If the old saying that you can't play the blues until you have lived the blues is true, then Little Joe Washington should be a giant of the genre. The 66-year-old Houston native has certainly paid his dues. Some will say he is still paying them. He's marginally homeless and has been for 20 years or so, even though in the past five he's been rediscovered and celebrated as one of the last great working practitioners of wild-and-woolly Texas R&B.

But Little Joe is also too set in his ways to pay much mind to what people think about him, and he's certainly immune to the lure of self-promotion. Since he doesn't even own a telephone, the only way to get in touch with him is through Eddie Stout, the owner of Dialtone Records, who acts as Little Joe's conduit to the world. Stout relays questions to Little Joe and then relays them back via e-mail.

True to his reputation, Little Joe is a man of few words, but he does make one thing perfectly clear: The blues isn't about sadness, at least not for him. "I try to take people's minds off the blues," he says in explanation of his hyperactive vocal and guitar style.