washington phillips: what are they doing in heaven today?
more crackly ancient beauty from mississippi records today, following yesterdays post on the magnificent skip james vinyl reissue.
washington phillips was a preacher, instrumentalist and gospel singer. he did not die in an asylum in 1930. he probably did not play the bizzaro dolceola instrument that’s often accredited to him. he did play more than likely some kind of fretless zither. between 1927 and 1929 he recorded five sessions in dallas. take your burden to the lord, the first 78 sold pretty well. and that was that. the stock market crashed, depression hit, followed by the ghastly decline of this kind of music being put on wax. eighteen songs. i suppose sometimes, like harper lee, you don’t really need to say anything more. i am born to preach the gospel and i sure do love my job.
the zither or dolceola or celestophone or phonoharp or whatever certainly makes a unique and very recognizable noise. it’s been called celestial and combined with his raw gospel blues preaching/singing, the sense of history, the crackle from those old 78’s, it does create a powerful almost (un)real atmosphere. like the skip james songs it reminds me of hearing him sing down some ancient telephone wires in the twenties/thirties, hearing some eerie music from another goddam world never mind time. it’s never anything other than spare and pure and simple. and it’s not much like anything else you’ll hear from this period.
he passed away in 1954. and outside the odd fella (like me) stumbling upon him, and the occasional cover appearing, he’s really only known among the musicologists and gospel blues collectors.
the vinyl’s a limited edition of 500 copies and comes with an insert reproduction advert for the dolceola. failing that the (again) yazoo released key to the kingdom cd is slightly more comprehensive. but not as fetishy…
i was born to preach the gospel by washington phillips
i had a good mother and father by washington phillips
i had a good mother and father by the palace brothers
i had a good mother and father by gillian welch
and from yesterday…
26/06/2008 at 6:50 pm
Have you been down to the Harry Smith remixed exhibition at the CCA yet? It’s an interesting range of responses to the tracks on the anthology. The best thing is that it makes you want to hear the records again.
The problem with a lot of the CD reissues of the old pre-war masters is that they’re scrubbed up to sound acceptable on modern hi-fis, but somehow lose some of their soul. There’s no substitute for an old Victorola and a stack of shellac, I guess. But I ain’t likely to hear the songs that way any time soon.
27/06/2008 at 11:52 am
yeah i’d seen yr post on this and made a mental note to go along at some point. still haven’t managed. july’s going to be a busy old month…
even the cd resissues without the noise cleanup all sound kindof flat and lifeless. imagined or otherwise. i think these mississippi records compilations proves there is a (niche) market for this kind of stuff on vinyl. even though last time i replaced my turntable i had to explain on occasion to people what records and record players were.