Junior Kimbrough - All Night Long

David "Junior" Kimbrough (b. July 28, 1930), the most important and influential blues guitarist of the last decade of the 20th century, redefined the Blues! Junior's approach to music is hugely different from anything that came before him! An originator, Junior did more than build on certain tradition or perfect a certain style. Yes, Junior re-imagined the Blues! He made a sound for himself, a whole music field too!

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 still a young man when he 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... At those years, one thing was for sure. Junior knew music, and he had a gift for songwriting... The rest is history (about his discography you have to wait until the next post).

Junior was 67 years old 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. He put his brand on the music worldwide!

Just listen the great Bluesman in the song which is titled "All Night Long". Enjoy it!