Junior Kimbrough
Junior Kimbrough (born David Kimbrough in Hudsonville, Mississippi, July 28, 1930; d. Holly Springs, Mississippi, January 17, 1998) was a prominent bluesman from Mississippi.
Kimbrough lived in the North Mississippi Hill Country around Holly Springs. He recorded for the Fat Possum Records label. He was a long-time associate of labelmate RL Burnside, and the Burnside and Kimbrough families often collaborated on musical projects. This relationship continues today.
Beginning around 1992, Kimbrough operated a juke joint known as "Junior's Place" in Chulahoma, Mississippi, which attracted visitors from around the world, including members of U2 and The Rolling Stones. Kimbrough's sons, musicians Kinney and David Malone Kimbrough (two of Junior's rumored to be twenty-eight children), kept it open following his death, until it burned to the ground on April 6, 2000.
Junior Kimbrough died in 1998 following a stroke.
Junior Kimbrough began playing guitar in his youth, and counted Lightnin' Hopkins as an early influence. In the late 50s Kimbrough began playing in his own style, which made use of mid-tempo rhythms and a steady drone he played with his thumb on the bass strings of his guitar. His music is characterized by the tricky syncopations between his droning bass strings and his mid-range melodies. His soloing style has been described as modal and features langorous runs in the mid and upper register. The result is complex and funky, described by music critic Robert Palmer as "hypnotic."
Kimbrough's music defies easy categorization. In solo and ensemble settings it is often polyrhythmic, which links it explicitly to the music of Africa. Fellow North Mississippi bluesman and former Kimbrough bassist Eric Deaton has suggested similarities between Junior Kimbrough's music and Malian bluesman Ali Farka Toure's.
Kimbrough made his recorded debut with a cover of Lowell Fulson's "Tramp" released as a 45 on an independent label in the early to mid 1960s. He recorded off and on until his death in 1998. Among his earliest extant recordings are two duets with rockabilly legend and childhood friend Charlie Feathers from 1969. Feathers counted Kimbrough as an early influence, calling him "the beginning and end of all music." This quote is on the back of Kimbrough's tombstone.
Kimbrough recorded very little in the 70s, contributing an early version of "Meet Me In The City" to a European blues anthology. With his band, The Soul Blues Boys, Kimbrough recorded throughout the 80s, releasing a single in 1982 ("Keep Your Hands Off Her" b/w "I Feel Good, Little Girl") that shows him backed by a superb band of hill country musicians and at the top of his powers as a singer and guitarist. He recorded at least one session for the independent label Gold Star in the mid 80s, though this label has never released any of his material. The High Water label recorded a 1988 session with Kimbrough and The Soul Blues Boys, releasing it in 1997 with his 1982 45 as Do The Rump.
Junior came to national attention in 1992 with his debut album All Night Long. Robert Palmer produced the album for Oxford, Miss., label Fat Possum Records, recording it in a local church with Junior's son Kent "Kinney" Kimbrough (aka Kenny Malone) on drums and RL Burnside's son Garry Burnside on bass. The album featured many of his most celebrated songs, including the title track, the complexly melodic "Meet Me In The City," and "You Better Run" a harrowing ballad of attempted rape. All Night Long earned near-unanimous praise from critics, receiving four stars in Rolling Stone magazine. His stock continued to rise the following year after live footage of him playing "All Night Long" in one of his juke joints appeared in the Robert Mugge-directed, Robert Palmer-narrated documentary Deep Blues. This performance was actually recorded earlier, probably about 1990, and showed Junior just before a stroke robbed him of much of his energy.
A second album for Fat Possum, Sad Days and Lonely Nights followed in 1994. A video for the album's title track featured Junior, Garry Burnside and Kent Kimbrough playing in Junior's legendary juke joint, with its distinct murals and relaxed atmosphere. The last album he would record, Most Things Haven't Worked Out, appeared on Fat Possum in 1997. Following his death in 1998, Fat Possum released two posthumous compilations of material Kimbrough recorded in the 90s, God Knows I Tried (1998) and Meet Me In The City (1999). A greatest hits compilation, You Better Run: The Essential Junior Kimbrough, followed in 2002. Fat Possum released a tribute album, Sunday Nights: The Songs of Junior Kimbrough, in 2005, that featured the likes of Iggy & The Stooges (Kimbrough once toured with frontman Iggy Pop), The Black Keys and Mark Lanegan.
