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| Me and Big Joe by Michael Bloomfield page 3 |
| Big Joe was getting drunk at a table with some older, heavy-set black women. After Sonny Boy�s last set he came up to me and said, �Michael, there�s some real fine leg sittin� here.�
Now, besides being of advanced years, these women had a combined weight of several tons, and didn�t fit my idea of good leg at all. But as an inducement to stick around and maybe go home with one or two of these women, Joe said, �These ladies have their womanhoods way up high on their bellies.� Considering their weight, I could see how that might be true, but I told him, �Joe, I don�t believe this is something I want to get into�I think we�d best head back to Chicago.� Joe got pretty irascible at this, but finally agreed to go, and we made it on home all right. �Drive me down by Gary,� Joe said one day, �and I�ll carry you to see LIGHTNIN� HOPKINS�him an� me is old, old friends.� So Joe and I and Charlie Musselwhite and Roy Ruby, who later for a time played bass with Steve Miller, climbed into Roy�s car and headed east to Indiana. Actually, we had to go out beyond Gary, into the countryside. where eventually we came to a barbeque pit, or roadhouse. This kind of place was also known as a barrelhouse or chockhouse, and seems to have pretty much disappeared from the North, and maybe from the South, too. The roadhouse was run by an older black couple and consisted of a barbeque pit in front and a large bare room in back. This back room was heated only by body heat�when there were enough people in the room, the place got warm. And that night it was hot. Joe had gotten himself a center seat and was buying drinks and ordering people around when the opening act, J.B. LENOIR AND HIS BIG BAND, came on. J.B. was a short man in a zebra-striped coat that hung down low behind him. He had straight hair, but it wasn�t up in a high process, it was slicked down flat against his head, He looked a little like a seal. The band backing him featured three horn players of such advanced stages of age and inebriation that they had to lean against one another to avoid collapse. J.B. played guitar and sang through a microphone on a rack around his neck. He had a high, almost feminine voice and was a fine singer. He danced through the crowd as he played and sang, and Joe sat nodding his approval�he liked J.B. quite a bit. Then old Lightning came on, and he was as sly and slick and devilish as a man could be. He had a real high conk on his head and wore black, wraparound shades. He had only a drummer behind him, and when the blue lights hit that conk�man, that was all she wrote. When the set ended Joe went over to Lightning to say hello, but before he could get a word out Lightning said, �What are you doing down here? I�m the star of this show, you know.� �I know you the star,� Joe replied, �and we don�t mean no trouble. I carried these white boys here down to see you, and I just wanted to pay some respects.� So Lightning mellowed and bought Joe a drink, but that was a mistake Continued on page 4. |
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