T-Model Ford(1924-2013)

Blues singer and guitarist T-Model Ford was born as James Lewis Carter Ford in 1924 in the small rural town of Forest, Mississippi. By age eleven T-Model was plowing a field behind a mule on his family's farm. Ford got a job at a local saw mill in his early teens. T-Model eventually secured an even better job as a truck driver for a bigger lumber company. Moreover, Ford was sentenced to a chain gang for ten years for murder. Luckily, he was released after serving only two years of his sentence. In addition, T-Model also worked at a logging camp. He recorded four fabulously lowdown rough and dirty albums for the label Fat Possum Records: "Pee-Wee Get My Gun," "You Better Keep Still," "She Ain't None of Your'n," and "Bad Man." With his savage moan of a ragged voice and gritty guitar playing style, Ford brought a gloriously raw and blunt ferocity to Mississippi Delta blues music that was both passionate and powerful in equal measure. T-Model appeared as himself in the charming comedy short feature "Lohues Gets the Blues" and the excellent documentary "You See Me Laughin'." In 2008 Ford released the albums "Jack Daniel Time" and "Don't Get Out Talkin' It." T-Model lived in Greenville, Mississippi with his girlfriend Stella. He died on July 16, 2013 in Greenville.