Kimbrough's influence is most apparent in the Oxford and north Mississippi music scene. His son, David Kimbrough, is an accomplished guitarist, singer and songwriter in his own right, releasing his first album (as David Malone) on Fat Possum records in the mid 90s and his second, Shell-Shocked, on Lucky 13/BC Records in 2006. Garry Burnside, one of Kimbrough's bassists, teamed with his nephew, drummer Cedric Burnside, as Burnside Exploration, to record The Record (2006). Both Burnsides count Kimbrough as a formative influence, as does Duwayne Burnside, Garry's older brother, who used to back Kimbrough in his youth. Another Kimbrough bassist and acolyte, Eric Deaton released his debut, Gonna Be Trouble Here in 2006 as well. Contemporary bands the North Mississippi All Stars, The Black Keys, Jimbo Mathus & The Knockdown Society and Mr. Airplane Man all count Junior Kimbrough among their influences.
by Bill Dahl & Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Cited as a prime early influence by rockabilly pioneer Charlie Feathers, Mississippi Delta bluesman Junior Kimbrough's modal, hypnotic blues vision remained a regional sensation for most of his career. He finally transcended the confines of his region in the early '90s, when he appeared in the 1991 movie Deep Blues and on its Anxious/Atlantic soundtrack, leading to his own debut for Fat Possum Records, All Night Long.
Junior Kimbrough was born and raised in Hudsonville, Mississippi, where he learned how to play guitar by listening to records by Delta bluesmen. In 1968, he cut his first single, "Tramp," for the local Philwood label. For the next two decades, Kimbrough didn't have the opportunity to record frequently — he recorded a single, "Keep Your Hands Off Her," for High Water and his "All Night Long" was available on the various artists compilation National Downhome Festival, Vol. 2 released on Southland Records.
During the '70s and '80s, Kimbrough played juke joints throughout Mississippi, which is where music journalist Robert Palmer discovered him in the late '80s. Palmer featured Kimbrough in his documentary film Deep Blues. The exposure in the movie led to a national record contract for Kimbrough — he signed with Fat Possum and released his first full-length album, All Night Long, in 1992. The record was critically acclaimed by both blues and mainstream publications, as was Deep Blues and its accompanying soundtrack. All of the media attention led to performances outside of the Delta, including a few shows in England. After the flurry of activity in 1992, Junior Kimbrough returned to playing juke joints in the Delta, recording occasionally — he released his second album, Sad Days, Lonely Nights, in 1993. Most Things Haven't Worked Out followed in 1997, and a year later Kimbrough returned with God Knows I Tried. He died of a heart attack on January 17, 1998.
Junior KimbroughBy: Greg Johnson
Article Reprint from the April, 2002 BluesNotes
Prior to the 1992 release of the film documentary "Deep Blues," based loosely on the book by music historian, Robert Palmer, few people were aware of the musical legacy of the North Mississippi Hill Country. Unlike the Delta, not far to the west, the Hill Country was farmland run mostly by sharecroppers and not home to the large cotton plantations. Modern conveniences such as the development of the Interstate highway system was late arriving in this s part of the state, so many of the field researchers who discovered the performers in the Delta knew nothing of this community only a short drive away. Perhaps the only Blues musician of any true renown from that area was "Mississippi" Fred McDowell, and his discovery did not take place until 1959, close to 30 years after many of the legendary figures of the Delta.
The film "Deep Blues" changed all of that. Portions of the movie took place at the Chewalla Rib Shack, located just east of Holly Springs, approximately one hour from Memphis. The stage is first occupied in the film by the talented Jessie Mae Hemphill, the grand-daughter of the great fife-and-drum musician, Sid Hemphill. Fife-and-drums played a major role in the development of the region's sound, with it's long, hypnotic beat. But, it was the film's next performer who drove this style home: David "Junior" Kimbrough.
