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Out on Highway 61 Driving the Road That Bore the Blues from the Deep South to Chicago – in a Car That Cost Less Than the Fuel Needed for the Trip

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Out on Highway 61 Driving the Road That Bore the Blues from the Deep South to Chicago – in a Car That Cost Less Than the Fuel Needed for the Trip CRUISING THROUGH BLUES COUNTRY OUT ON HIGHWAY 61 Driving the road that bore the Blues from the Deep South to Chicago – in a car that cost less than the fuel needed for the trip WORDS Dale Drinnon // PHOTOGRAPHY Martyn Goddard 106 JANUARY 2014 OCTANE OCTANE JANUARY 2014 107 CRUISING THROUGH BLUES COUNTRY IKE ANY CUNNING PLAN the Perfect Car. It plainly had to be a Cadillac, ‘I think I’ve found a Cadillac,’ Stan wrote. it was a considerable time in the because that’s what any self-respecting old- ‘It’s a 1981 Coupe de Ville, no major rot, and making, and originally hatched time bluesman (or blueswoman – and there everything important works except the air con. during a now dimly remembered have been many) with an urge to impress New alternator, drives fine, and I can get it for drive down some long, lonesome would want to drive to fame and fortune in a thousand bucks, dead-even.’ I transferred the Lstretch of vast American road as Martyn Chicago. It had to be a cheap, used-up Cadillac, money to the States straight away, the full Goddard and I listened to Muddy Waters too, not a press fleet beauty or a 100-point resto princely £656.36 of it, and called Martyn. ‘Start on the radio. We should do a story in classic, because used-up Cadillacs were the booking hotels,’ I said. ‘The Blues trip is on… Mississippi Blues country, we decided, on only kind old-time bluesmen coming from the and we’d better finish before Mississippi hits illustrious Highway 61, driving through the Delta could have afforded. We should really air conditioning season.’ heart of the Delta where the Blues were born. just fly into New Orleans, I told myself, buy Consequently I arrived in Tennessee in mid- We should, in fact, keep right on going along the first raggedy Caddy we find, and head to April, with a week to prep the car to a standard the Great Migration route that once took Chicago with it. commensurate with the project’s struggling- countless poor black Southerners to better lives Fortunately I had the accidental good bluesman philosophy. I replaced one tail-lamp in the industrial North, and giants like Muddy judgement to mention that suicidal idea to bulb and a windscreen wiper, hammered the Waters to the Chicago clubs and studios where great friend, former racing partner, and long- balky driver’s power seat into co-operation, the Blues reached the wider world and changed time mechanical guru Stan Heath while and begged a bit of free help with the wheel popular music forever. And we liked the plan visiting my native Tennessee last Christmas. cover locks from my buddy Alan Phelps at so much that for ages thereafter we were ‘Let me have a look around before you do Cadillac of Knoxville, as well as two free constantly, diligently, fine-tuning the details. anything,’ he gently advised, and my jet lag second-hand tyres from ex-boss Lowell Arp at Somehow, though, we never quite pulled the hadn’t evaporated from the return to Twin City Buick (slightly too small but, hey, the trigger, mostly thanks to my fixation on finding Oxfordshire when I got his email. critical word is ‘free’). Caption Xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxx xxxx xxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxx. 108 JANUARY 2014 OCTANE OCTANE DECEMBER 2013 109 Caption Xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxx. Then I replaced the missing radio with a ‘REMEMBER, soulful, hard-charging R&B standard by Lil’ $20 boombox from America’s equivalent to Red and Big Bad, to a Skynyrd tribute band Poundland and, to set a proper bluesy mood, it’S NEW OR-LENS, shattering the eardrums of drunken lager louts met Stan, wife Tina and son Stirling for a send- in Confederate-flag t-shirts. Whatever you off dinner of our local Bishop’s barbeque – only NOT NEW OR-LEANS, want, brother, all you gotta do is shop around. available for home consumption, and only if New Orleans also happens to be the southern you know who to ask and bring cash. The next UNLESS YOU’RE anchor of Highway 61, and an early start is morning I left for New Orleans to rendezvous critical if you’re to get any miles into the day; with Martyn’s flight from London. ZZ TOP’ an hour north is Baton Rouge, and traffic can For anyone making such an expedition, be as bad as it is in New Orleans, especially if especially a Brit, New Orleans is the ideal there’s a Gulf Coast downpour en route. Once