It’s Spring, of course, and there ought to be something in that—at the very least I should be able to pontificate about swinging your leg over a motorcycle and blowing the accumulated ice and cancer out of your guts—but it’s been such a slovenly, stretched-out, tantalizing attempt at a new season that the fresh flush of enthusiasm (and hope for ending winter’s paralysis) has been spent in a series of false starts.

Or, I could write about country blues. There’ve been a series of new releases by old masters of late, and there seems to be a rebirth of interest in the music (or is that wishful thinking? Do any of you actually listen to the blues ?). Actually the one record I would tout is .Mance Lipscomb, Vol 5 (Arhoolie 1049). I really haven’t heard much of Lipscomb, but I’m tremendously impressed by the vitality of this effort (he was 75 years old April 9). His singing voice is that of a young man, his guitar playing is crisp and effective, and when he speaks on this record it is with a vigorous and saucy wit (“gonna get drunk, white folks!”).