Kimbrough had been playing this form for more than 40 years when the movie was released. His mesmerizing appearance caught the attention of Matthew Johnson, a journalist for "Living Blues" Magazine, who had decided that he wanted to pursue authentic Blues musicians in order to create a new record label. He was tired of seeing the newer Blues musicians coming out of large cities in the East, playing heavy-handed Blues-infused-Rock. Junior Kimbrough became the first artist on this new label he dubbed Fat Possum.
Junior Kimbrough had spent nearly his entire life in the Hill Country, born in nearby Hudsonville on July 28, 1930. He was the son of sharecroppers and at an early age he would be left alone in the care of his older sister while the family tended the farm. Both his father and brother owned guitars, but they placed them where they believed they'd be secure from younger hands. David was entranced by the sound of the guitar and he removed the instruments from their hiding places once the others had left for the day. He had a natural gift, able to learn by ear. Once he even claimed that if he had a thought for a song, all he would need to do was play it once and it would be committed to memory. If he did not play it, then it was lost forever. Fred McDowell was one source for his learning. As was a local guitarist named, Eli Green, a man who many believed gained his musical prowess through the voodoo powers he was said to possess. Young David was a quick learner and even proved to be a teacher to his childhood friend, future Rockabilly star, Charlie Feathers, who to this day claims Kimbrough to be his earliest influence.
But, it wasn't only the guitar that David found intriguing while his family was at work. It was also reported that he gained his first taste for whiskey by the age of eight. One day his mother came home and found him in an alcoholic-induced coma. This proved to be the last time that the youngster was left home with his sister; instead he began learning the ways of farming.
After only two years of attending high school, David accepted a position working at the local John Deere dealership. He held onto this position until 1954, when he decided to migrate north like many other African-Americans of the time and ended up in Chicago. Four years later he returned south and settled briefly in Memphis. All throughout this period he continued to perform, now playing under the self-given moniker of "Junior"
While living in Memphis, he had his first opportunity to record. He made a handful of sides for the father of Sun Records owner, Sam Phillips, but they failed to garner any airplay at the time and Junior moved back to the Hill Country.
In 1979, historian David Evans, a professor of music at the University of Memphis, chanced upon Junior Kimbrough playing at Ethel's Juke Joint in Holly Springs. The University had recently created its own small record label called High Water and he brought Kimbrough, along with Jessie Mae Hemphill and longtime friend, R.L. Burnside, in to cut some sides, including his next single titled, "Keep Your Hands Off Her." The sides would be compiled for Junior's first full-length album, "Do The Rump" (re-released by the HMG label in 1997). Other than an early version of the single, "All Night Long", which would appear on a compilation recording released by Southland Records, these would be Kimbrough's last recordings until the debut Fat Possum release, "All Night Long" in 1992.
Fat Possum utilized "Deep Blues" producer, Robert Palmer, to create the album for Kimbrough. It was decided the only true way he could be captured was live at the Chewalla Rib Shack and so a make-shift studio was erected. This proved to be a success, as this untapped sound which had caused a sensation with the film, turned out to be the right combination for the fledgling label. "All Night Long" received rave reviews, eventually being named the "Most Important Blues Album of the Decade" by "Rolling Stone" Magazine.
Not long after the. releases of "Deep Blues" and "All Night Long," Sammy Greer, the owner of Chewalla Rib Shack, decided that he had had enough of the juke joint business and closed down. Junior purchased a larger juke in nearby Chulahoma, which came to be known simply as "Junior's Place." Fat Possum released a second album titled, "Sad Days Lonely Nights," which proved to be another winner for Junior. Soon, his juke was being visited by tourists and touring Rock musicians from around the world, including The Rolling Stones and U2, who came to see Junior, R.L. Burnside, and their respective families perform.
Junior's success would lead to Fat Possum putting together traveling renditions of the juke joint's artists throughout the United States and Europe. Kimbrough even found himself doing a tour as the opening act for rocker, Iggy Pop. A third album was also issued by Fat Possum in 1997, "Most Things Haven't Worked Out."
