- Artist: Fats Waller
- Rating:
- Release Date: June 05, 2007
- Total Time: 308:54
- Type: Compilation (best of), Box set
- Genre: Jazz
Review
For decades Fats Waller's recorded legacy has found its way into the lives of jazz heads and regular folks throughout the world, most often in piecemeal fashion through "best-of" collections that fixate upon his most popular recordings from the 1930s and early '40s, or in mammoth "complete editions" inevitably peppered with gaps and flaws. "Messin' Around with the Blues" is volume one in JSP's Complete Recorded Works of Thomas Fats Waller. Spread across four compact discs, one-hundred vintage tracks map nearly every single recording session that Waller participated in between October 21, 1922 and June 18, 1928. Sound is good throughout, and some of the early pressings sound much better than they did when reissued by the Classics label. This comes very close to being the best early Fats Waller reissue project the world has ever seen. Beginning with his first two piano solos, JSP traces young Waller's progress with almost unprecedented thoroughness, following him from date to date as he accompanies vocalists (most notably Alberta Hunter and Rosa Henderson) and comedians (Clarence Williams and Clarence Todd); sits in with bands led by Fletcher Henderson, Thomas Morris, Jimmy Johnson and Johnny Dunn; convenes with Johnson, cornetist Jabbo Smith and multi-reed man Garvin Bushell to make chamber jazz records under the name of the Louisiana Sugar Babes, and establishes himself as the world's very first jazz organist. The rarest material presented here is so uncommon that even lifelong Wallerites might never have caught it before; on May 17, 1927, Waller played organ behind four sermons viscerally delivered by the Rev. J.C. Burnett, assisted in holy roller style by Sisters Ethel Grainger and Odette Jackson. These recordings pick up where Waller and church ladies Alta Browne and Bertha Powell left off with their solemn little pair of sacred songs recorded for Gennett in April 1926. JSP's phenomenal early Waller anthology is outstanding and utterly essential. The only serious omissions appear to be two sides -- "Chloe" and "When You're with Somebody Else" -- recorded with Shilkret's Rhyth-Melodists in early March 1928. How or why these tracks didn't make it onto this otherwise stunningly complete overview of early Fats Waller is anybody's guess. Taken together, the eight CDs comprising volumes one and two in JSP's Complete Recorded Works of Fats Waller are major achievements deserving of highest honors. All that's needed now is for someone to issue every known player piano roll by Waller, Luckey Roberts and James P. Johnson. The rolls need to be played back using the Yamaha Disklavier, a high-tech instrument that was employed to rescue Jelly Roll Morton's piano rolls from oblivion. When this occurs, humanity will at last have taken decisive steps towards paying worthy homage to the Harlem pianists whose music played a decisive role in the rapid evolution of jazz and popular music during the first half of the 20th century. ~ arwulf arwulf, All Music GuideTracks
CD 1
| Track Title | Composers | Performers | Time |
| Muscle Shoals Blues | Fats Waller | (3:19) | |
| Birmingham Blues | Fats Waller | (3:05) | |
| 'Taint Nobody's Bus'ness If I Do | Sara Martin, Fats Waller | (2:57) | |
| You Got Ev'rything a Sweet Mama Needs But Me | Sara Martin, Fats Waller | (3:02) | |
| Mama's Got the Blues | Sara Martin, Fats Waller | (3:18) | |
| Last Go Round Blues | Fats Waller, Sara Martin | (3:30) | |
| Stingaree Blues | Alberta Hunter, Fats Waller | (2:40) | |
| You Can't Do What My Last Man Did | Alberta Hunter, Fats Waller | (3:18) | |
| Sister Kate | Fats Waller, |
(2:52) | |
| You Can't Do What My Last Man Did | Fats Waller, |
(3:17) | |
| Trixie Blues | (2:57) | ||
| I'm Cert'ny Gonna See 'Bout That | Clarence Williams, Sara Martin, Fats Waller | (2:46) | |
| Squabbling Blues | Clarence Williams, Sara Martin, Fats Waller | (2:58) | |
| In Harlem's Araby | Fats Waller, Porter Grainger | (2:44) | |
| You Don't Know My Mind Blues | (2:52) | ||
| West Indies Blues | Fats Waller, Clarence Williams, |
(2:39) | |
| Maybe Someday | Fats Waller, Hazel Meyers | (3:19) | |
| (I'm Gonna See You) When Your Troubles Are Just Like Mine | Hazel Meyers, Fats Waller | (3:01) | |
| You Get Mad | Fats Waller | (3:00) | |
| What's the Matter Now? | Fats Waller | (2:48) | |
| Nobody Knows de Trouble I See | Fats Waller | (3:02) | |
| Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray | Fats Waller | (2:59) | |
| Ain't Got Nobody to Grind Ma Coffee | Fats Waller, |
(3:09) | |
| Mama's Losin' a Mighty Good Chance | (2:53) | ||
| The Henderson Stomp | Benny Morton, Fats Waller, Coleman Hawkins, |
(2:55) | |
| The Chant | Fats Waller, Benny Morton, Don Redman, |
(2:59) |
CD 2
| Track Title | Composers | Performers | Time |
| St Louis Blues | Fats Waller | (2:56) | |
| Lenox Avenue Blues | Fats Waller | (2:40) | |
| What Do You Know About That | Fats Waller, Clarence Williams | (3:02) | |
| Shut Your Mouth | Clarence Williams, Fats Waller | (3:18) | |
| Soothin' Syrup Stomp | Fats Waller | (3:01) | |
| Sloppy Water Blues | Fats Waller | (3:06) | |
| Loveless Love | Fats Waller | (3:15) | |
| Messin' Around with the Blues | Fats Waller | (3:01) | |
| The Rusty Pail | Fats Waller | (3:05) | |
| Stompin' the Bug | Fats Waller | (3:17) | |
| Hog-Maw Stomp | Fats Waller | (3:10) | |
| Blue Black Bottom Stomp | Fats Waller | (2:57) | |
| Whiteman Stomp | Coleman Hawkins, |
(2:49) | |
| I'm Coming Virginia | Coleman Hawkins, |
(3:09) | |
| Preach the Word | Fats Waller, Rev. J.C. Burnett | (3:06) | |
| I'll Just Stand and Ring My Hands and Cry | Fats Waller | (3:01) | |
| True Friendship | Fats Waller, Rev. J.C. Burnett | (2:57) | |
| The Christians' Trouble Is Ended | Rev. J.C. Burnett, Fats Waller | (3:13) | |
| Sugar | Fats Waller, Alberta Hunter | (3:05) | |
| Sugar | Alberta Hunter, Fats Waller | (3:20) | |
| Beale Street Blues | Alberta Hunter, Fats Waller | (3:17) | |
| Beale Street Blues | Fats Waller, Alberta Hunter | (3:08) | |
| I'm Going to See My Ma | Fats Waller, Alberta Hunter | (3:09) | |
| "Fats" Waller Stomp | Fats Waller, |
(3:28) | |
| Savannah Blues | (2:59) |
CD 3
| Track Title | Composers | Performers | Time |
| Won't You Take Me Home | Fats Waller, |
(2:50) | |
| My Old Daddy's Got a Brand New Way to Love | Fats Waller | (3:09) | |
| Anything That Happens Just Pleases Me | Fats Waller | (2:57) | |
| I've Got the Joogie Blues | Fats Waller | (3:11) | |
| Florence | (3:08) | ||
| Gone But Not Forgotten | Fats Waller, |
(3:07) | |
| You Live on in Memory | (3:29) | ||
| Bye-Bye Florence | (3:15) | ||
| He's Gone Away | Jimmy Archey, |
(2:42) | |
| I Ain't Got Nobody | (3:14) | ||
| The Digah's Stomp | Fats Waller, Jimmy Archey, |
(3:00) | |
| Red Hot Dan | Fats Waller, |
(3:28) | |
| Geechee | Fats Waller, |
(3:02) | |
| Please Take Me out of Jail | Jimmy Archey, Fats Waller, |
(2:52) | |
| Back in Your Own Back Yard | Fats Waller, Andy Razaf | (3:21) | |
| Nobody Knows How Much I Love You | Andy Razaf, Fats Waller | (3:04) | |
| What's the Use of Being Alone? | Johnny Dunn, James P. Johnson, Fats Waller | (2:42) | |
| Original Blues | Fats Waller, James P. Johnson, Johnny Dunn | (2:39) | |
| Willow Tree | Fats Waller, Jabbo Smith, James P. Johnson, |
(3:26) | |
| 'Sippi | James P. Johnson, |
(3:13) | |
| Thou Swell | James P. Johnson, |
(3:03) | |
| Persian Rug | (3:33) | ||
| Chicago Blues [Take] | Fats Waller, James P. Johnson, |
(2:50) | |
| Mournful Tho'ts | Fats Waller, |
(2:59) |
CD 4
| Track Title | Composers | Performers | Time |
| You Can't Do What My Last Man Did | Fats Waller, |
(3:15) | |
| Trixie Blues | Fats Waller, |
(3:04) | |
| St Louis Blues | Fats Waller | (2:46) | |
| What Do You Know About That | Fats Waller, Clarence Williams | (3:07) | |
| Shut Your Mouth | Clarence Williams, Fats Waller | (3:24) | |
| Soothin' Syrup Stomp | Fats Waller | (3:20) | |
| Sloppy Water | Fats Waller | (3:32) | |
| Messin' Around with the Blues | Fats Waller | (3:05) | |
| The Rusty Pail | Fats Waller | (3:13) | |
| Stompin' the Bug | Fats Waller | (3:27) | |
| Hog-Maw Stomp | Fats Waller | (3:09) | |
| "Fats" Waller Stomp | (3:28) | ||
| Savannah Blues | (3:04) | ||
| Won't You Take Me Home | (2:52) | ||
| My Old Daddy's Got a Brand New Way to Love | Fats Waller | (3:01) | |
| Anything That Happens Just Pleases Me | Fats Waller | (2:57) | |
| I've Got the Joogie Blues | Fats Waller | (3:06) | |
| He's Gone Away | Tom Morris, Jimmy Archey, |
(2:38) | |
| The Digah's Stomp | Jimmy Archey, Tom Morris, Fats Waller, |
(3:21) | |
| Red Hot Dan | (3:21) | ||
| Geechee | Tom Morris, |
(3:08) | |
| Please Take Me out of Jail | (2:46) | ||
| Willow Tree | Fats Waller, |
(3:38) | |
| 'Sippi | James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, |
(3:09) | |
| Thou Swell | James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, |
(3:01) |
