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Junkman Cometh

Bluesman Willie Houston turns a junkyard into a juke joint.

A A A Comments By John La Briola Thursday, Oct 2 2003

...continued from page 2

Though such a desire spits in the eye of a strict Baptist upbringing -- fit only for backsliding types on the mourner's bench -- Houston cuts through the once-popular distortion of blues music as infernal noise.

"They call that workin' for the devil. It's not!" he fumes. "You want to talk about your history, your life. Is it wrong to tell your life? I'll play the blues in the church, 'cause I'm talkin' 'bout what we're goin' through -- 'specially the black people. And if they don't understand it, it's just too bad. It's me and the good Lord, that's who it is. He's involved in it, too. He gives me the talent and he tells me to use it."

John Johnston

A diamond in the rough: Willie Houston.

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"I still goes to church now," Houston adds. "I turn on my TV. I get all the parish I want on that."

More at home in a juke joint than Amen Corner, Houston -- equal parts working stiff and junkyard griot -- sums everything up with characteristic simplicity: "Blues ain't just said; blues is lived. People can tell on a bandstand if you're fakin' or you're telling the truth. You don't need a smile. The things I had to go without, and the things I had to go through -- that's not a good feeling. And it's not something to laugh at. But I want to be a gentleman up on the bandstand, like B.B.," He got a good name of bein' a nice, beautiful person. Warmhearted -- that's what I want to be.

"You got to have it here," Houston concludes, pointing to his chest. "You got to make your heart talk."

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