At this same period, Junior began to suffer from various health problems, including a series of strokes. He was also involved in an auto accident that revealed other medical conditions he was unaware of, including diabetes, high blood pressure and gall stones. He was forced to step away from playing for a while and left the juke joint to be run by his sons, David (Malone), Jr. and Kenny Malone. On January 17, 1998, Junior was watching TV at the home of his common-law wife, Mildred Washington, in Holly Springs, when he died of a sudden heart attack. He was 67 years old.
Funeral services were held at Rust College in Holly Springs on January 24th and he was buried at the Kimbrough Chapel Missionary Baptist Church in his hometown of Hudsonville. Besides his partner Mildred Washington, Kimbrough left behind 36 children from various relationships.
The juke joint, Junior's Place, continued to thrive as a local music hangout and tourist attraction until April 6, 2000, when it was destroyed by a fire caused by arson. Everything inside was lost: instruments, stage equipment and original artwork by regional painters. But, the sound that was created inside the walls of the juke will always remain. Junior Kimbrough may not have experienced the grandeur of success that his friend R.L Burnside has received over the following years, but he is the acknowledged creator of the style that has sparked a whole new generation of Blues musicians.
Junior's childhood friend, Charlie Feathers, is quoted on Kimbrough's headstone, which probably brings this musical creation home. It reads: "Junior Kimbrough is the beginning and the end of all music".
Fat Possum Records
David "Junior" Kimbrough, quite possibly the most important blues guitarist of the second half of the 20th century, redefined blues. Junior's approach to music is so hugely different from anything that came before him that he ranks among the three greatest bluesmen of all: Son House, Bukka White, and Fred McDowell. An originator, Junior did more than build on certain tradition or perfect a certain style. Junior re-imagined the blues; he made a sound for himself.
If Junior's sister had been any kind of baby-sitter he might not have picked up the guitar. When Junior was too small to help his father work the fields his eldest sister stayed home with him. She was supposedly watching him the day he took his father's guitar "off the high shelf," where his father kept everything he didn't want his children fooling with. It became routine: when his father left for the fields, Junior carefully took down the guitar. He learned fast and well, well enough to teach a local white boy, Charlie Feathers, how to play.
Junior was six years old, and his sister was doing her usual bang-up job of babysitting the day he took a gallon jug of corn off the high shelf. His mother found him in an alcohol-induced coma; she thought Junior was dead. Junior's father recognized the problem and knew the solution: his daughter needed a whipping and Junior belonged in the field. After two years of high school Junior was lured into Holly Springs by a job at the John Deere dealership.
Junior couldn't remember the exact date he deliberately set out to create music but knew the reasons. He was still a young man and had gone as far as he could go at John Deere. If Junior was gonna make his mark in the world, he'd have to do it with a guitar. Up until then he'd been playing the same country blues standards, as well as the contemporary hits of Little Milton and Albert King, in the same jukes and clubs that his long-time friend and rival R.L. Burnside played. And then Junior stopped playing covers and stopped taking requests. Determined not to become just another "entertainer" or "performer," Junior realized playing covers only helped the composers or the artist who first recorded the song. He wasn't going to help anybody, ever again. From then on, Junior would only play Junior.
He might've been the first person in his family to work off the farm, but Junior never gave up his rural habits like throwing parties every Sunday night with his furniture dragged out in the yard so more people could fit. Before long Junior had to rent a one-bedroom apartment to get a break from the chaos he'd started at home. Junior's old house became more than a club. It was an entity: it was Junior's Place--and without help from a sign or telephone locals gathered on Sunday nights to drink and dance. Junior understood music, and had a gift for songwriting, and began developing the music that was first recorded in the mid-'80s for a Memphis State single.
