish they'd say, 'He was a working man.Acknowledgments:
Anderson, Barbara and Mark Lipscomb.Rhythm, Juke Blues, and Chicago Blues magazines.ROM and on the Internet.Pepsi Smash
Nissan Live Sets
Who's Next?Strictly judging from the lyrical sentiment of his recordings to this point, it might be wise not to make Chicago guitarist Byther Smith angry.Smitty's uncompromising songs are filled with threats of violence and ominous menace (the...
|