start. Besides having the largest international the subtleties. After two years in Louisiana, I past BR, though, it’s smooth sailing, with good, airport in the region, it’s historically the most never could get it right. open A-roads full to Memphis. Sadly, that’s delightfully laissez-faire city in the American Of course, the main French Quarter attraction irrelevant to us, since anything above 60mph South, and a few days in the French Quarter is the music. Music first became a viable slings out oil and transmission fluid faster than provides a painless introduction to the profession for black people in the Deep I can pour them in. complexities of Southern culture. Or cultures, South soon after the Civil War, in the But at a steady 55 to 60 (about the legal limit I should say; we’ve got bunches, all with Quarter’s Storyville red-light district (part of anyway) the car cruises like a champ. As different customs, cuisines, music, and our posh Dauphine Orleans Hotel was once produced, it boasted what Cadillac called a V8- especially accents. a Storyville brothel). Music was furthermore 6-4, selectively dropping cylinders for fuel So don’t worry if you don’t understand us among the few African-American jobs carrying efficiency, which worked as erratically as 1981 immediately, we sometimes don’t understand appreciable earning potential, and both Jazz electronics would predict. each other, but we’re a gregarious and chatty and Blues sprang from those beginnings. With that feature thankfully long since lot (something else you’ll need to adjust to) Musicians of every discipline still flock there, kaput, it’s merely a nice American V8 land and everything works out eventually if you too, and it’s a worthy education to wander club yacht, with decent power, a smooth ride, go with the flow. Do remember, however, the to club, listening for the Blues underpinnings and as quiet as the tomb where any sudden pronunciation ‘New OR-lens’ is preferred to behind so many genres, and with so many change of direction would certainly send us – ‘New Or-LEANS’, unless you’re ZZ Top or variations. A half-hour walk can easily take and the top-up stops do allow us ample Louis Armstrong – and don’t try ‘NAH-lens’ you from a righteous, straight-up Delta dobro opportunities to see the sights on the until you’ve lived there long enough to master performance by earnest young Colin Lake, to a Mississippi Blues Trail map. 110 DECEMBER 2013 OCTANE OCTANE JANUARY 2014 111 CRUISING THROUGH BLUES COUNTRY You will, however, spend about a year if you Best of all, savvy Delta residents are working overdo those stops, and some priority-setting to both preserve their Blues heritage and aid ‘MOST EVERY is wise. We limit ourselves to a peek at the the local economy, traditionally among the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola (which poorest in the USA, through the medium of SIGNIFICANT actually isn’t on the map), where acclaimed Blues tourism, and to good effect. The Delta Founding Father of the Blues, Huddie isn’t just a place to run from anymore; it can EVENT IN THE Ledbetter, aka Lead Belly, did time and was indeed be pretty inviting. The Lofts hotel famously ‘discovered’ by Library of Congress rooms overlooking revitalised downtown EARLY HISTORY musicologists John Lomax and his son, Alan. Clarksdale are bigger than my house, with OF THE BLUES You will definitely not want to pause at much better kitchens; Indianola’s Blue Biscuit the wretched place long, anyway, and we Bungalows are re-located, antique-filled old HAPPENED WITHIN enjoy a counterbalancing layover in beautiful, plantation buildings, directly across from the antebellum, plantation Natchez. Seeing both inspiring BB King Museum. A 50-MILE RADIUS back to back is another education, of a Most importantly, leave plenty of time for disturbingly different kind. the music. Ground Zero, co-owned by actor OF INDIANOLA’ Extra stops notwithstanding, a comfortable Morgan Freeman, is almost always hopping; day’s drive will still get you to Indianola, we saw the All Night Long Blues Band, a geographic centre of the Delta as well as the popular Mississippi group with a Delta/ historical centre. Most every significant event Western Swing sound and a nice combination in the early history of the Blues happened of showmanship and genuine talent. within a 50-mile radius: BB King is from But don’t pass up the rare chance to visit Indianola; Muddy Waters grew up on nearby dying-breed, juke-joint-type venues, like Po’ Caption Stovall Plantation and Alan Lomax recorded Monkey in Merigold (only open on Thursdays) Xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx him there in 1941; Bessie Smith died tragically and Red’s Lounge in Clarksdale.
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