Smoky who?

While Baton Rouge’s blues traditions are often discussed among local music lovers and amateur folklorists, a majority of the enormously talented individuals who have made music here have been all but forgotten as the city strives to become more cutting edge and technologically advanced.

That being said, it is easy for music lovers both young and old to remain blissfully unaware of just how impressive and prolific the wellspring of local talent has been over the years.

One such man is Smoky Babe (born Robert Brown), whose entire recording career was comprised of two sessions with Harry Oster, a musicologist and former LSU professor. Around 1960, Oster asked blues man Robert Pete Williams for leads on unheralded local talent and was brought to Scotlandville where Smoky was an informal street performer of sorts. I can now thank that twist of fate for the hours that I’ve spent engrossed in these few recordings, the only ones available since Smoky’s death in 1975.

Despite having been way into old blues recordings for many years before I moved to the area, I had only heard of Smoky Babe two months ago. I was immediately taken by the conviction and urgency in his voice, which to me was instantly as expressive and visceral as any of the blues legends I listened to every day. I heard the jumping and driving boogie guitar rhythms of Lightnin’ Hopkins and a swagger and delivery which was reminiscent of a young Muddy Waters at his rawest.

The timing of my new found interest could not have been any better, since Arhoolie Records has announced the release of an album of previously unheard Smoky Babe recordings due July 29.

As I listen to the preview clips of the tracks on the album, I wonder what the man would think if he knew I was sitting here at my laptop in the bustling modern incarnation of Baton Rouge, completely knocked out by songs that even his contemporaries might never have heard.

Hear “Bad Whiskey” by Smoky Babe