Bloodstains on the wall

Bloodstains on the Wall

It seems today that any blues artist worth a shit has been anthologised to death. Records you would have killed for years ago are now available at the press of a button. We know just about everything about anyone that mattered, fights, divorces, jail terms and, when it comes to the music, all sorts of out takes and versions 1 2 and 3 etc etc….. So when it comes to a song that apparently only appears on one anthology and seems to be the only recording known by the artist, the ears perk up. That song is the spooky mystery that is Honeyboy’s “Bloodstains on the Wall,” a genuine chilling slice of urban blues. Honeyboy has a mess to deal with, the aftermath of some terrible event. What, why and how is never explicitly addressed, all we seem to know is that something happened and the guy is pissed. The title makes the listener think of abattoirs, a mess (or one that will do until a real mess comes along). The guitar sputters over a sleazy barrelhouse blues piano, is the singer a pimp or a messed up working man who finds out strange things are happening when his back is turned. No matter what, the detectives are coming and he has his alibi.
Honeyboy is not to be confused with Honeyboy Edwards but is instead Honeyboy Frank Patt (go on, Google him). According to what I could find about him he was born in Fostoria, AL on Sep. 1, 1928 and he sold about 50,000 copies of this single so there should be some attics somewhere that have this gem lurking underneath the boxes, detritus and cobwebs of someone’s life. Recorded for the Speciality label this is a sleazy, murky piece of work with a dense claustrophobic sensibility. If you don’t believe me ask Bob Dylan who included it in one of his recent radio shows.