Tonight we will explore the career and music of a rather uniquely named player, Barbeque Bob. Born in Georgia 1902, as Robert Hicks, Bob only lived for 29 years, dying of tuberculosis and pneumonia, brought on by influenza, in 1931 at the age of 29. He got his nickname, not surprisingly, as he was a cook in a barbeque restaurant.
Although his life was short, his recording was prolific. He recorded 68 sides from 1927 until his death. His first record, “Barbeque Blues” sold 15,000 copies and was Columbia Records biggest selling record up to that time.
Barbeque Blues
–
The following song is what brought to the top of the pack. This song “Mississippi Heavy Water Blues” was recorded in New York a few months after Barbeque Blues.
Mississippi Heavy Water Blues
–
I was not able to find to many of his tunes covered by others. I did find this though, a great version by Eric Clapton.
Motherless Child
–
Bob also recorded a few songs with The Georgia Cotton Pickers. These were to be the last songs recorded by him prior to his death. I will be doing a post on this group next week, so I will pick up the story then.
Related articles
- Let’s Explore The Blues – Mississippi John Hurt (joebeans2002.wordpress.com)
- Let’s Explore The Blues – Roosevelt Sykes (joebeans2002.wordpress.com)
Fantastic set. I wonder how many kids today know what a “side” is.
I’ve been hearing lots of covers of Motherless Children lately. Did you know Roseanne Cash did it too? I didn’t find it too country,..
Blind Willie Johnson did Motherless Children. Motherless Child is a different tune. I got fooled on that one when I did the post on Blind Willie, cause Clapton did a cover of that song to. Crazy back then. Try and sort out the Mississippi heavy water levee songs haha. The song you put up is pretty damn good.
Yeah. That one is particularly confusing. It’s interesting how the music was passed on, like a grand telephone game, from slave hymns to blues music. “Motherless Child Blues” is an excellent song and I love the Clapton version. Great post!
The Clapton version is golden. The passing on you speak is worthy of an entire post I think. I have to be real careful when pulling songs, even covers, as they are all so similarly named. I almost got burned a couple of times and you guys are so versed in song that I would hate to do wrong. Literally go from song to song and pay real close attention to the lyrics as sometimes that is the only tell.
I definitely agree. I love how some of our favorite blues songs (and the foundations of rock n’ roll) do not have firm roots, but are rather 19th century hymns, heard and luckily recorded by blues musicians in the 20’s and 30’s. It is fascinating