"It's Full of Holes / It's Full of Holes..."

May 16, 2009

"It's Full of Holes / It's Full of Holes..."

Department of Musical Project Compost Pile(s) / part 2.
Here are some floor sweepings from an experiment planned for several years: To create a bizarre and multi-artist inclusive METAVERSION/crashup of the song Boll Weevil Blues. Last year I finally did create a first attempt at melting down all of my ideas for this song into a piece, but I'm not terribly impressed with my first try (despite it's imminent release); so here are some of the raw components for you to play with to create your OWN sick remix of BOLL WEEVIL. The song has been burrowing and crawling around since 1908 and was further spread when Charley Patton recorded his first version in 1929, with the later format that we know today somewhat codified by Leadbelly in his 1934 telling of it as recorded by Alan Lomax.
Since then there are hundreds of larval re-recordings of this flexible song, and the four elements we have here are portrayed by none other than a few of my favorite people: Homer and Jethro, Walter Brennan, the 'hit' version by Brook Benton, and most especially, a sly cross-referencing of the song's lyric by William S. Burroughs, as used by Spring-Heeled Jack in their piece 'The Western Lands', of which I'm presenting an abridged version here. In original discussion of the Burroughs inclusion in our own re-do of the song, we debated about whether he 'meant' to reference the song in his repeating of the refrain "it's full of holes / it's full of holes", but knowing Burroughs and his love of cutting-in lyrics and old-timey American fragments along with futuristic and ancient materials, I think that he must have been doing this 'consciously'.
Now your mission is to take these disparate versions, plus stirring-in other covers of Boll Weevil that YOU have and enjoy to create a 'new' and unique mix of the song. If people would like to actually submit their results, drop a line here, and I'll do a future post featuring the new offspring of this old bug.