The two are easy to distinguish. Williamson I played the harmonica acoustically and was essentially a pre-War artist. Williamson II was entirely an electrified harpist, in the style of Little Walter, reflecting the advent of the jukebox and electrified instruments following World War II.
(Compare the albums Sonny Boy Williamson I ~~ Sonny Boy Williamson II)
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Sonny Boy Williamson I (30 March 1914 - 1 June 1948)
also known as John Lee Curtis Williamson, was an American blues harmonica player, born in Jackson, Tennessee, whose first record Good Morning little School Girl was a hit in 1937. He was widely popular throughout the whole southeast of the U.S., and was practically synonymous with the blues harmonica for the next decade, making his a commonly used stage name by the time he was murdered in 1948. He is buried at the Old Blairs Chapel Church, south west of Jackson, Tennessee.
more on wikipedia
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Sonny Boy Williamson II (11 March 1908 - 25 May 1965) also known as Willie Williamson, Willie Miller, Little Boy Blue, The Goat and Footsie.
Aleck "Rice" Miller was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter.
Born as Aleck Ford to Millie Ford on the Sara Jones Plantation in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, his date and year of birth are a matter of uncertainty. He claimed to have been born on December 5, 1899, but one researcher, David Evans, claims to have found census record evidence that he was born around 1912. His gravestone lists his date of birth as March 11, 1908.
He lived and worked with his sharecropper stepfather, Jim Miller, whose last name he soon adopted, and mother, Millie Ford, until the early 1930s. Beginning in the 1930s, he traveled around Mississippi and Arkansas and encountered Big Joe Williams, Elmore James and Robert Lockwood, Jr., also known as Robert Junior Lockwood, who would play guitar on his later Checker Records sides. He was also associated with Robert Johnson during this period. Miller developed his style and raffish stage persona during these years. Willie Dixon recalled seeing Lockwood and Miller playing for tips in Greenville, Mississippi in the 1930s. He entertained audiences with novelties such inserting one end of the harmonica into his mouth and playing with no hands.
In 1941 Miller was hired to play the King Biscuit Time show, advertising the King Biscuit brand of baking flour on radio station KFFA in Helena, Arkansas with Lockwood. It was at this point that the radio program's sponsor, Max Moore, began billing Miller as Sonny Boy Williamson, apparently in an attempt to capitalize on the fame of the well known Chicago-based harmonica player and singer John Lee Williamson (Sonny Boy Williamson I). Although John Lee Williamson was a major blues star who had already released dozens of successful and widely influential records under the name "Sonny Boy Williamson" from 1937 onward, Aleck Miller would later claim to have been the first to use the name, and some blues scholars believe that Miller's assertion he was born in 1899 was a ruse to convince audiences he was old enough to have used the name before John Lee Williamson, who was born in 1914 (this is made somewhat less likely, however, by the fact that Miller was certainly older than Williamson even if one does not accept the 1899 birthdate.) Whatever the methodology, Miller became commonly known as "Sonny Boy Williamson", and Lockwood and the rest of his band were billed as the King Biscuit Boys.
In 1949 he relocated to West Memphis, Arkansas and lived with his sister and her husband, Howlin' Wolf (later, for Checker Records, he did a parody of Howlin' Wolf entitled "Like Wolf"). Sonny Boy started his own KWEM radio show from 1948 to 1950 selling the elixir Hadacol.
Sonny Boy also brought his King Biscuit musician friends to West Memphis: Elmore James, Houston Stackhouse, Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, Robert Nighthawk and others, to perform on KWEM Radio.
In the 1940s Williamson married Mattie Gordon, who remained his wife until his death.
Williamson's first recording session took place in 1951 for Lillian McMurry of Jackson, Mississippi's Trumpet Records (three years after the death of John Lee Williamson, which for the first time allowed some legitimacy to Miller's carefully worded claim to being "the one and only Sonny Boy Williamson"). McMurry later erected Williamson's headstone, near Tutwiler, Mississippi, in 1977.
When Trumpet went bankrupt in 1955, Sonny Boy's recording contract was yielded to its creditors, who sold it to Chess Records in Chicago, Illinois. Sonny Boy had begun developing a following in Chicago beginning in 1953, when he appeared there as a member of Elmore James's band. It was during his Chess years that he enjoyed his greatest success and acclaim, recording about 70 songs for Chess subsidiary Checker Records from 1955 to 1964.
In the early 1960s he toured Europe several times during the height of the British blues craze, recording with The Yardbirds and The Animals, and appearing on several TV broadcasts throughout Europe. According to the Led Zeppelin biography 'Hammer of the Gods', while in England Sonny Boy set his hotel room on fire while trying to cook a rabbit in a coffee percolator. Robert Palmer's "Deep Blues" mentions that during this tour he allegedly stabbed a man during a street fight and left the country abruptly.
Sonny Boy took a liking to the European fans, and while there had a custom-made, two-tone suit tailored personally for him, along with a bowler hat, matching umbrella, and an attaché case for his harmonicas. He appears credited as "Big Skol" on Roland Kirk's live album 'Kirk in Copenhagen' (1963). One of his final recordings from England, in 1964, featured him singing "I'm Trying To Make London My Home" with Hubert Sumlin providing the guitar. Due to his many years of relating convoluted, highly fictionalized accounts of his life to friends and family, upon his return to the Delta, some expressed disbelief upon hearing of Sonny Boy's touring across the Atlantic, visiting Europe, seeing the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, and other landmarks, and recording there.
