Woody Guthrie - Poor Boy - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Recorded in 1940, and later reissued by Folkways Recordings in 1950, Guthrie's first album chronicles the American Dust Bowl through his prosaic style of talking blues. Using only guitar and vocals, the album follows the exodus of Midwesterners headed for California and mirrors both Guthrie's own life and John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath. Along the way, characters are forced into theft, murder, and unbearable hardship against a biblical backdrop of the American West. Hugely influential, Dust Bowl Ballads has been revered by Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, and Bruce Springsteen. In Hard Hitting Songs for Hard-Hit People, Steinbeck wrote of Guthrie InchHarsh voiced and nasal, his guitar hanging like a tire iron on a rusty rim, there is nothing sweet about Woody, and there is nothing sweet about the songs he sings. But there is something more important for those who will listen. There is the will of the people to endure and fight against oppression. I think we call this the American spirit.Inch

This one is as influential as it is essential. Woody is accompanied here by Lead Belly, Cisco Houston, Sonny Terry and others. InchHard Travelin',Inch InchOregon Trail,Inch InchThe House of the Rising Sun,Inch InchJohn Henry,Inch InchBoll Weevil Blues,Inch and more. 14 tracks in all. Smithsonian-Folkways.

24 more of the historic recordings Woody made for Mo Asch's Folkways tag, including such classics as Hard Travelin'; So Long It's Been Good to Know You; Mean Talking Blues; Talking Columbia, and I Ain't Got No Home in This World Anymore, plus a number of unreleased sides and detailed notes. 1944-1949 material.