Unfortunately, David "Junior" Kimbrough didn't release his first album until 1992, when he was 62, but when he finally made his first album, All Night Long (produced by Robert Palmer for Fat Possum Records), the world took notice. Rolling Stone was the first to acknowledge Junior and awarded the album four stars. In addition to giving his music long overdue exposure, All Night Long gave the Fat Possum label hope. Junior, for the most part, was not physically able to tour, now that he finally had the support of a record company. There were notable exceptions: a string of dates with Iggy Pop, and several tours with the Fat Possum Circus (a package deal). But the news traveled-- to hear Junior you had to go to Mississippi. Rock bands such as the Rolling Stones, Sonic Youth, and U2 made pilgrimages to Holly Springs to experience his club and hear Junior with his son Kinney Malone on drums and Garry Burnside on bass. Junior went on to record Sad Days, Lonely Nights, Most Things Haven't Worked Out and the posthumously released God Knows I Tried (all on Fat Possum).
Junior was 67 when died of heart failure on January 17, 1998 at Mildred's apartment in the Holly Springs public housing project, watching TV on her couch. Mildred Washington, his companion of 30 years, had been taking care of him. Junior Kimbrough still kept a one-room bachelor's apartment at the time of his death: immaculately clean, with nothing whatsoever on the walls or tables, no pictures, no tour posters, nothing. Junior knew what he had accomplished, and didn't need any souvenirs. In addition to the 36 children he claimed, Junior put his brand on music.
Sad Days, Lonely Nights From: roastingears
Junior Kimbrough Runs The Voodoo Down
By Wes Freeman (June 2000)
Night has already fallen on October 28, 1990, when 60-year-old David "Junior" Kimbrough sits down to play guitar for the regulars at his juke joint in Holly Springs, Mississippi. Behind him is his drummer Calvin Jackson. To his right is Little Joe Ayers, his electric bass player. He looks at the crowd and then past them. His mouth is open and he looks lost, even though he owns the place in every sense of the word. Within a few months he will have a stroke. In a year he will record his first album. In time, his son and musical heir, David Kimbrough, will be imprisoned. He will be awarded a $5000 Gibson Les Paul guitar, his most prized possession. In seven years, he will die of heart failure. But right now, Junior knows none of this; he's just getting ready to play guitar. As he begins to play, he moves his head as if he is receiving radio transmissions from deep space. He says that his songs come to him in his dreams, and listening to him play them, you can believe it. The bassist and drummer tighten up behind him, so that everybody can dance. Over their muscular, repetitive rhythm, Junior's electric guitar floats and bounces, moving at about half the speed of his rhythm section, but guiding it through his songs just the same.
His solos almost always use the same groups of notes, but they never cease to beguile the dancers. He watches them move, then turns to watch his bass player, his drummer, then back to the bass player again. He wears an expression that is delighted and perplexed, as though he has never seen a guitar before, but inexplicably knows how to play one.
The late Robert Palmer, a New York Times journalist and university instructor, produced Kimbrough's first two albums, All Night Long (1992) and Sad Days, Lonely Nights (1994). In the liner notes to All Night Long, Palmer said that "you'll hear (Junior) sing something that sounds like a pre-blues field holler while he's playing a guitar rhythm like Memphis soul music, and when the bass and drums come in on one of Junior's riffs, the music might sound like some kind of hillbilly-metal-funk that hasn't been heard yet - except around Junior's place."
"Junior's place" was an institution in the hill country of Northern Mississippi. Originally, it was his house. Kimbrough and his band, the Soul Blues Boys, would rehearse on Sunday afternoons and people just began showing up. "The people there seemed to be the disinherited, the poor, and sometimes wayward individuals looking to ease their pain from the pressures of everyday life," said Sylvester Oliver, a professor at Mississippi's Rust College. "There was a natural tendency of these people to divest themselves of phoniness and pretentiousness and let it all hang out, so to speak. There were usually more people outside engaging in merrymaking, who never entered the house and were content to listen from afar." Kimbrough's house has since burned down.
In the '70s Junior's place became a small wooden shack in the hills. In the early '90s, his reputation began to grow, first with his appearance in the documentary Deep Blues (1990) and then with the release of All Night Long, which received 4 out of 5 stars in Rolling Stone. Prior to recording All Night Long, Kimbrough moved his juke joint to an abandoned church, and there, his reputation was really made.
