Louisiana Cajun Music

A celebration of the exceptional music that can occur in the most out of the way places.

Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town is a transitional effort that bridges the curveballs of Emmylou Harris' earliest solo work with the more traditional country albums that comprise the bulk of the second phase of her career…

A sort of a sequel to Gatemouth's 1974 Cajun country & western cowboy album Down South in the Bayou Country, the originally issued Bogalusa Boogie Man consists of 12 tracks performed in more or less that same vein. "Bogalusa Boogie Man" was recorded in Bogalusa, LA, during March of 1975, almost exactly one year after Bayou Country. Material for this project was composed by Danny Morrison, Red Lane, Hoyt Garrick, David Craig, Jerry Hubbard, Pat Rush, Fred Martin, and Little Feat founder Lowell George, whose "Dixie Chicken" features "vocals by everyone around in the studio, including friends and neighbors and the one and only Woody Lee Lewis." George is said to have singled out this version as his all-time favorite.

Link Davis - Gumbo Ya Ya: The Best Of 1948-1958 (2008) {Rev-Ola Bandstand CRREV252}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 358 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 175 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 26 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1948-58, 2008 Rev-Ola Bandstand / Cherry Red | CR REV 252
Rock and Roll / Country / Cajun / Rockabilly

With his cajun fiddle, raw, yelping voice, and visceral mix of country, R&B, proto-rockabilly, and New Orleans sounds, Link Davis was a precursor to the swamp-pop style of the 1950s and '60s. GUMBO YA YA brings together some of Davis's greatest tracks from his peak period of 1948-58, including such swampy gems as “Big Mamou,” “Lonely Heart,” and “Time Will Tell.” This is a fine opportunity to catch up on the legacy of this Louisiana pioneer.

Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown's tough-minded approach to the blues, country, Cajun, and jazz insures a minimum of nonsense and a maximum of variety, while his virtuosity on the guitar and fiddle insures the highest standards. Nonetheless, Brown's 1997 album is a landmark for the 73-year-old picker who won a Rhythm & Blues Foundation Pioneer Award. All 13 tunes on Gate Swings find Brown working with his regular road quartet plus a 13-piece horn section, enabling him to prove that Duke Ellington, Count Basie, and Lionel Hampton have been as important to his music as any bluesman or Creole fiddler. Gate Swings includes tunes by all three of those big-band leaders as well as compositions by Buddy Johnson, Percy Mayfield, Louis Jordan, and Brown himself, and they all swing with the massive force that only a big horn section can muster. Brown has leaned in this direction before, but Gate Swings is special, because it features the horn arrangements of Wardell Quezergue, an alumnus of the Dave Bartholomew band who arranged many of the best New Orleans R&B hits in the '60s and '70s.