The coolest jazzy blues album there is (Reefer Songs: Original Jazz & Blues Vocals)

Member Name: dangaroo

Product:	Reefer Songs: Original Jazz & Blues Vocals
Date:	05/06/09 (30 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great music, lyrics and vocals

Disadvantages: None

Reefer Songs is a compilation of songs from 1927 through to 1947 dedicated to marijuana that was originally released in 1989, to years ahead of similar album "Viper Mad Blues", it's by far the best one - leaving some of the scraps for Viper Mad Blues. It's not that VPM is bad but Reefer Songs is an amazing collection of songs. The stories told through these awesome piano and guitar blues tracks are wild and enjoyable. Topics covered include the singer's dealer being arrested and being left without supplies, another encouraging the sale of drugs to change around ones fortunes but most of the artists are just singing about their love for "tea", "jive", "roach" "reefers", "wackey dust" and being "a viper" or "mellow" .

The songs also detail some humorous dreamy and hallucinative thoughts. This album is very much routed in blues but there's numerous jazz tracks including the Django Reinhardt sounding Stuff Smith and His Onyx Club's track "I'm the Man with the Jive". There's a great energy in the music, the drug related jargon of the time is highly entertaining, it's presented by some superb vocalists, musically each and every track is amazingly catchy and joyful - except the more thoughtful and dark "The Weed Smoker's Dream" by The Harlem Hamfats which seems to have the first reggae chords I've ever came across but probably doesn't realise it.

"Willie the Weeper" too has a kind of tragic sound. Piano playing throughout the album is outstanding. Some of the crackly recordings on the older tracks just add to the aura. There's a lot of comedy present mostly revolving around describing the behaviour of the stoned drug dealers

And of course there's the funky "Who put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine." Not every song is just singing the praises of the drug but also talking about the consequences "Jerry the Junker" for instance is killed in an electric chair for his misbehaviour, whilst drug dealers are caught throughout the album and Lil Green claims to be bringing shame on herself and knows she's killing herself or "knockin' myself out" by smoking too much but finds it the only cure since her man left her!

Definitely one of the understated stars of the album is Buck Washington who seems to be having the last laugh on his neighbours! A crazy compilation, they don't make them like this any more. Because these songs are in the public domain, you're not really supporting anyone other than the compilers by buying it, might as well download it from rapidshare. The result of being in the public domain is that since this compilation many of the songs have been re-packaged on various other compilations, the best reefer compilation though is definitely: "Reefer Songs: Original Jazz & Blues Vocals"

1 Reefer Man - Redman, Don Orchestra
2 Man From Harlem - Calloway, Cab & His Orchestra
3 Here Comes The Man With The Jive - Smith, Stuff & His Onyx Club
4 If You're A Viper - Howard, Bob & His Boys
5 Texas Tea Party - Goodman, Benny & His Orchestra
6 Light Up - Bailey, Buster & Rhythm Busters
7 Jack I'm Mellow - Smith, Trixie
8 Sweet Marijuana Brown - Bigard Sextet, Barney
9 Viper Mad - Bechet, Sidney & Noble Sissle's Swingsters
10 Weed Smoker's Dream (Why Don;'t You Do Right) - Harlem Hamfats
11 G Man Got The T Man - Johnson, Cee Pee & Band
12 All The Jive Is Gone - Kirk, Andy & His Twelve Clouds Of Joy
13 Stuff Is Here - White, Georgia
14 Wackey Dust - Webb, Chick & His Orchestra
15 Who Put the Benzedrine In Mrs Murphy's Ovaltine - Gibson, Harry 'The Hipster'
16 Jerry The Junker - Williams, Clarence & His Washboard Five
17 Refer Song - Waller, Fats
18 Lotus Blossom (Sweet Marijuana) - Lee, Julia & Her Boy Friends
19 Willie The Chimney Sweeper - Rodgers, Ernest
20 Weed - Foote, Bea
21 Save The Roach For Me - Washington, Buck
22 Knockin' Myself Out - Green, Lil
23 Minnie the Moocher - Calloway, Cab & His Cotton

Summary: Great stuff