Trixie Smith
  Vol 2 1925 - 1939
DOCD-5333
Everybody loves my baby (take 6) - How come you do me like you do? (take 6) - You`ve got to beat me to keep me - Mining camp blues (take 1) - Mining camp blues (take 2) - The world`s jazz crazy and so am I (take 1) - The world`s jazz crazy and so am I (take 2) - Railroad blues (take 1) - Railroad blues (take 2) - Everybody`s doing that Charleston now (take 1) - He likes it slow (take 2) - Black bottom hop - Love me like you used to do - Messin` around (take 1) - Messin` around (take 2) - Freight train blues - Trixie blues - My daddy rocks me - My daddy rocks me no. 2 - He may be your man (but he comes to see me sometime) - Jack I`m mellow - My unusual man - No good man
Anyone who likes pre-war blues and jazz has encountered the bad quality of Paramount records, due to the use of a below average quality shellac. Many good sides are barely audible today and it’s an immeasurable loss. Trixie Smith’s recording make no exception.
The first 15 cuts come from the mid 20’s and are recorded with various bands that include Louis Armstrong, Freddy Keppard and Charlie Green.
This sides include Vaudeville pieces, pop songs of the day (A Dixieland version of Everybody Loves My Baby) and a couple of blues (Railroad Blues one of Smith’s recurrent theme). Written by Porter Grainger, composer of the blues standard “T’ain’t Nobody’s Business If I Do.”, “You've Got To Beat Me To Keep Me” featuring Fletcher Henderson on piano, is slightly disturbing with lyrics like : You’ve got to beat me to keep me, cause mama loves a hard boiled man / So don’t you let no man cheat me, if he’s got a good right hand. / Beat me up for breakfast, knock me down for tea, / Black my eye for supper, then you’re pleasing me. / You’ve got to beat me to keep me, cause mama loves a hard boiled man. / Mama don’t want no diamond rings and she don’t want no swell clothes / Wail me daddy til it stings across my mouth and nose. / I don’t want no hug and kiss, / I don’t want no love and smile, / Beat me with your hand or fist, Papa like I was your child. Not your average “I woke up this morning and you left me” blues.
Then she stopped recording for 13 years and came back to the studio only in 1938. This session for Decca (hear the difference of the sound) features among others Sidney Bechet with a four piece rhythm section (drums, bass, guitar, piano). Better recorded and preserved this session allows us to clearly hear Trixie’s fantastic voice (and elocution) and it’s hard to imagine she stayed far from the studios for so long. The material is high class (and hot) like “My Daddy Rocks Me”, “He May Be Your Man” and “My Unusual Man”. The band matches the quality of the performance with fine solos (the guitar chorus on “Trixie Blues” worth to be mentioned). The following year she recorded another song, No Good Man, with equal success (at least artistic) then vanished and died four years later.

Fred "Virgil" Turgis