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Smokestack Lightnin' Home Page -- The Blues Profile Page
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Geeshie Wiley (sometimes rendered as Geechie Wiley) was a female United States blues singer and guitar player. She recorded three records in the early 1930s. There are no known photographs or images of the artist in existence.
“If Geeshie Wiley did not exist, she could not be invented: her scope
and creativity dwarfs most blues artists. She seems to represent the
moment when black secular music was coalescing into blues.” Further details of Wiley's early and later life, her career, and her legal name are unknown. The nickname "Geechie" or "Geechee" was most commonly given to people from around coastal South Carolina and Georgia, and is an alternate name for the Gullah ethnic group of that region. Her song "Last Kind Word Blues" was used in the documentary Crumb (1994) by Terry Zwigoff in the scene where Robert Crumb puts a record on (not the Wiley selection) and sits down to listen. During the song a slideshow of his cartoons is shown. The song also appeared on the latter day compilation album, Mississippi Masters: Early American Blues Classics 1927-1935 (Yazoo Records). David Johansen and the Harry Smiths covered "Last Kind Words" on their 2002 album Shaker. Johansen also sang a portion of "Last Kind Words" in the movie Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus (2003). Dex Romweber Duo released a version of "Last Kind Word Blues", featuring Jack White, on White's vinyl only label, Third Man Records.
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