My Rough and Rowdy Ways, Vol. 2 features 23 songs from the '30s about badmen and hellraisers, by artists ranging from legends like
Uncle Dave Macon,
Mississippi John Hurt, and
Big Bill Broonzy to obscure music pioneers like George Reneau and groups like the Haywood County Ramblers. The mix of white, country, and black, blues artists is one of the better in this series, the music meshing together to form a kind of audio panorama of story-songs dealing with life on the far side of law and order -- "Otto Wood the Bandit" by the Carolina Buddies, (aka Odell Smith [fiddle] and Norman Woodlief [guitar]), segues into
Mississippi John Hurt's "Frankie," followed by
Uncle Dave Macon's rip-roaring banjo workout "Railroadin' and Gamblin'" (anyone seeking a track that defines
Macon's claw-hammer style of banjo playing need look no further than this cut). Among the too little heard bluesmen featured here are Sloppy Henry ("Canned Heat Blues") and Peg Leg Howell ("Skin Game Blues"), who also plays on Henry's cut, and
Robert Wilkins, whose "Old Jim Canan's" features a superb guitar duet between the singer and Little Son Joe, later the husband of
Memphis Minnie. Country highlights include Georgia based fiddle wildman
Earl Johnson ("Nobody's Business") and George Reneau's "Jesse James," which features singing by future star crooner
Gene Austin. Yazoo has done a generally good job of remastering these cuts, so the sound on most of it (David Miller's "That Bad Man Stackolee" and
Uncle Dave Macon's "Late Last Night When Willie Come Home" are the big exceptions) holds together at a decent volume without any excessive artificial processing or distracting noise. The only drawback is the booklet, which is extremely confusing, since it refers extensively to artists and material on
Vol. 1 of this collection, a separate CD. ~ Bruce Eder