| 1. Babe | 2:46 |
| 2. Most Beautiful Woman | 3:43 |
| 3. Get Out Of My Life | 3:39 |
| 4. Keep What I Got | 4:17 |
| 5. Shake Your Moneymaker | 2:33 |
| 6. Lookin' Good | 3:15 |
| 7. Mellow Down Easy | 3:40 |
| 8. Calling All Ducks | 2:58 |
| 9. Love Me Baby | 4:23 |
| 10. You Were Wrong | 3:59 |
| 11. I'll Kick Your Booty | 3:30 |
| 12. You Never Know | 3:48 |
| 13. I've Been Abused | 2:19 |
| 14. One Way Out | 2:18 |
| 15. Jump The Boogie | 3:19 |
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Bassist, vocalist, and bandleader Wesley Jefferson has been a stalwart of the Clarksdale blues scene since the mid-1960s. He was born in Roundaway in Coahoma County on March 23, 1944, the oldest boy of thirteen children. As a youth he picked and chopped cotton, plowed with mules and later with a tractor, and lived in extreme poverty. He recalls being influenced by his grandfather, Claude Jefferson, who played guitar at his home in Clarksdale. He also furtively listened to records by “deep blues” artists at a juke joint run by his mother “way out in the field,” where they sold catfish and moonshine made by his stepfather. Local musicians who he saw playing at small venues in the country included the one-man-band “Popeye,” guitarist Ernest Roy—“the best guitarist I ever seen,” and the band led by Tutwiler’s Lee Kizart, who hauled his piano from gig to gig.
Jefferson first played blues on a diddley bow on the wall of his house, and was first able to buy a guitar after he moved to Memphis to work around age 18. He soon moved on to drums, and began playing in Memphis juke joints and house parties. After several years he returned to the Clarksdale region, where he found work as a mechanic on Hopson Plantation, a job he held for 22 years. He soon formed his first band, playing drums behind guitarist/vocalist David Porter and bassist “A.C.” at Smitty’s Red Top Lounge in Clarksdale. The band lasted for about three or four years, and Jefferson then formed a new band—now having switched to the bass—with guitarist J.C. Holmes, drummer C.V. Veal, and Veal’s wife Marian on vocals, a grouping that lasted seven or eight years.
For about a decade Jefferson worked regularly across the Delta with drummer Sam Carr and guitarist/keyboardist/harmonica player Frank Frost. He also played with Big Jack Johnson, Little Jeno Tucker, Robert “Bilbo” Walker, and Willie Foster. “I kind of was with all of them for a while,” he says, and explains that he was the organizer of these groups, doing the booking and providing much of the equipment.
He also played in groups called the Scalpers and Creative Funk, which performed more modern soul blues. In the ‘90s the Wesley Jefferson band featured guitarist/vocalist James “Super Chikan” Johnson, and more recently Willie “Rip” Butler, Michael “Dr. Mike” James, and Gladys Kyles. The group also features Earnest Boone on double trumpet, and drummer Joe Williams. In the late ‘90s Jefferson was involved in a serious automobile accident and also had heart problems, which resulted in a temporary hiatus from performing. Since returning he has performed regularly in the Clarksdale area, and has traveled to a festival in Canada.
Jefferson’s first recordings appeared on the Clarksdale-based Rooster Blues’ 1990 cassette-only compilation, Clarksdale, Mississippi—Coahoma The Blues. As Wesley “Mississippi Junebug” Jefferson he sings the song "(Hey Theresa) Don't throw Your Love on me so Hard (Strong)", and backs fellow band members Willie “Rip” Butler, Lorenzo Nicholson, and C.V. Veal on five other songs.
In 1996 the Repap paper company underwrote the cost for the CD, The Wesley Jefferson Band: Delta Blues Live from the Do Drop Inn. Over half the songs are originals by vocalist James “Super Chikan” Johnson, who recorded his debut CD the following year. Jefferson’s most recent recording is Meet Me in the Cotton Field, a collaboration with Clarksdale guitarist Terry "Big T" Williams, released in Spring 2007 on St. Louis-based Broke & Hungry Records.
-Scott Barretta
Part I of the unofficial history of the Delta Kings...DON’T FORGET, TONIGHT FOR ONE NIGHT ONLY- THE DELTA KINGS WILL REUNITE THEIR HISTORIC 1965 LINE-UP OF THE ORIGINAL 4 MEMBERS (WELL, NONE OF THEM ARE ALIVE, BUT WE WILL HAVE THE ORIGINAL GAFFER’S TAPE AND ONE OF THE ORIGINAL EXTENSION CORDS – IN FACT THE ONE THAT WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ELECTORCUTION OF GUITARIST BLAZE ONTARIO –CODY REPLACED HIM - )
Part II of the unofficial history of the Delta Kings -
Blaze Ontario was the coolest guitarist ever, and people forget that he was originally the drummer until Fess Timmons quit to go back to Dental school.
Part III of the unofficial History of the Delta Kings -
So then with Blaze firmly planted on the guitar throne- and never was there anyone who sat so imperially on said throne, and sat high in the saddle too (mixed metaphors, ouch!), Blaze set out to find his kindred funky rock brothers. Well, as luck would have it, on a trip to New York City, he espied some skanky skinny rock'n'roll dude drinking his own personal bottle of Night Train wine. Well, it was not apparent if he could play, but it was apparent that he could drink. So, Blaze said, "hey young man, I'm the king-maker of rock'n'roll and I am going to make you a star. Now, just pass me that bottle." Well the wino on that fateful day was none other than Kirk Junkow, legendary Polish emigre guitar slinger. Blaze returned to Champaign with the young & impressionable Junkow in tow. (Coming in Part IV- the new bass player) .
The Delta Kings were formed in 1993 in Champaign, Illinois when founding members Bill Humphrey (bass) and Kenny McNichols (guitar & vocals) recruited Cody Sokolski (guitar & vocals), a freshly transplanted New Yorker. After a couple of unsuccessful tries, the band found human rhythm machine Terry Hawkins (drums) and the Delta Kings were complete.
Playing four sets a night to tough roadhouse audiences up and down the Central Illinois’ area, the band realized they had turned into a crack rhythm oriented blues/rock’n’roll band. Next thing you know, the Delta Kings started writing their own songs. Much to their joyous surprise, audiences actually liked the band’s original material, at times, even screaming out requests for the stuff. Hearing about a fellow who had a 16 track studio in his dining room, the Delta Kings thought, “Hey, let’s record this stuff, just to hear what we sound like.” Blitzing through 25 songs in six hours, the band was ecstatic with the results. No one knows how six hours in a dining room ended up at Streeterville Studios in Chicago, being mixed by Fred Breitberg of numerous Alligator Record credits. But it did. The result of that mysterious process was their first cd release in 1997, “Damn Thing Bites”. By 2000 they had released “Done Fell Out The Back,” a collection of rarities & out-takes, and in between, two limited edition live recordings. “Live at the Farmer City 4th Of July Music Festival” and “Night Of The Living Groove.”
With the release of “Roadhouse Hullabaloo,” two things were done differently. More time was put into the actual recording process and the songs were chosen to more closely reflect the diversity of the band’s repertoire. Sharing stages with acts like Bobby Blue Bland, Delbert McClinton and BR 549, as well as playing over 500 one nighters at Central Illinois roadhouses, biker bashes and festivals, the band has shaped & honed a song list of originals and select covers that span the breadth & depth of American Roots Music. Blues, R&B, Country, Rockabilly & Rock’n’Roll are the humble, but noble streams which The Delta Kings draw from to create their funky brew.
