Interview with RL Burnside
 
  

Mat: Alright, so, um, what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna introduce myself, then I’m gonna do something, I’m gonna talk about you to introduce you for a minute.

Okay.

Mat: Alright. Let’s see what we got here. You all set, Dave?

Dave: Yeah, I’m all set.

Mat: Okay. Hey, this is Mat Hall, and you’re listening to Joe’s Blue Plate Special. Today we’re talking with Fat Possum and Epitaph recording artist and living blues legend, R.L. Burnside. We’ve also got Kenny Brown, Cedric Burnside and Fat Possum recording artist Robert Cajun in the room hangin’ out. And, so here we go. R.L. Burnside is 73 years old and has been playing the blues for most of his life. He honed his craft playing with legends like Muddy Water and Fred McDowell in the middle of the century. Supporting himself and his family as a farmer in the Mississippi hill country, R.L. satisfied his blues jones by playing local juke joints and the occasional tour when he could afford it. A few years ago, after signing to Fat Possum Records, he released the critically acclaimed "An Ass Pocket of Whiskey" with the John Spencer Blues Explosion as his backing band. With the release of this record, R.L. finally received recognition on a worldwide level as one of the last true blues men recording today. R.L., thanks for coming to the show tonight.

RL: Very proud to be here.

Mat: Very cool. The "Ass Pocket of Whiskey" record seemed to bring your music in front of a whole new type of fan.

RL: Yeah, I think it brought more young people coming to the show, you know, than was. ‘Cause people ________________ may didn’t like that before that, you know.

Mat: Was that pretty weird to adjust to, you know, I think a lot of the fans are people like myself, white college students that may have been introduced to blues by you in the first place. Was it kind of weird after all these years?

RL: Yeah, that’s right . That’s what I’m proud of.

Mat: Like I said, for many of your fans, your music was their first experience of the blues.

RL: Yeah, that’s right.

Mat: ...and why do you think that your music has made an impression on these kids?

RL: Well, I believe, well, see, the blues out of existence there for a while, and the rock ‘n roll and stuff, you know, disco and stuff came in there, but now people begin to realize that the blues is the roots of all the music, that’s where it all started from and they just now beginning to realize it.

Mat: Yeah, I think people are really beginning to appreciate it with people like yourself and Robert, you know, finally starting to get some real recognition. What a lot of people know as the blues is the Chicago...

RL: Yeah.

Mat: ...the real slick Chicago kind of sound, and you’re not doing anything like that.

RL: No, no, just a Mississippi boy.

Mat: Right. You think that just comes from the experiences that you’ve been through and stuff like that?

RL: Yeah, I think so. Just some, we play by feeling, you know, what our music first started off at.

Mat: You know, going along the lines of people considering you one of the last real blues players out there making authentic blues music, if that’s true, then what do you think the future of blues music is gonna be?

RL: Well, it should be good.

Mat: Should be good?

RL: Should be good.

Mat: Alright. Well, that sounds good, man. So it must be kind of a shock, how are you dealing with the exposure that you’re getting now. You got a video on MTV. Did you ever think you’d see yourself on MTV?

RL: Well, yeah, no, I ain’t got a chance to see it yet, but they say I’m on there, but I haven’t a chance to see. I hadn’t saw it yet. But...

Everybody, mom said you Burnside _______________ also the drummer.

You guys ain’t the first to ask have we saw our own video. Everybody’s been asking us, like, man, you guys’ video is good, it’s tight. We ain’t never saw it, you know. We ain’t never saw it.

Mat: Is it something you’d be interested in checking out?

Yeah, I mean, I’m looking forward to seeing the _____________, they said it’s so good, I want to see it, you know? But we ain’t saw it. Ken ain’t never saw it. Big Daddy ain’t never saw it. It’s just like, man. Pretty good, I guess.

Mat: RL, spirituality and religion is something that the blues has been steeped in...

RL: Yeah.

Mat: ...since it’s come up. What’s your feelings on spirituality and stuff like that in your music?

RL: Well, the first music I played was spiritual. The first I played on guitar. When I was young, you know, I sang __________________________. I never went out in the public, you know, much, but that’s what I learned how to play first. ____________ and I went to blues.

Mat: Do you find yourself writing about spirituality? As far as the music that you write and stuff like that, what do you find yourself liking to write?

