Chad Kassem knows what it takes to make an immortal blues record. "Somebody who lived down in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, the South. They lived through it. Their story is real, and their voice is real."
The founder/owner of Analogue Productions and longtime blues true believer, Kassem's record label, mail-order warehouse, and vinyl plating and pressing plant—all headquartered in Salina, Kansas—were recently profiled in The New York Times ("The Wizard of Vinyl is in Kansas," March 5, 2025). Among his many business ventures, Kassem is part of the new Craft Recordings vinyl-reissue series of titles drawn from the Bluesville catalog, which is owned by Craft's parent company, Concord Records.
Kassem's fascination with and respect for the blues began in his hometown. "I'm from Lafayette, Louisiana, so we can start there," he began, when I asked how his love for the blues began. "Clifton Chenier, they call it zydeco, but hey, it's blues with an accordion. [Swamp-pop stars] Warren Storm, Johnny Allen, Rod Bernard, and those guys, we thought they were cover bands. We didn't know they had hits and were on Dick Clark."
"Most white guys of a certain age, the way they first heard about blues was Bloomfield, Butterfield, and Musselwhite. I skipped that. I was listening to Zeppelin, Foghat, and the Allman Brothers. But then I also listened to Muddy Waters, Lightnin' Hopkins, and John Lee Hooker, and I figured it out. So, for me it was either the rockin' or the real version."
Currently up to 10 titles, the Craft/Bluesville series has an impressively broad stylistic reach, stretching (so far) from the Chicago blues of Jimmy Reed and Buddy Guy, to the rhythmic growl of Detroit's John Lee Hooker, continuing through the solo Delta sound of Skip James and Mississippi John Hurt and the Carolina piedmont stylings of Reverend Gary Davis, ending up in Texas with Last Night Blues from the greatest of blues raconteurs, Lightnin' Sam Hopkins. Possibly the most rewarding title in this series so far is Mr. Scrapper's Blues from Francis "Scrapper" Blackwell. Best known for the recordings he made between 1928 and 1935 in partnership with pianist Leroy Carr, Blackwell, who is reputed to be part Cherokee, had an idiosyncratic gift on guitar, piano, and as a singer. Mr. Scrapper's Blues was originally released in the spring of 1962, months before Blackwell was gunned down in a back alley in Indianapolis, Indiana.
It's a measure of how long the blues has been valued in America that the genre has become something of a museum piece. The first generation of Mississippi Delta players has gone, and other than Buddy Guy, the second generation—the guys who moved north and discovered electricity—has also passed. While its creators may be gone, listening to these crisp, timeless new remasterings from the Bluesville catalog gives proof once again of the power inherent in their music—and of the immutable truth that, in Kassem's words, "The blues are the foundation for all the music that came after."
Despite being crowned vinyl royalty in The New York Times, Kassem, who is collaborating with producer Scott Billington on the series, allows that having another set of ears on this project has its advantages.
"There's a good side to it not just being me. We're working together, I'm part of a team. I might skip a title whose recorded sound isn't totally awesome, so it's a good thing that it's a joint venture."
"These reissues are a good mixture, a ton of good blues from acoustic to electric," he continues. "I help pick the titles, oversee the mastering, oversee the pressing, the quality, and then help sell and promote it. Our pressing plant"—that's Quality Record Pressing—"presses it. Our mastering engineer, Matthew [Lutthans], who's really doing a terrific job, masters it, and so things have been great."
While Kassem's and Acoustic Sounds' reissue series with Verve, a UMG label, has been an unqualified success—"the sales, the sounds, the looks, those series have just been incredible," he said—the new Bluesville series with Craft, all sourced from tape, is close to his musical heart.
"Lightnin' is my favorite," Kassem concludes. "The way I found out about the Bluesville label is Lightnin' Hopkins' Goin' Away and the other Hopkins albums on Bluesville. I love all the Bluesville albums. And a lot of them were recorded by Rudy Van Gelder, so to me there's nothing better than the most real music with the best, most real sound. You combine those two, and you done gone to heaven. What else could you possibly ask for?"
