Album O’ the Week: “Midnight Special,” Leadbelly

I am not a student of The Blues.
I like what I like, and that includes many country blues singers — something I figured out after declaring my disdain for Stevie Ray Vaughn and the like.
My appreciation begins and ends with Leadbelly. Some hangers-on have been added since my discovery of Mr. Huddie Ledbetter, but Leadbelly remains my favorite, time and time again.
If I could go back in time to any era, I’d like to see him live in Texas, New York or Louisiana. The man had a passion for music (and women, and alcohol and the like) that found its way into his 12-string acoustic. He has a sound like no other, and wrote so many songs that you know… you just don’t realize a man born in the late 1800s in Texas wrote them. Those who know me know I adore songwriters, especially those who make them interesting. I love a good story song, and Leadbelly was a master of the fable.
My first album was “Midnight Special,” which I bought off eBay for around $5 many years ago, when eBay was new. It’s got 19 or so songs, many of Leadbelly’s classics, and is a Library of Congress release of his music.
My mama raised me on Bill Monroe and his followers, and I find so many similarities between Leadbelly and the bluegrass sound. Bluegrass and country blues live a few houses down from each other. But country blues is steeped in danger and mystery, whereas bluegrass has many religious overtones. The perfect example of that bridging is on “Midnight Special:” “Where Did You Sleep Last Night,” made famous in my generation by Nirvana.
Originally called “Black Girl” the song is related to “In The Pines,” made famous by Bill Monroe. Both are born from the standard “The Longest Train.” The sentiment is the same: “In the pines, in the pines, where the sun don’t ever shine… I would shiver the whole night through.” Dark, scary, lost… it’s a story that we all feel we’ve lived.
“Midnight Special” is a perfect album for jumping into Leadbelly’s glorious catalog of music.
He wrote “Midnight Special,” which Creedance Clearwater Revival made a huge hit. Legend has it that if you were in the jail in Suger Land, Texas, and light from the train called the Midnight Special landed in your cell, you were released. So therefore, “Let the Midnight Special shine its ever-lovin’ light on me” makes perfect sense.
Other songs you’ve heard by other people can be found on this album, including “Goodnight, Irene,” “Pick a Bale O’ Cotton,” and “TB Blues.” He’s also the father of the song “House of the Rising Sun” and “Black Betty,” which are on separate anthologies. He inspired Led Zeppelin’s “Gallows Pole,” with “Gallis Pole.”
I’ve tried to coerce modern blues fans to listen and adore Leadbelly like I do. I meet with resistance, because modern blues fans are more impressed with the sound of the slide guitar than the words that make it a blues song. While Leadbelly was a maestro on his 12-string, as well as the accordion, concertina and other instruments, he didn’t have the chops of counterpart Robert Johnson. To a person who only listens to riffs, much of it sounds similar. But to someone picking through lyrics for diamonds, Leadbelly’s is the most fertile mine. And the music is great too. Simple, passionate.
Huddie sang the blues from experience. He really did kill a man. He womanized, claiming to “make it” with eight to 10 women a night in his youth (an exaggeration, I’m sure, but a nice fish story). He lived through the Depression, tuberculosis, poverty, racism, hatred and more. He was discovered during one of his stints in prison, and got out early for his talent.
It’s the little things that endear Leadbelly to me. For instance, in the song “Roberta,” he says “Oh Roberta, don’t you hear me calling you?” then, in an echo, says “Go ahead and call her.” He carries on in his songs, bending his booming voice into conversational tones and adding grunts and sound effects. He claps his hands, slaps his thighs, and moans like he’s been been studying the blues forever.
But he wasn’t a study. He was The Inventor, along with so many others from that era. What’s so interesting to me about that time is that there was no technology to spread the style. It just grew out of juke joints and saloons, from brothels and red-light districts, and split and splintered into countless styles and techniques. Leadbelly was my favorite, the most intriguing and prolific, the one who captured the time and made it relevant for any era.
If you like a good story, something inspiring, something that makes you want to live during the Depression in the poorest parts of Texas, listen to Leadbelly. Start with this album. It’s the one that made me fall in love with him, and spawned years of study of his music and life.

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