Lucille Bogan-The Raunchy, the funny and forgotten Blues Singer

I did some research on banned books and movies recently. This lead me to discover a century of banned media. Century.

There were banned rock songs in the 1950s and there were blues songs that were banned. There were records sold underground that people didn’t know to ban. We’re not talking bootlegs of concerts, these were raunchy or loud or fast in tempo. In the very early days of recorded music, the Okeh record label recorded blues and country songs. They also recorded “party” records. These were the novelty songs that were also lewd. Lucille Bogan recorded her share of these records.

“Jump Steady Daddy” is romantic. The woman can sing and with modern updating technology, she sounds really talented. I’ve read she was the third biggest blues singer of the 1920s behind Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith. Bessie Smith had a box set of recordings that was released to critical acclaim in the 1990s! There are plays about a a Rainey.

Lucille Bogan is more difficult to find. Perhaps it’s because of her “party” songs. She also recorded under the name Bessie Jackson. These recordings were the bigger sellers of the time.

If you find songs like “Coffee Grind Blues,” “Walking Blues” “I’m as Tired As Can Be,” you’ll hear 1920s blues. Guitar and wailing singing. She did songs about drinking and smoking and pawn shops. These are things that the average person had dealings with in the difficult years of the Depression of the 1930s.

She also did “Shave ‘Em Dry.” In the lyrics you will find what area of the body she is shaving. I read somewhere she had to do multiple takes because she kept laughing. “Pot Hound Blues” the title says it all.

Her last recording was in 1935 according to www.Americanbluesscene.com. Her contracts lapsed and she managed her son’s blues band. She died in 1948 at around 51 years old. Her birth date was disputed so the actual age is disputed. She has a simple gravestone with her name, years alive and the line “Classic Blues Singer.”

On the plus side she isn’t totally forgotten. She was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. James McWhorter told me about her in his book, 9 Nasty Words.”