Page 76 - Blues Festival Guide Magazine 2012

Foundation podium in Memphis to receive a coveted Keeping the
Blues Alive (KBA) award — an award so appropriately bestowed.
Now, as if those past honors weren’t enough, Paden and his
legendary juke are the main subjects of a new feature film.
This documentary film project produced by Cat Head Delta
Blues & Folk Art (yours truly) and Broke & Hungry Records (Jeff
Konkel), entitled We Juke Up In Here: Mississippi’s Juke Joint Culture
at the Crossroads (www.wejukeupinhere.com). Working with fellow
producers Damien Blaylock and Lou Bopp, the all-new DVD/CD
highlights the surviving juke joint culture and music of today’s
Mississippi Delta.
While it includes other classic jukes such as Po’ Monkey’s
Lounge, Do Drop Inn and Blue Front Café, it mainly showcases Red’s
Lounge. After all, Red’s Lounge is one of the very few still booking
authentic blues music every weekend.
Beer bottle and crowd at Blue Front Cafe in Bentonia, MS Photo by Lou Bopp As Paden says in We Juke Up In Here, “Me being old and set in
my ways, I always have liked the live bands.”
spinning recorded versions of their favorite new R&B, Southern soul But what about the money? Isn’t the lack of a predictable payoff
or hip-hop songs. what keeps most modern jukes from booking regular live music?
Fortunately, there are still a handful of hardheaded juke joint In the film, Paden explains: “A lot of the younger people that
owners in Mississippi who simply refuse to face the writing on are coming up, they’re into the fast money. A lot of the older guys
the wall. have told me that if you get to moving too fast, you aren’t going to
Enter Red Paden of Red’s Lounge in Clarksdale. be here too long. And so I’m trying to stay. When I started, I was
Located “across the tracks” from downtown, Paden’s long-time making like a dollar and fifty cents a day for chopping cotton, so
juke continues to be the flag bearer for real-deal, hardcore, Delta when you’ve been trained to deal with slow money, then it’s not such
blues. Whereas other “blues clubs” in the region regularly feature a bad thing.”
rock, R&B and country music nights (not to mention deejays and Now, that’s the blues.

Terry “Harmonica” Bean, Jeff Konkel, Roger Stolle, Red Paden and Damien Blaylock
Filming in front of Po Monkey’s Lounge, near Merigold, MS Photo by Lou Bopp
in front of Red’s Lounge Photo by Lou Bopp
even the dreaded karaoke), Red’s Lounge bucks the trend by
offering up true blue characters like James “T-Model” Ford, Robert Roger Stolle owns Cat Head Delta Blues & Folk Art in Clarksdale, MS. He
“Wolfman” Belfour, Terry “Harmonica” Bean and many others — is a co-producer of the documentary, M for Mississippi, Hidden History
live and in person. of Mississippi Blues author, Juke Joint Festival co-founder, Blues Revue
Red’s has received several awards through the years, including columnist and XM/Sirius radio correspondent. Cat Head has been called
from both Clarksdale’s Sunflower River and Juke Joint Festivals, but “one of the 17 coolest record stores in America” and received a Keeping
this past February he was offered a particularly sweet honor. the Blues Alive award for music retail in 2008. “This festival season,” says
Behind his omnipresent sunglasses and wearing a “Red’s Roger, “c’mon down to the Delta and support our local jukes like Red’s —
Lounge” T-shirt under his suit jacket, Paden stood at a Blues while you still can!” www.cathead.biz.

76 Blues Festival Guide 2012