The band would set up in a corner of the church (there was no stage) so the dancers could have the floor. The building was decorated with surreal murals and knick-knacks, probably the closest anyone would ever get to a visual representation of Junior's mind and the subconscious that played music for him in his dreams. On the walls were homemade paintings, the products of a rural black culture. On one wall there's a painting of Oprah Winfrey as an African princess. It's bright reds and yellows make it look as if it might have been painted by Van Gogh after he mastered the velvet Elvis technique. Another painting shows a horse as it rears up and paws the air beneath a desert sun. In other paintings, African American women hold babies and bottles of perfume. A landscape shows black children running through deserts and across mountains. Grandest of all is the seascape that stretches out behind Kimbrough and his band. In the mural, alien beaches and uncharted islands frame a churning sea, and it's difficult to tell from the sky above whether it's day or night. This was where Junior held court, "his university" as Sylvester Oliver called it. Supposedly, members of the Rolling Stones once visited the place and sat in with the band. Although Junior was too nice to ever kick anyone off his "stage," the crowd apparently booed them off because they couldn't "swing the music."
"It was the only place (in the area) where it didn't matter if you were black or white," said one of the white regulars at Junior's place. "There was no tension at all."
This was the place that Kimbrough was running when he died at 67. He was with Mildred Washington, his companion of 30 years and mother to some of his 36 children, sitting on her couch and watching TV when his heart failed him.
"Junior Kimbrough still kept a one-room bachelor's apartment at the time of his death," read the liner notes from God Knows I Tried, his fifth album. "(The apartment was) immaculately clean, with nothing whatsoever on the walls or tables, no pictures, no tour posters, nothing."
Recently, his juke joint burned down, as did the houses of his bass player, Gary Burnside, and drummer, Kent Kimbrough. This adds to the mystery of the man, something Kimbrough never discouraged. He once told a story about Eli Green, a local blues musician who had a profound influence on Kimbrough. Green was a firm believer in voodoo and allegedly could throw a pack of cards in the air so that they all stuck on the ceiling. Once the cards were in place, Green could call out the name of a card, and that card would fall to the ground. Kimbrough's talent was equally inexplicable and, like the seemingly random array of images in his juke joint, seems to have no precedent. But his music is still the best bet for finding out what Kimbrough was all about.
His lyrics are simple, mostly about love and sex, drenching with an eroticism that manages to be deeply intimate without being self-conscious. He sang about what he knew, and after fathering 36 children by multiple partners, he knew sex pretty well. His music is not terribly dynamic either, although it is immensely complex. His songs are rarely built out of more than one chord (they are meant for dancing and have a deliberately hypnotic quality) but their rhythmic subtletly and freshness of vision are overwhelming. Kimbrough weaves in and out of key, layering his stock melodic phrases on top of the already dense rhythmic layers put down by the other two members of the band. Solos and vocal breaks alternate regularly, phasing past and into one another (a distinctly African musical technique) so that the listener can't remember how the song began and when it ends, the effect is often shattering. Junior's voice, high and plaintive, drips with soul and emotion.
When he spoke, which he did not do often, he was quiet and "dreamy" as one of his ex-sidemen put it. When he saw something amusing, like two of his women arguing for instance, he chuckled quietly to himself. He was fond of flipping his middle finger at people for no reason. There is video footage of him throwing a cigarette off the stage of a local blues festival. He does it with a long, slow gesture and when he finally releases the spent butt, he wears an angry expression, like he's casting out a demon.
Junior Kimbrough existed in a self-made bubble. His music seemed to rise from the dust or descend from the clouds. It existed without any help from anybody, and now that Junior's gone, it can't be explained. There was no reason for Junior Kimbrough: he came, baffled the world, and left it before anyone could catch on. Charlie Feathers, a recording artist and contemporary of Kimbrough's who was deeply influenced by his unique style, called Junior "the beginning and end of all music." This is perhaps the best way to describe a man whose songs were too small for more than one chord, but big enough to put his world inside.
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