RL: Well, the Lord give you title to play the blues, just like you do spiritual, you know, he spare you to do that. If it wasn’t for him, you couldn’t do none of it.

Mat: That’s the truth. That’s the truth. Obviously you’ve got Cedric here playing with you and who’s been playing with you for a few years now. Are you happy about incorporating your family into your music?

RL: Oh, yeah, that’s great. I’m glad to see him, you know, playin’ the blues.

Mat: This might be the future of blues right here that we’re talking about.

RL: It might be. That could be right.

Mat: And the rest of your family I know you’ve got a real large family. How have they responded to...

RL: Well, they in the blues.

Mat: And what about as far as the fame and stuff....you know, you’ve been recording for a long time. A lot of people don’t even know that, that you had a lot of records out before Fat Possum. But in recent years, you’ve been getting some more exposure.

RL: Yeah, I’ve been gettin’ a lot of more exposure now lately.

Mat: And has that affected the family life and stuff?

RL: Yeah, that help me make a little more, a little better livin’, you know.

Mat: We deal here at Joe’s Blue Plate Special with independent bands and people that are playing music because they love to play music and aren’t making the same kind of money that the major label artists are making and stuff like that.

RL: Yeah.

Mat: As far as the business of music goes, can you speak on that....

RL: Well, I just, I love playin’ the blues, you know, and I think, I’m trying to keep the blues going. I want the blues to pay a toll. ‘Cause they started the music, let ‘em be the endin’.

Mat: Are you listening to anything, what do you listen to?

RL: Well, I listen to some of the other music, but I like blues better. I stay with them.

Mat: So what kind of artists are you listening to right now?

RL: Well, I listen to a lot of, like Chicago-type blues and things like that, but I like them old, raw blues better.

Mat: Right, right. On your new album, "Come On In," remixed by Tom Rothrock, who’s worked with backin’ a lot of other people and throwin’ in some hip hop beats and stuff like that, what’s your feeling on rap music?

RL: Well, I like it alright now, ‘cause it start the ________________ good, but I didn’t think I was gonna like it when they sent ____________ the remake, I didn’t think I was gonna like it, but after I started listenin’ to it, I liked it alright.

Mat: Yeah, it sounds great. It’s definitely different than your other records. Cedric. playing drums in the blues band and you’re 20 years old, what are you listenin’ to these days? Are you influenced by the old blues men, or....

Cedric: Well, comin’ up, as a little kid, we didn’t have a radio or nothin’, and I listened to my granddaddy. He used to play acoustic guitar on the porch and everything, and all the grandkids would just sit out there and just listen to him play the guitar and dance from the guitar, ‘cause we didn’t have a radio, man, so I mean, I grew up just listenin’ to my granddaddy music. I mean, I’m always love blues, I lived the blues, man, for 20 years.

Listen to a lot of rap, too, now.

Cedric: Yeah, I listen to a lot of rap. I say, that’s the first music I ever heard was blues, so I gotta love it. Yeah. That’s the first music I ever heard was blues, so I mean, I gotta love blues, you know? I listen to rap, I mean, but rap is just a music that I like, you know what I’m sayin’? I like to listen to rap ‘cause a lot of my friends listen to rap, but a lot of my friends also listen to blues, you know? So I mean, it’s been a much cool. You know, I don’t care, like, what you listen to, as long as, you know, understand where everything come from, which is the blues like my granddaddy said, you doin’ good, man.

Mat: See, a lot of people, like you just said, you didn’t have a radio comin’ up and a lot of people would think that, you know, that that’s a bad thing, but I don’t think anybody has got the same kind of experience you do listenin’ to....

Cedric: No, no. Well, see, that’s what I say. I mean, people ask me this, man, do you like the blues? I mean, man, I love the blues, you know? Listen to my granddaddy like all the time. We didn’t have a radio. That’s the only thing...that was music, man, you know? We didn’t know nothin’ about other types of music but blues and _____________ played at our house right on the front porch, you know?

Mat: And that’s a real treat, that...

Cedric: That’s cool, man.

Mat: ...that most people don’t get to experience at all listening to the blues on the front porch.

Cedric: Yeah. Well, see, most people probably had like a radio, you know, to listen to what they want to listen to, you know? But I’m just saying, we didn’t have, so we just had to listen to the blues. And we loved it, man. It’s like if a radio was there, we would want to hear my granddaddy play us, to listen to the radio, ‘cause we listened to it so much, you know, on the porch.

