RARE Blues Vinyl Record 45rpm 7" Single JOHNNY WRIGHT Coal Shed / Bad Air Boogie

$

100

RARE Blues Recording - Hidden Gem Uncovered!
~ JOHNNY WRIGHT Coal Shed / Johnny's Bad Air Boogie ~ 
45rpm Single Vinyl Record  Hi-way Records (small, independent label) Terre Haute, Indiana, 1978
Record is in mint condition, never played. This was a VERY SHORT RUN, limited edition recording by blues singer Johnny Wright. Recorded and released in Terre Haute, Indiana, 1978. I have a few mint, unplayed copies are still available through a family connection.
Johnny Wright recorded a handful of songs in the mid 1950's for RPM, DeLuxe, Magnificent, and Stevens record labels, including a few singles recorded with Ike Turner and his Orchestra. These songs are available on several Ike Turner & Kings of Rhythm CD compilations.
From blueskingpins dot com: "Though the structure of Johnny Wright's chilling "The World Is Yours" is straight out of the Guitar Slim songbook, Ike's whammy-bar wildness ignites the downbeat number like nuclear fission. The southern Illinois-based Wright had done a 1953 session for DeLuxe that included an auspicious "I Was In St. Louis," and that's where he rendezvoused with Turner in November of '55 to make his lone single for the Biharis' RPM imprint. Ike's Kings of Rhythm consisted at that point of Hill and Eddie Jones on saxes, Knight on bass, and drummer Eugene Washington." ?
Wright also recorded a handful of singles under his own name, including "Winehead" (Magnificent) and "I Was In St. Louis" (Deluxe) in 1953, and "Look at That Chick" (Stevens) in 1959. These and other songs can be heard on the compilation CD "Battle of Hastings Street: Raw Detroit Blues & R&B from Joe's Record Shop 1953-1954" that was released in 2006.
??After a run of hardships, Johnny was discovered working in a foundry in Terre Haute, Indiana, in the late 1970's. He began making music again with harmonica player Steve Rusin (who has played most recently with blues guitarist Mark Cook). Backed by Rusin and local Terre Haute players, Wright released two more 7" singles on the Hi-way Records independent music label: "Coal Shed / Johnny's Bad Air Boogie" (1978) and "Shut Up / Move." ?? (1979)
In 1977 a re-working of "I Was In St. Louis" featuring Wright on acoustic guitar and Rusin on harmonica, was privately pressed to vinyl in an extremely limited run (only about 100 were printed), as a gift to Rusin by his sister. The latter was re-mastered and released as a limited edition CD single in 2012.
Johnny died on June 2, 1988, in Terre Haute at 58 years old.
Very few copies of these latter-day Johnny Wright recordings are in circulation, especially since so few were printed on this small, independent label based out of Terre Haute, Indiana, where Wright lived and work through his later years. As a result, many blues aficionados who are aware of Johnny Wright have never heard these recordings. See my other auctions for copies of the other two singles.