Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. I Want to Be Like Jesus in My Heart
2. All I Want Is That Pure Religion
3. Got the Blues
4. Long Lonesome Blues
5. Booster Blues
6. Dry Southern Blues
7. Black Horse Blues
8. Corinna Blues
9. Got the Blues
10. Long Lonesome Blues
11. Jack O' Diamond Blues
12. Jack O' Diamond Blues
13. Chock House Blues
14. Beggin Back
15. Old Rounder's Blues
16. Stocking Feet Blues
17. That Black Snake Moan
18. Wartime Blues
19. Broke and Hungry
20. Shuckin' Sugar Blues
21. Booger Rooger Blues
22. Rabbit Foot Blues
23. Bad Luck Blues

Disc 2:

1. Black Snake Moan
2. Match Box Blues
3. Easy Rider Blues
4. Match Box Blues
5. Match Box Blues
6. Rising Hig Water Blues
7. Weary Dogs Blues
8. Right of Way Blues
9. Teddy Bear Blues
10. Teddy Bear Blues
11. Black Snake Dream Blues
12. Hot Dogs
13. He Arose from the Dead
14. Struck Sorrow Blues
15. Rambler Blues
16. Chinch Bug Blues
17. Deceitful Brownskin Blues
18. Sunshine Special
19. Gone Dead on You Blues
20. Where Shall I Be?
21. See That Grave's Kept Clean
22. One Dime Blues
23. Lonesome House Blues

Disc 3:

1. Blind Lemon's Penitentiary Blues
2. 'Lectric Chair Blues
3. See That My Grave Is Kept Clean
4. Lemon's Worried Blues
5. Mean Jumper Blues
6. Balky Mule Blues
7. Change My Luck Blues
8. Prison Cell Blues
9. Lemon's Cannon Ball Moan
10. Long Lastin' Lovin'
11. Piney Wood's Money Mama
12. Low Down Mojo Blues
13. Competition Bed Blues
14. Lock Step Blues
15. Hangman's Blues
16. Sad News Blues
17. How Long How Long
18. Lock Step Blues
19. Hangman's Blues
20. Christmas Eve Blues
21. Happy New Year Blues
22. Maltese Cat Blues
23. D.B. Blues

Disc 4:

1. Eagle Eyed Mama
2. Dynamite Blues
3. Disgusted Blues
4. Competition Bed Blues
5. Sad News Blues
6. Oil Well Blues
7. Tin Cup Blues
8. Big Night Blues
9. Empty House Blues
10. Saturday Night Spender Blues
11. That Black Snake Moan, No. 2
12. Peach Orchard Mama
13. Big Night Blues
14. Bed Spring Blues
15. Yo Yo Blues
16. Mosquito Moan
17. Southern Woman Blues
18. Bakershop Blues
19. Pneumonia Blues
20. Long Distance Moan
21. That Crawlin' Baby Blues
22. Fence Breakin' Yellin' Blues
23. Cat Man Blues
24. Cheaters Spell
25. Bootin' Me 'Bout

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #85964 in Music
• Released on: 2003-03-18
• Number of discs: 4
• Format: Box set
• Dimensions: .65 pounds

Customer Reviews

Good intro to Lemon
The sound is better on the second of the two Yazoo releases ("The Best of Blind Lemon Jefferson") than it is here, but this is a more complete set (although it's missing a few alternate takes) at a good bargain. This set is certainly superior to the Documents, but some of the songs are mastered from very lousy 78s (better copies exist and are used on other compilations). The reviewer below mentions an upcoming Catfish set. In my opinion, the Catfish sets in general are of very poor quality, they eradicate all the surface noise then artificially add some treble to make up for the loss in sound quality, and the overall effect is a very flat, lifeless sound and compromised music. Catfish's releases seem to be aimed towards the 78 layman who is not used to hearing surface noise. If you want the (near) complete Jefferson output, this is the set to get, but the Yazoos still sound the best by a fairly wide margin.

That time is now
Having had this since about 3/23/03, I am ready to review it. I'll start by saying that it has not left my cd player since it arrived. I've listened to 2 or more discs each day every day that I have owned it so far.

I don't have that single-disc Yazoo Blind Lemon compilation from a couple years ago, so I can't compare/contrast the sound quality with that, but this does indeed sound better than do the Documents.

I do know that the Catfish label will be releasing their own complete Blind Lemon box later in 2003 (yes I know it is listed for sale here but I have e-mailed the label and it absolutely has not been released yet, and will not be until the tail end of 2003) and I am very curious to hear that one also, but I've been loving this one so far.

This box maybe isn't the sonic improvement I was hoping for, but I really can't fault it. You're definitely upgrading from your Documents if you purchase this set but I think I will really just have to hear this side-by-side with the new Catfish box for me to make a definitive statement.

I know some of you may be wondering why I went ahead and reviewed this already if I feel I have to hear the Catfish box to be sure of what I think of this one. Well, I've really been into this one and just thought some of you who don't own it yet would like to be able to read a review of it to help you decide.

So far my review has been geared towards the people who already know Lemon and his music. Now I'll try and write a bit for those of you who may be taking your first crack at him.

First, this is an excellent choice for a first Blind Lemon Jefferson purchase. I look at it like this... this box has a great price and you get everything he recorded, thus you can fully immerse yourself in his music and decide from there whether you are into him or not.

Blind Lemon's music ranges from mournful to lewd, upbeat to low-down. I suppose that many "first-time Lemon" fans may (or may not) be coming to him from Robert Johnson. All I am going to say is that the world of pre-war blues is a very large world that covers lots of moods and modes of personal expression. RJ is not the end-all and be-all that many would have you believe. That's really all there is to remember. Blind Lemon was his own man with his own unique artistic vision, all of which pre-date RJ by a decade. This box-set collects his entire recorded output. 1926-1929 were some great years for American music!

You may also want to consider Jelly Roll Morton's 5-disc JSP box-set. I've had that one for 2 or 3 years now and it just keeps getting better!

5 Stars because it's Lemon, but not the best sound
Blind Lemon Jefferson was the greatest of the country bluesmen. (For a measure of my enthusiasm, see my review of the Yazoo set.)

If you dig him enough, or are curious enough, to want his entire output in one place for a budget price, then by all means this is the package to buy.

But completeness and price are the top virtues of this set. If you want to hear these records at their best, with careful attention to making them sound clear and present, the Yazoo one-disc compilation still leads the pack, far and away.

Except for a slightly better mastering job, these four discs mirror the four separate BLJ volumes on Document. In fact, I would not be surprised to learn that these _are_ the old Document masters, run through a noise reduction system. The sound quality is quite uneven: the better-sounding takes sound pretty good, but some of the others are awful.

The version of " 'Lectric Chair Blues," one of Lemon's finest records, as heard here is terribly worn and noisy, to the point of being unintelligible. Also true of the same track on the Document. On Yazoo, it's a wonderful listen and you can hear and understand all of the words.

"Long Lonesome Blues," take 2, is also nearly inaudible. On the Yazoo, it sounds as if they may have been working with the same 78 disc, but the results are much improved.

JSP Records gained a stellar reputation because its earliest roots-and-jazz compilations were mastered by the late John R. T. Davies, who was a genius at resurrecting old recordings and making them sound real. But this is not one of those sets.

So: With Lemon Jefferson, you always get quality music, and with this JSP collection you get nearly all of it. (Several alternate takes are not here.) But if sound quality is an issue, I have to recommend Yazoo's "Best of."