SOUTH MEMPHIS STRING BAND - HOME SWEET HOME (LP)

South Memphis String Band Home Sweet Home On Vinyl LP

When Luther Dickinson, Alvin Youngblood Hart and Jimbo Mathus got together to make music, it certainly wasn't out of commercial consideration. This troika of roots-imbued musical pros coalesced through a shared vision and consuming passion for the music of their forebears, most notably the Mississippi Sheiks, Memphis Jug Band, Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers and other practioners of pre-blues era roots sounds.

Home Sweet Home, their first album, showcases their passion for the old timey tradition that is underscored by the group's name. South Memphis is that rough and tumble area of the Bluff City extending from downtown to the Mississippi border and beyond. It's where Stax Records as well as hundreds of churches thrived. The sacred and profane, holy rolling and dice rolling, were cheek by jowl in old South Memphis and its modern day namesake reflects that ecumenicism quite brilliantly. For Luther, Alvin and Jimbo, South Memphis is more of a musical state of mind than a specific geographical location.

They've been called a "regional roots music supergroup" but the alliance of Dickinson (North Mississippi Allstars, the Black Crowes), Hart and Mathus (Squirrel Nut Zippers) is more like three good friends just putting down in a very traditional way.

South Memphis String Band Home Sweet Home Track Listing

1.  Jesse James
2.  Deep Blue Sea
3.  Old Hen
4.  Worry 'bout Your Own Backyard
5.  Things Is 'bout Coming My Way
6.  Let Your Light Shine On Me
7.  The Carrier Line
8.  Bloody Bill
9.  Eighteen Hammers
10. Bootlegger's Blues
11. Dixie Darling
12. Home Sweet Home