I guess this is a question for all you guys. Has your style changed at all? I mean, since, you’ve been playing blues for a long, long time, has the style of blues, I mean, I know you went to Chicago for a little while, all those things have gotta be, you know, somewhat of an influence on you.

RL: Yeah.

??? How has your style changed throughout time?

RL: That hasn’t changed my style much. I’ve still got my same old style mostly. See a lot of the blues, they call it Chicago blues, 90% of the people that play the blues in Chicago are from Mississippi.

??? They just make more money.

RL: Yeah. When they move up to Chicago, they call ‘em Chicago blues, but the blues started in Mississippi.

??? Only difference that RL does is like, you know, started on acoustic....

RL: Yeah.

??? ....now using an electric guitar and drums.

RL: Yeah, electric.

??? We didn’t ever have a drummer a long time until Calvin and Cedric, you know, got to playing.

Mat: Now, Kenny, how did you come up playing with RL? I know that’s a pretty interesting story.

Kenny: Yeah, I met him in about ‘71, ‘72, at a little picnic-type thing with a rock band playing. RL was the opening act, and I met him and told him I played guitar and liked what he was doing. He said, come on down to the house. Started going out there about 2, 3 days a week and then on the weekends, and, you know, we’d set up from dark ‘till midnight and play, you know.

???: Now, where was this?

Kenny: It was in north Mississippi.

RL: North of Mississippi.

Kenny: Yeah, up in Tate County, right on the edge of Tate County.

Mat: It must have been pretty weird for you. How did people respond to you initially playing with RL? You probably were the only white dude in miles...

Kenny: Most of the times I was, you know. I learned when I was a kid from Joe Callica, who’s on a record with RL back years ago, but I’d be the only white person there, but it wasn’t any problem, you know, I mean...

Mat: People took to you fine?

Kenny: Yeah, yeah, as long as you could play, you know.

Mat: It’s all that Maters.

Kenny: You know, and you didn’t start no trouble, you know, it wasn’t no problem at all.

??? About the music then, huh?

Kenny: Yeah, but I mean, you know, like I’d grown around black people. Mississippi they say a lot of racial, and I’m sure it is, but we all good friends and there ain’t that kind of thing with us. I grew up like that, you know.

??? I think is, you know, there’s a little racism anyway you go, you know what I’m sayin’? It’s just not just one particular state, Mississippi.

Kenny: What I was gettin’ at, Mississippi ain’t like all the movies you see.

??? Yeah, that’s what I said. A lot of people ask me, they were like, man, I watch a lot of movies, and they said bad things about Mississippi, I’m scared to come.

Kenny: Scared to come to Mississippi.

??? That’s movies, man.

Kenny: They think everybody got a shotgun in the truck window or something.

??? They have to put what they want to put on the movie in order to get paid, you know what I’m sayin’. All the movies, Mississippi ain’t nothin’ like the movies, you know what I’m sayin’?

??? Tell me what it’s about. I’ve never been there.

??? I mean, you come down, my man, in the part of Mississippi I stay in, it’s just the friendliest people you ever want to meet. You walk up in the club, people offer you moonshine, women and men, you have five or six bottles in your face when you enter the door, ready to get drunk, man. All they want to do is dance and have fun.

Mat: And I bet the cooking’s pretty good, huh?

??? Yeah, it’s pretty cool, yeah. It’s pretty cool, man. A lot of experience in the kitchen.

??? Yeah, but Mississippi is a good place, man. You guys ever get the chance, come down, my man, check us out.

Mat: You’ve been playing for a long time, RL, and you’ve crisscrossed the country and have been to Europe and all over the world really. How is playing changed, just playing different venues with, I guess what we’re talking about now, like race relations and stuff like that, you’ve had to have seen all that stuff, you know, on a....

RL: Yeah, where I play at now, people look like they seem to enjoy it, you know? They look like they learnin’ to, gettin’ back to the music now, you know, to the blues.

??? ________ too long a guy from Australia and we went over there, John Spencer Blues Explosion, and a lot of people was over there, Taj Mahal, and the first day we went over there it was raining, and it was like I guess 10,000 people then on the first day, and the second day, man, we played it was raining even badder and harder, and the second day was like 13,000 people, and everybody was like, man, we comin’ in, I mean, that ain’t gonna stop us from listening to the blues, we love it. So they didn’t stop. They came bare feet, man, and it was all good.

