Word: juking
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Inside, the club has a bizarre kind of postmodern juke joint vibe, complete with Southern primitivist folk art and a portrait of Tigrett's Afro-coifed guru, Sai Baba, beaming angelically from above the stage. The ceiling is paneled with the faces of Blues legends carved in relief, their plaster countenances staring placidly down at this whole scene. Boston Phoenix writer and Crimson alum Gary Susman '89 quips, "You almost expect them to start singing, like in the 'Disney Hall of Presidents.'" Tonight, there's also a video camera on the ceiling to collect footage for the upcoming House...
...folks have something good going. It looks like their hearts are even in the right place, notwithstanding the impending Hanes jihad of club t-shirts. Sure, these people are funneling megabucks into this project and have a retail clothing division, and this club bears no resemblance to an actual juke joint. But, the way I see it, any force of nature or entrepreneurial insight that brings the blues to Harvard Square is a good thing. And besides, I live across the street from this bar, so I'll like it sooner or later, in this case sooner...
...fare will at first seem unfamiliar--even alien--to regulars, and it just won't be the same without Tommy's with-it juke box and signature formica tables...
...that means these 50 sides are some definitive blues: great blues, in the great tradition. Elmore James, who was born in Mississippi in 1918 and died in Chicago in 1963, led the archetypal bluesman's life: he rambled around the Delta with Robert Johnson in the '30s, played juke joints in the '40s, had a couple of R.-and-B.-chart hits in the early '50s, cut some fierce sides in the late '50s and early '60s (collected here in all their home-fried glory), then passed on from the accumulated effects of road life and drink before his legend...
SOUTHSIDE JOHNNY AND THE ASBURY JUKES: BETTER DAYS (Impact). Juke-joint Nirvana, with Southside smoking his way through 11 smash tunes, mostly written by Little Steven Van Zandt, and holding his own with some heavy company, including Jon Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen. When Springsteen joins Johnny and Little Steven to sing It's Been a Long Time, you can hear friendship recalled and solidified -- and a touch of history being made...