Stinging electric blues and sparkling Texas stride-blues piano, and dapper, sad, droll singing, with a measure of the slurred wit and poise of Percy Mayfield.
Mercy Dee picked cotton like his parents, and his writing about rural poverty is unforgettable: check his first, minor hit Lonesome Cabin Blues, and the bigger One Room Country Shack, covered by Mose Allison, Jr. Wells and co. ‘If I ever get from around this harvest, I don’t even want to see a rose-bush grow / And if anyone ask me about the country, Lord have mercy on his soul.’ He also richly and lovingly disses various girlfriends: ‘the mule-head woman… her mind in the gutter, and her hands on my pocketbook’; ‘the bird-brain baby, with a heart the size of a mustard seed…’
These sides are from 1949-55 — for Spire, Imperial, Colony, Rhythm, Flair, and Specialty — but don’t miss his comeback LPs for Arhoolie, too.

‘My life is blank and empty, like a pea out of a shell.’
‘I’ve tried so hard, and failed, baby.’

Wonderful, hard-core country, with plenty of fiddles, honky-tonk piano, steel guitar, sexual neurosis, and razor-sharp wit, from one of the all-time greats.
Have Blues, Will Travel compiles singles releases between 1949 and 1962, across seven different record labels: Gold Star, 4-Star, TNT, Starday, “D”, Mercury and Allstar.
Take It Away Lucky… The Worm Has Turned…

‘Get hit by truck and get a busted head / Everybody says, Lucky, he ain’t dead. / Lucky old Ed, luckiest man in town.’

Electrifying, raw, wild rockabilly, lathered in sex, alcohol, and general doowhutchalike.
From 1956, his first record is one of our favourite 45s ever: Red Headed Woman backed with We Wanna Boogie. ‘Here was total abandon: coarse, untutored singing; unintelligible lyrics; ragged drumming; distorted guitar, backed by a wildly bleating trumpet. It was punk before punk, thrash before thrash’ (Colin Escott).
And as for Ain’t Got A Thing… whoa oh oh… what a KILLER.

Searing, ultra-dread Chicago blues. Total murder like Double Trouble, when Otis had barely turned twenty, with Ike Turner on second guitar. Genius.

The first decent compilation, from the early honky tonk and rockabilly sides — total killers like the tanked-up, randy-as-a-stoat I’m Coming Home — through to the witty country hits.
‘Get your face all pretty and your hair done right / ‘Cos we’re gonna do the town tonight / Well I’m comin’ into town and right on time / I still got your lovin’ on my mind… Well I came to a hill and the truck looked down / Throwed in low and she’s huggin’ the ground / Scratchin’ gears but I’m goin’ again / I’m comin’ home baby /  I’m doggin’ it in.’

One of the all-time great guitarists, Nolen was with the James Brown band from the mid-sixties till his death in 1983.
Strollin’ collects 78s and 45s released before 1961, both under his own name and as a much in demand session guitarist and touring band member with artists like Monte Easter, Johnny Otis and George Smith.
Don.