LIGHTNIN’ SLIM
“The way I used to get Lightnin’ Slim to cut blues was this. Two or three days before I’d call him for a session I’d give his woman $25 to give him hell.”
“The way I used to get Lightnin’ Slim to cut blues was this. Two or three days before I’d call him for a session I’d give his woman $25 to give him hell. If at the session he really sang the blues, because that woman had given them to him, I’d give her another $25. If she really made a good job of it, I’d give her the prettiest dress she’d ever seen on top of that!”
Thus former Excello Records producer Jay D. Miller remembered his favorite blues artist in a 1969 conversation with British journalist Mike Leadbitter. Unsuspecting Lightnin’ Slim must have caught a lot of hell down in Louisiana, because “he really sang the blues” record after record on Excello. Titles like “I’m Leavin’ You Baby,” “Cool Down Baby,” “Mind Your Own Business,” “I’m Warning You Baby,” “Don’t Mistreat Me Baby,” “You Give Me the Blues,” “Have Mercy on Me Baby,” and “Can’t Live This Life No More” indicate that Miller’s tricks must have been working. Singing about woman troubles, or just plain bad luck, Otis “Lightnin’ Slim” Hicks became Exello’s most prolific blues artist and gained an international reputation as one of the foremost practitioners of true down-home blues.
