ELEVEN YEARS OF SCREWING AROUND: THE BLUE SUIT ANNIVERSARY ALBUM

featuring fine cuts from the Blue Suit catalog and new material too:

over 70 minutes of music and 8 of the 16 tracks are new

  1. Eddie Burns: Dixie Boogie
  2. Detroit Junior: Chicken Shack Boogie
  3. Howard Armstrong: Lady Be Good
  4. Sir Mack Rice: Cadillac Assembly Line (live)
  5. Queens of Harmony: He's A Mighty Good God to Know
  6. Willie D. Warren: Killing Floor
  7. Detroit Junior: Take Out The Time
  8. Honeyboy Edwards: Who May Be Your Regular Be
  9. Eddie Burns: Orange Driver (live)
  10. Big Jack Reynolds: Little Dog
  11. Mr. Bo: If Trouble Was Money
  12. Ellis Kirk: Breakup
  13. Detroit Junior: How Blue Can You Get (live)
  14. Art & Roman Griswold: I Love The Woman
  15. Harmonica Shah: Stubborn As A Mule
  16. Sir Mack Rice: Mustang Sally

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 The eleven years of Blue Suit Records have been an effort in revitalizing a historically very rich tradition, yet at  times quite stagnant blues scene, in the Toledo - Detroit area.  Founded in 1987 as a vehicle to release a recording by local legends Big Jack Reynolds and Art & Roman Griswold, Blue Suit has brought out highly  acclaimed  albums and, in many cases, the first albums by many classic artists of Detroit's  blues scene.  Its albums by Honeyboy Edwards and Howard Armstrong were nominated for W C Handy Awards and Blue  Suit's discs by Eddie Burns, Sir Mack

Rice, Louis "Mr. Bo" Collins and Detroit Junior were their first ever or first US-produced albums. These men were integral to the development of the blues in  Detroit, yet remained unrecorded since the advent of the album-length format.  All the while this was feeding the addiction of Blue Suit's principals John Rockwood and Bob Seeman: creating great, authentic American music  recordings for themselves.  In fact, the unwritten rule at Blue Suit headquarters is that all albums must be something that Rockwood and Seeman would want to buy; therefore a recording must be important and well-balanced and  the accompanying package must be interesting and informative.  Even this collection disc "Eleven Years of Screwing Around: The Blue Suit Anniversary Album" is an example of this - eight of the sixteen tracks are either  previously unreleased, from future albums or unreleased live recordings.

Along selections from cornerstone Blue Suit albums by Howard Armstrong ("Louie Bluie"), Sir Mack Rice ("Right Now") and  Detroit Junior ("Take Out The  Time") "Eleven Years Of Screwing Around" features three selections from the upcoming two volumes of "Hastings Street Grease."  The first volume will be released in the fall of 1998 and both discs represent the rich and  thriving music of the Blues' Second City; they are therefore named for the famed street that was the center of Detroit's African-American culture in the post WWII period.  All new recordings by many of the men who made Detroit  blues famous and others who were behind the scenes (or on drums, bass or rhythm guitar) including Eddie Burns, Eddie Kirkland, Willie D. Warren, Detroit Piano Fats and Howard Armstrong, "Hastings Street Grease" will give a picture  of not only what Detroit blues was like in the 1950s, but also what it's like still in 1998.

"Eleven Years of Screwing Around" also has three tunes recorded at Blue Suit's 10th Anniversary Concert on November 29, 1998  at the Ohio Theatre in Toledo.  With the backing of Maurice John Vaughn and his band, songs by Sir Mack Rice, Detroit Junior and Eddie Burns gain renewed vitality.

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