RL: Hanging there like a dirty sheet.

Mat: After playing all these years, and now you’re giggin’ for the new records and stuff, what gets you excited to play?

RL: Well, I like when the people enjoy it, you know, that more people comin’ listenin’ to blues, and that make me feel good.

Mat: Right.

??? Especially when the Dead Presidents come.

RL: Yeah. ‘Cause if you want to have some fun in this man land, you got to let Jackson and Lincoln start shakin’ hands.

??? It’s like, man, we so used to playin’ at jug joints and everything ‘till, you know, we so used to seein’ everybody just dance and jam to when we do a __________ and don’t nobody just, you know, don’t nobody dance, they just sit there and clap, you know, that kind of make us feel uneasy ‘cause we so used to playin’ for people that, you know, love to shake their boody, you know what I’m sayin’?

??? There aren’t too many shows like that that you don’t get up and dance.

??? No. Yeah, they get up and dance just about everywhere we play. Some places we play they just sit there, you know. When we get through playin’, they clap. Like, man, that’s kinda uneasy, ‘cause we so used to people jammin’.

RL: Yeah, see, you’re supposed to shake what you brought with ya.

??? Shake what your momma gave.

??? Now, do you tell them to shake their boody, I mean, do you try to get the crowd moving?

??? We’ll stand up there, get on the mike and say, you know, it’ll be good if you guys dance. We like when you guys dance. But of course, I mean, some places the owner don’t be wantin’ them to get up on the floor and dance no way.

??? Really?

??? Yeah. Some places they don’t.

??? Where is that, Kansas or somewhere?

??? They don’t allow dancin’.

RL: Signs on the seat, on the table, you know, no dancin’.

??? That was in Maryland or outside of D.C. somewhere there.

??? Yeah. Yeah, and they had little cards on the table, "Please, No Dancing," and stuff, and one girl, she just couldn’t stand it. She got up and danced and they had to come two, three times to ask her to sit down.

??? And that place we played at in Philadelphia, ____________________, there was no dancin’ in there.

??? There ain’t many places like htat.

??? That’s what I’m sayin’. We don’t play many, but I mean, even some places that we played, you know, the crowd be a little slow about gettin’ up, doin’ their thing, you know...

RL: That let you know the people enjoy it more when they do that, you know.

??? ...so we have to boost them up and tell them. We have to tell them, man.

??? We have played for 10,000 people though, and people in the front be dancing, and I’ve looked all the way to the back...

??? Nobody move.

??? ...they’d be dancin’ back there. People dancin’ all the way in the back.

Mat: Well, I guess we’ll finish up with this again with the experience that you’ve had through all your years playing. If you could give some advice to people coming up that want to play music as a living, like you’ve been able to carry through your life, what kind of advice would you give to those people?

RL: I’d tell them to stay with the blues, keep the blues alive.

Mat: Keep the blues alive.

RL: ‘Cause that’s the root to all the music.

Mat: Alright.

??? Get ‘em down, stick ‘em up.

RL: Say you going to hang like a dirty shirt, eh? What do you want to do, shake what they brought with ‘em?

??? Oh, yeah, shake with they brought with ‘em, yeah.

??? Shake what your momma gave ya.

Robert: Yeah. Yeah, shake what your momma gave ya.

Mat: That’s what I’m talkin’ about. That’s Robert Cage. Robert, you’re also on Fat Possum Records and you’ve been touring with these guys, and I think a lot of the things that we’ve said about RL is true for you.

Robert: Yeah, about the same, yeah. Yeah.

Mat: How you feelin’ about the recognition that you’ve gotten as of like the last five years or so? Has it changed....

Robert: No, it hasn’t changed. I started with blues and ending up with it, you know. Yeah, we gonna stick with the blues, you know. That’s what I was raised up on, blues. Yeah.

Mat: Alright. RL, you’ve said that you’ve got maybe five years left, is that what you’re thinkin’ now?

RL: Well, if the Lord spare me, you know, I keep my health ____________ I’m gonna keep playin’ blues for a few more years.

Mat: What are you gonna do when you’re done?

