This was recorded when she was (for a semester) at the University of Texas at Austin and used to sing in bars. She sang folk and blues, her voice is unmistakably hers, if less raspy and on a higher register. The acoustics of bars students could afford in Austin is what I'd expect. The song has been included in far too many compilations and quoted in the biography Love, Janis written by her sister Laura for me to doubt. Mostly it's the voice. Besides I do not know that the song was not recorded by accident. If so, and if this is circa 1962 (when Janis would be 19) I have no idea what kind of easily portable recording devices people carried about with them but this is the kind of quality I'd expect from one.
This was recorded in Austin when Janis was briefly at the University of Tx there. The double LP just named 'Janis' later released on CD as "Janis Live" is where t«you'll find the dates (1965 on this case) and the venues (and the tech/equipment(. As for her voice she was transitioning from her natural folk/country o her purposely intended blues. Odetta and Leadbelly being her great influences at the time but you sure can tell the Port Arthur, TX kind of country and blues mix. As for equipment used this was live in a Uni or nearabouts bar. Would you expect it to sound much better or are you just very young?
@@HerrCrankzy Thank you for the info. I was born in 1960 and grew up listening to folks songs recorded from the 1920's through the 1960's. In sound quality, this sounds a lot more like the stuff them the early 1930s, but I guess it wasn't.
Janis sang with the Waller Creek Boys (Lanny Wiggins, a folk music expert, and Powell St. John, who wrote "Bye Bye Baby" which is on the first Big Brother lp, and in the late 60s worked with Mother Earth/Tracy Nelson in SF) in Austin circa 1963-64 when she was attending university there. This was done in early 65 with the Dick Oxtot Jazz Band in SF. They recorded 4 songs to my knowledge. The music of both was released by Columbia in 1975 on an album called "Janis', after the doc. film 'Janis' was released. The story of her brief involvement with the DOJB is told in Holly George Warren's wonderful bio of Janis and is quite amusing.@@davesettlow7063
