Producer and co-director Peter Carlson of Sagebrush Productions says in his liner notes for the DVD, "...despite a life that only bordered on success, Son Seals never failed to stay committed to the music that drove him". In so many ways that would sum up the legacy of the vast majority of blues men and women who came out of the south to join the legion of players up in Chicago. None of them ever became rich doing what they were doing, but the compensation was they were doing what they were supposed to be doing.
Journey Through The Blues is divided into two parts. The documentary, which includes interviews with Koko Taylor, Dr. John, and of course Son Seals himself, is thirty minutes long. There is also around an hour of concert footage culled from three concerts, Rooster Blues, House of Blues, and The Chicago Blues Festival. There are also outtakes from over a dozen songs in the interview section of the film that act as little tastes of what is to come in the concert and to emphasise some of the more important aspect of his personal and professional life.
For instance, we learn about one of his wives who tried to kill him and managed to shoot him in the face. The bullet remained permanently lodged in his head just below his ear. The biggest worry after the injury, after finding out he was going to survive, was that he may have lost his voice forever. But Son came back from that and his voice was just as good as it ever was.
But the most important thing you learn about Son Seals from this documentary is how much he loved doing what he was doing. Koko Taylor describes the life on the road as going from one dive to another in your car. They would play for three or four hours a night and then have to load all the equipment back up into the car and drive until they found someplace to spend the night that wouldn't charge all they had earned from the gig.
"We didn't do it for the money, we did it because we had no other choice," is how Koko Taylor put it. These folk loved what they did to the extent they sacrificed their lives and their health for their music. There's no way your going to have anything resembling a family life if you're on the road as much as these people were in those days.
Article comments
1 - chuck
It is a damn shame how routinely diabetes takes our blues stars away from us (and their loved ones) far too soon.
As a diabetic who has a younger brother that is already down to two knees, pardon me while I do some preachin' on some hard lessons learned about diabetes. If you know of blues musicians with the disease, plead with them, hound them (if you have to) to get it under control as much as possible. Imo the medical community doesn't do enough un regards to preventive medice. When I meet other folks with diabetes, I routinely ask them if they are "low carb," and most of them look at me puzzled. Carbs tun into sugar in your body. That load is hard on diabetics, so the less the better. Also stress exercise, just walking briskly is fine. Get them to test their blood glucose levels before and then after a good walk.
That will usually cause a light to go off in their head (or their spouses), and at least give them some inspiration.
Sorry, I could go on and on, but the idea is that we need to use our access of the web to help get some good information into the hands of our sick blues muusicians who need it...that's one way to really "keep the blues alive!"