Product Review

Documentarist Todd Kwait helms the nonfiction mosaic Chasin' Gus' Ghost as an homage to jug band music. Using as a point-of-entry the introduction to four popular celebrators of that form - Gus Cannon, Cannon's Jug Stompers, the Dixieland Jug Blowers and the Memphis Jug Band - Kwait then employs a co-mingling of archival clips and photographs and interviews to illustrate how jug music impacted folk and rock music from the 1960s through the 1970s. He subsequently moves into a discussion and exploration of jug music's widespread popularity in contemporary Japanese culture. Participants (and interviewees) include Bob Weir, Fritz Richmond, John Sebastian, Jim Kweskin, Geoff Muldaur and others.