Phillip Walker RIP

From Bob Corritore

July 22, 2010

RIP Phillip Walker, February 11th, 1937 - July 22, 2010. It is with great sadness that we report the passing of Phillip Walker this morning at 4:30 AM of heart failure. He was 73. Phillip was a great singer and guitarist who was considered legendary, though he never broke through to the success that his talent merited. He played guitar on the Specialty and Chess recordings of Clifton Chenier (Phillip once said that it was him and Etta James singing the backup on Clifton's song "My Soul"). He moved from Louisiana to California in 1959, and released his first record "Hello My Darlin", produced by J.R. Fulbright. Phillip's first full album, produced by Bruce Bromberg and called Bottom Of The Top was released in 1973 on the Playboy Record Label (actually a business division of the magazine). He also made great recordings on Galaxy, Vault, Joliet, HighTone, JSP, Black Top, Rounder, Alligator, P-Vine, MC, and most recently on Delta Groove. Additionally, Phillip was a noted sideman who contributed to albums by  Lonesome Sundown, Eddie Taylor, Percy Mayfield, and Johnny Shines. Phillip toured frequently with a great band that included his longtime partner, James "Broadway" Thomas, on bass. He was lovingly booked by Tom Radai of Blues Management Group. His passing highlights the loss of the few remaining blues artists of his generation. We salute Phillip for always delivering the true blues, for his kind and giving personality, and for his unique and awe inspiring blues style. To see Phillip Walker's website click here , for an extensive bio click here. So long Phillip, we will miss you.

Video of Phillip Walker

Randy Joe Fullerton RIP

From Bob Corritore

RIP Randy Joe Fullerton, Sept 18, 1949 - June 27, 2010. This news comes in from Will "Smokey" Logg. Bassist Randy Joe Fullerton passed away on June 27 in Dallas, Texas. He was 60. Fullerton was a popular blues bass player in the late 60s and 70s who worked with Luther Allison, Rod Piazza, Paul Filipowicz, Jim Liban, Billy Flynn, Madison Slim and many others. He is probably best known as the young, long haired bass player in the 1970 video of Howlin' Wolf performing Highway 49 at a blues festival in Washington D.C. where he was a capable fill in for Wolf's curtailed bass player. To see this unbelievable video, click here. To see Randy Joe Fullerton's myspace, click here. Randy remained an active performer his whole life and is considered a top shelf bassist by all that knew him. He will be greatly missed.


Here is a video of Howling Wolf singing with Randy Joe Fullerton playing bass

Sick Again! More About Videos!

Well, I was doing good until today. I hadn't really been ill, except for a slight cold over Easter, so that means I had gone almost three months without being sick. This has been a bad year for me. I swear I was sick for most of December, and then again in January. So waking up this morning with this crud again really sucks! I hope I can avoid the Doctor because I can guarantee that he will put me on Antibiotics, which is not one of my favorite things to do. I think that for the most part these are virus that I have, but the doctors take one look at my throat and they go STREP! I suppose it is the hazard of working with kids.

For those of you following the video saga. Youtube deleted a ton of videos over the last few months. In particular a lot of Bobby Darin videos. I found out that the guy who posted them didn't have permission (duh!!!) and the Darin Estate pulled the plug. I know that myself and a few others have gone out and bought some Bobby Darin CDs and DVDS after seeing the clips so I think the estate is being a little shortsided. Besides I have found a few of the old clips are back up under different users. I think it is a lot like the Elvis videos they don't last long! I bet the Elvis Estate must have a full time guy who sits at a computer all day looking for videos of Elvis to pull! Again I think it is too bad, because it is great advertising, and it keeps these artists alive.

If you would like to see all the videos on Blues Historian (they are embedded videos from other sites, if you represent an artist and want them gone please go to the site that the video originates from) CLICK HERE or on the title of this post.

Dead Videos And Links

I have well over 600 videos embedded on this site. Most are from Youtube, but a few are from some other video sharing sites. Unfortunately I have a ton of videos that are not working right now. It seems that at least one person who I posted a lot of his videos has run afoul of the corporations that control individual artists performances, and they pulled his videos from the site. It is unfortunate that corporations are so short sided that can't see how giving away video clips actually help promote artists, and get us to go out and buy their stuff. Of course I know that the younger college age crowd probably uses peer to peer file sharing, and torrents and all sorts of stuff that I don't understand to get free music, but the bulk of the people here like to buy stuff:-) So when we see a video of an artists we like we buy their music. So when the big bad corporations start pulling the plug on the videos they are just shooting themselves in the foot. It is painfully obvious that people are more likely to follow an artists once they see them, or hear them. Most people will not go into a music store to buy a CD if they have never seen or heard the artist. Of course the corporations that control and make the most money are trying desperately to keep alive the goose that laid the golden egg. The actual CD costs as far as production is far less than the 15 to 20 bucks they charge, and of that money the artists get a pittance. As any blues performer can tell you, they make money off performances not CDS, unless they self produce the music themselves, then if they play enough, and sell enough they can make some money.

I will try to delete as many of the dead posts that I can find, and if I can replace the videos I will, but I doubt that some of the rarer clips are replaceable and that is a shame for both the artists and their fans.


UPDATE

I am up to about the middle of may of last year and so far I have deleted 35 videos that are no longer working. I have no idea when I am going to get back to updating new videos. This may take awhile. It also looks like Daily Motion at least gives you a warning that the video is gone. Unlike Youtube which you actually don't know if it works or not until you play it. Don't you just love corporate America:-)