Upon his return to the U.S., he resumed playing the King Biscuit Time show on KFFA, and performed around Helena, Arkansas. As fellow musicians Houston Stackhouse and Peck Curtis waited at the KFFA studios for Williamson on May 25, 1965, the 12:15 broadcast time was closing in and Sonny Boy was nowhere in sight. Peck left the radio station and headed out to locate Williamson, and discovered his body in bed at the rooming house where he'd been staying, dead of an apparent heart attack suffered in his sleep the night before.
Williamson is buried on New Africa Rd. just outside Tutwiler, Mississippi at the site of the former Whitman Chapel cemetery.
more on wikipedia
Got the Bottle up and Gone
Sonny Boy Williamson Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I don't sell no gas
I done brought my problem
My burners heat too fast
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
Well now look-a-here, baby
What you been waitin' on?
Say ya didn't love me
I'd-a done been gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
You know that papa got you water on
Well, I had a little duck
An' I named him, Jim
I put him on the pond
Just to see him swim
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
You know that papa got your water on
Well, ya want ev'rything
In the latest style
But I've got wise
Unto your line of jive
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
That your papa got your water on
Well, if you don't love me
Why don't you tell me so?
I know you don't love me
Baby, no mo'
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
You know that your papa got your water on
I can't play no piano
But I wish I could
I got a woman
Don't mean me no good
You got the bottle up and gone
You got the bottle up and gone
You know that high-powered mama
You know that papa got your water on
The song "Got the Bottle up and Gone" by Sonny Boy Williamson talks about a man who brings all his problems to the table. He doesn't have a filling station or sell gas, but he has a problem with his burners that heat up too fast. The lyrics seem to suggest that he has brought his problem to the woman he is addressing in the song. He then goes on to talk about her being "high-powered" and how her father has her "water on", which could imply that she is withholding something from him. She wants everything in the latest style, but he's wise to her line of jive, possibly meaning that he knows she's playing games with him.
The man then talks about how he wishes he could play the piano, and how he has a woman who doesn't mean him any good. The lyrics seem to suggest that he knows the woman doesn't love him anymore, but he wants her to be honest with him about it. The repeated line "you got the bottle up and gone" could refer to the woman drinking and avoiding her problems, hence why she has her "water on" and doesn't want to face the reality of the situation.
Overall, the song seems to be about a man who is frustrated with a relationship where the woman is not honest with him and is possibly using alcohol to avoid dealing with their problems.
Line by Line Meaning
Well, I don't run no fillin' station
I don't provide fuel for cars
I don't sell no gas
I don't sell any gasoline
I done brought my problem
I have brought my issues
My burners heat too fast
My stove heats up too quickly
You got the bottle up and gone
You have consumed all the alcohol
You know that high-powered mama
You know that strong alcoholic drink
That your papa got your water on
That your father has supplied you with money to purchase alcohol
Well now look-a-here, baby
Listen to me, dear
What you been waitin' on?
What have you been waiting for?
Say ya didn't love me
If you didn't love me
I'd-a done been gone
I would have already left
Well, I had a little duck
I once had a small pet duck
An' I named him, Jim
And I gave him the name Jim
I put him on the pond
I placed him in a body of water
Just to see him swim
Just to watch him float in the water
Well, ya want ev'rything
You want everything
In the latest style
In the newest fashion
But I've got wise
But I have become aware
Unto your line of jive
To your way of talking/ deceiving
Well, if you don't love me
If you don't have feelings for me
Why don't you tell me so?
Why don't you just tell me?
I know you don't love me
I am aware that you don't feel the same way I do
Baby, no mo'
Anymore
I can't play no piano
I can't play the piano
But I wish I could
But I desire to
I got a woman
I have a partner
Don't mean me no good
Who doesn't treat me kindly
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: JOHN LEE WILLIAMSON
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
cora Visser
Love it this Blues.Brilliant .
Vesa Walamies
The musicians from left to right are Elmore James, Aleck "Rice" Miller alias Sonny Boy Williamson n:on 2, Tommy McClennan & Little Walter. This picture was taken in Chicago, sometimes in 1950's.
Keith Randall
No, it's Earl Phillips, the superb drummer, not McLennan. And THIS Sonny Boy Williamson in the pic is not the one on the record...
Zack May guitar
awesome, on spotify it says this is by sonny boy williamson 2
ssurfcity
Incorrect.
Mark A Miller
They are incorrect.
Arjun Upadhya
"i cant play no piano but i wish i could i got a woman dont mean me no good"
Yaron Ben-Ami
That's the other Sonny Boy in the picture, Rice Miller. The Sonny Boy who sings this song is John Lee Williamson.
Keith Randall
That's right, Yaron Ben-Ami. Those two men are confused so often on YouTube, it's ridiculous.
Dale McFarland
"Bottle Up and Go" or "Bottle It Up and Go"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottle_Up_and_Go