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M & O Blues by Willie Brown

M & O Blues is the second surviving recording Willie Brown made during that now famous Grafton, Wisconsin session.  Like his Future Blues, M & O exhibits a quiet discontent, a certain restlessness, not speaking of the events of today but looking elsewhere, this song begins:

“When I leave here gonna catch that M & O.  Going way down South where I ain’t never been before.”
 
This is our first day of recording, October 9, 1998.  We climb atop tanker cars parked on the railroad tracks along side Old Highway 61 just south of Coahoma. We'd spotted these train cars during our first trip down this stretch of 61 in search of the curve that took the life of blues singer Bessie Smith.  Instantly, we knew this was the spot for M & O Blues.  After battling our way through tall grasses that entwine wheels, axles and train car couplings, Eddie takes his guitar and climbs a rusting ladder to perch atop one of the tankers.  It's like a crows nest up here looking out over ocean waves of cotton.  This day lives a life of its own.  A couple of chords, a few gusts of wind and slowly our ship of blues begins to move us on a sunward journey.  Today we catch that M & O.
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