Good Gravy, Geeshie Wiley

I guess it credits an artist when you only record half a dozen songs in your life and seventy years later you're still gaining new fans.
-- Danny McCoy, Ari Eisinger’s Acoustic Blues Message Board, on Geeshie Wiley


I hate to post so soon after my last post (what's it been, two hours or so?) but I absolutely must. I move to the background to no one, absolutely no one, in my admiration for the legendary lost early-1930s acoustic-blues cypher Geeshie Wiley, and I just discovered that now, four of her songs are available on YouTube. That's an astonishing 2/3 of her entire recorded catalogue.

She has a reputation for having been a superb guitarist, but jesus could she sing. Check it out.

Skinny Legs Blues
Last Kind Words
Pick Poor Robin Clean
Eagles on a Half

I still have not heard "Motherless Child Blues" or "Over To My House," which makes me sad. (If I have a feminist musical icon, it's Geeshie Wiley, who beat Robert Johnson at his own game, and did it in six sides.)

You can download the first three tracks off the pages linked here, which I would strongly NO KIDDING GO DO IT NOW encourage you to do.