Down Where the Alligators Grow so Mean

After getting thoroughly hoodoo-ed by Redbone yesterday, I'm not quite ready to leave the swamp. A rainy night in NYC has me thinking about swamp rocker Tony Joe White, writer of one of my all-time favorite songs, "Rainy Night in Georgia." Much like Redbone, Tony Joe White's early success was in having his songs recorded by people more established than himself. R&B singer Brook Benton made "Rainy Night in Georgia" a hit in 1970, and Elvis performed White's song "Polk Salad Annie" on a live album the same year. In the late 80s, Tony Joe White achieved a comeback by writing some successful songs for Tina Turner, which resulted in a new record deal for himself.

As much as I love other performers' versions of Tony Joe White songs, though, there's no substitute for the real thing. His voice is whispery, soulful, and growling all at the same time, and his guitar style is a driving, bluesy rhythm that helped create the term "swamp rock." He says he was inspired to start writing songs after hearing the masterwork of another deep south troubadour, Bobbie Gentry's "Ode to Billie Joe." So while Gentry's songs chronicled the people and ways of life around her home state of Mississippi, Tony Joe White does the same for the cotton fields and bayou backwaters where he grew up in Louisiana. 

Today's song is a perfect example of that--"Conjure Woman" is about an old woman casting spells by a fire in the middle of the swamp where she lived. Maybe a backwoods relation of Marie Laveau? It appeared on Tony Joe White's third album, 1970's Tony Joe, and does a fair job of conjuring a bad spell even without the required tongue of a hoot owl or tooth of a crawdad. Just don't get too close or she'll chunk you in a deep, dark well.