Various Artists - Drug Songs - High And Low (1917 - 1944)

Listeners under the impression that drug music began with "White Rabbit" and ended with "White Lines" would be wise to pick up the first and best volume in the German Trikont label's excellent Flashbacks series -- compiling 25 jazz, blues, and vocal cuts from the first-half of the 20th century, the set documents World War II-era vice and sin at its finest, deftly mixing radio hits with utter obscurities. The songs range from the benign (Gene Krupa's "Feeling High and Happy") to the explicit (the Memphis Jug Band's "Cocaine Habit Blues"), and while some of the selections are clearly reaching to justify their thematic inclusion -- Bukka White's immortal "Fixin' to Die Blues" almost certainly has nothing to do with "fixing" in the junkie lexicon sense of the term -- the pacing and sequencing are dead-on, and even novelty throwaways like Harry "The Hipster" Gibson's "Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine?" stand up to repeated listening in this context. Excellent remastering and liner notes (in both English and German) round out the package

Tracklist:

01 The Cat Is High - The Ink Spots
02 Junker's Blues - Champion Jack Dupree
03 Who Put The Benzedrine In Mrs. Murphys Ovaltine - Harry 'The Hipster' Gibson
04 Don't You Make Me High - Blue Lu Barker
05 I'm Wild About My Stuff - Kansas Joe and Memphis Minnie
06 You're A Viper - Stuff Smith & His Onyx Club Boys
07 Selling That Stuff - McKinney Cotton Pickers
09 Moonshine Man Blues - Peter Cleighton with Blind John Davis
10 Cigarettes, Cigars - Florence Desmond
11 Minnie The Moochers Wedding Day - Mills Blue Rhythm Band
12 The Ghost Of Smokey Joe - Cab Calloway
13 Let's Have Another Cup Of Coffee - Waring's Pennsylvanians
14 Dope Head Blues - Victoria Spivey & Lonnie Johnson
15 Wacky Dust - Ella Fitzgerald with Chick Webb & His Orchestra
16 Fixin' To Die Blues - Bukka White
17 Cocaine Habit Blues - Memphis Jug Band
18 Reefer Man - Baron Lee & The Blue Rhythm Band
19 Cocaine - Dick Justice
20 Jake Walk Papa - Asa Martin
21 Kickin' The Gong Around - Louis Armstrong
22 The Candy Man - Rosetta Howard & The Harlem Hamfats
23 Repeal The Blues - Ray Noble & The New Mayfair Orchestra
24 Feeling High And Happy - Gene Krupa & His Orchestra
25 Knockin' Myself Out - Jean Brady & Big Bill Broonzy
26 Smoke Clouds - Herbert Payne


Download Link - Mediafire