Member Since: 21/12/2005
Band Website: www.DownHomeRadioShow.com
Band Members: Eli Smith; banjo, guitar, harmonica, fiddle. I play solo but often play together with 1, 2 or 3 other people from a grab bag of zealots.
Influences: Music: Roscoe Holcomb, Virgil Anderson, Frank Proffit, Gus Cannon, Frank Blevins, Doug and Jack Wallin, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, Gaither Carlton, Mississippi John Hurt, Woody Guthrie, Hobart Smith, Blind Boy Fuller, Emry Arthur, Ramlin' Jack Elliott, Riley Puckett, W.M. Stepp, Rufus Crisp, Clarence Ashley, David "Honeyboy" Edwards, Sid Hemphill, Alec Askew, Will Head and Lucius Smith, Josh Thomas, Paul Clayton, Jelly Roll Morton, Victoria Spivey, Lonnie Johnson, Mike Seeger / NLCR, Grayson and Whittier, Rufus Crisp, Burnett and Rutherford, Lucius Curtis and Willie Ford, Guy Carawan, Jim Garland, Jody Stecher, Samantha Bumgarner, Banjo Bill Cornett, Wade Ward, Big Bill Broonzy, Leadbelly, Mance Lipscomb, Golden Gate Quartet, Old & In The Way, Bill and Charlie Monroe, Delmore Brothers, Frank Stokes, Stanley Brothers, Crap Eye, Memphis Jug band, Nashville Washboard Band, Henry Thomas, Washington Phillips, Dock Boggs, Furry Lewis, Joe Hickerson, Alan Lomax, Henrietta Yurchenco, Archie Green, Bob Dylan, Dave Van Ronk, Doc Watson, Jimmie Rodgers, John Fahey, Daniel Jatta, Public Enemy, Immortal Technique, Otis Brothers / Pat Conte, Charlie Patton, Abe Mandel, Harry Smith stuff, among many others. I also like music from all other parts of the world such as gamelan music from Indonesia, George Sibanda is great from Zimbabwe, sapeh lute music from Sarawak Borneo, Malaysia, lots of Central Asian music. Basically check out the Nonesuch Explorer Series, PAN Records and the Secret Museum of Mankind on Yazoo. Also check out internet archives of Pat Conte's old radio show on WFMU, and of course the Lomax series on Rounder .
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I also check out visual art/films by Bill Traylor, Harry Smith, Thomas Hart Benton, Lotte Reiniger, Jan Svenkmeyer. Wild Style is a great folk music/art movie.
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Books: Beating Back by Al Jennings. You Can't Win by Jack Black, The Trouble With Music by Mat Callahan, Dalhgren and Equinox by Sam Delany, The Western Lands by William Burroughs, My Life by Leon Trotsky, Agents of Repression by Ward Churchill and James Vanderwall, Assata by Assata Shakur, American Folk Music and Leftwing Politics by Richard A. Reuss, The World Don't Owe Me Nothin' By David "Honeyboy" Edwards, Charles Seeger: A Life in American Music by Ann. M. Pescatello, Notebook of a 60's Lawyer and Che Guevara and the FBI by Michael S. Smith, On A Slow Train Through Arkansas by Thos. W. Jackson. Autobiography of Big Bill Broonzy, I Say Me For A Parable by Mance Lipscomb/Glen Alyn, The Society of the Spectable by Guy Debord, The Politics of Heroin by Al McCoy, Making People's Music by Peter Goldsmith, Autobiography of Malcolm X, Around the World in 80 Years by Henrietta Yurchenco, Joe Gould's Secret, Gilgamesh. So many more.
Sounds Like: Woody Wachtel
Type of Label: Major