RL: Well, if I live on a while, I just retire, you know, and go fishin’ and lay back and rest or somethin’, you know. ‘Cause I know when you...see, a lot of people say, what is the blues? They don’t know why people have ‘em, but you want some and you ain’t got no money to get it, you got the blues right there. Or you pull up to your house one night __________________ pull up to your house one night and get out your car and you meet the rooster comin’ out of the yard. She here, she here, you’re in trouble then. __________ done took your woman and gone.

??? Hungry, ain’t got no food, __________ blues. You on the highway, run out of gas.

RL: That’s right.

??? That’s the blues.

Mat: But you’re still gonna play when you’re retired, right?

RL: Oh, yeah. Have to try to do it.

Mat: Can’t stop.

??? You sit out there on the boat when you’re fishin’.

RL: Yeah, I try to do something like that, you know. Maybe they come on up in the boat, maybe.

Mat: So the cats are sayin’ the same things ______________ as the roosters now?

RL: Yeah.

Mat: That’s alright, man.

??? You guys got anything else you really want to tell folks out there, you really want to make ‘em know about the blues, anything like that?

??? Only thing I got to say is, keep listenin’ to the blues and shake what your momma gave ya.

??? I think that’s the message of the night here.

Kenny: Well, I love the blues and I’d like to see it continue, yeah. Um-hm.

??? All day long.

Kenny: Yeah, yeah.

Mat: You fellows gonna tell the crowd tonight that they gotta shake it a little bit?

??? Oh yeah.

??? You got to do the hokey-pokey.

??? Shake it all about.

Mat: Got any last words?

??? Hope people keep comin’ to the shows and keep buyin’ our records and tell your friends about ‘em. Hope you enjoy ‘em.

RL: That’ll help a lot. That’ll be a lot of good favor.

Mat: Well, it has been a pleasure today talking with RL Burnside and Robert Cage and Kenny Brown and Cedric Burnside, a few guys that are living embodiment of the blues here, even 20-year-old Cedric Brown, who’s got it....

??? Burnside.

Mat: Ah, dude. We’ll edit that out.

??? Grandson, not my son.

Mat: Just a little bit of that whiskey’s enough for me to... So you gotta get a little excited when you’re sittin’ in a room with these guys here. It’s....

??? We so cool, he just made a mistake. He ain’t been around cool people like this in a long time.

Mat: That’s true. That’s true.

RL: Uncle Jim will do the talk then, see?

Mat: Yeah, speaking from Uncle Jim’s mouth. It’s been a pleasure having you guys here. Thank you for being on Joe’s Blue Plate Special.

RL: We really proud to do it.

Mat: Very cool. This has been Mat Hall and Dave Corey with....

??? What’s the name of you guys?

Mat: We’re out of school. We’re going to colleges all over the country.

??? Oh, okay.

Mat: Yeah, this is gonna be heard by...

??? ...out of college.

Mat: Yeah.

Dave: I go to C.U.

??? But the radio shows plays in a lot of different...

Dave: Yeah, this goes all over the country. It even goes up into Canada a little bit, so you guys will be, you’ll be touring up in the freezin’ states....

??? Yeah, we already been there this year.

Cedric: Comin’ from Cedric Burnside, C.U., you guys stay safe and keep listenin’ to the blues.

Mat: Very cool. Very cool. Thank you guys for hanging out.

RL: Alright. You’re welcome. We plan to do it.

Mat: What you guys gonna do between now and the show?

??? Probably smoke a little weed, get high. Drink some beer, think about the ladies we gonna see tonight.

??? Um-hm, um-hm.

Mat: Man, you gotta walk around this town, you gotta walk. I’m talkin’, Boulder brings ‘em in to go to that school, and they are so fine, so fine. Walk through that campus.

??? Man, Denver wasn’t bad. They were just so friendly down there.

??? Denver wasn’t bad. But I’m lookin’ forward to lookin’ at ‘em here....this a big university.

Mat: They’re better here. They’re better here. We got 25,000. Half of them are female and they are from around the country, the hottest women. I walk around campus, and I tell you...

??? That man knows.

??? What is it?

??? We gotta play good enough to get a little under yonder. When I say under yonder, under those skirts.

??? Yeah, I didn’t want to say that. Oh, damn, I didn’t want to say that.

Mat: The door’s already open?

??? Don’t think so.

??? Thanks a lot, guys.