IN: Eddie James "Son" House, Jr. (March 21, 1902 - October 19, 1988) was an American delta blues singer and guitarist, noted for his highly emotional style of singing and slide guitar playing. After years of hostility to secular music, as a preacher and for a few years also as a church pastor, he turned to blues performance at the age of 25. He quickly developed a unique style by applying the rhythmic drive, vocal power and emotional intensity of his preaching to the newly learned idiom. In a short career interrupted by a spell in Parchman Farm penitentiary, he developed to the point that Charley Patton, the foremost blues artist of the Mississippi Delta region, invited him to share engagements and to accompany him to a 1930 recording session for Paramount Records.

House was born in the hamlet of Lyon, north of Clarksdale, Mississippi, the second of three brothers, and lived in the rural Mississippi Delta until his parents separated, when he was about seven or eight years old. His father, Eddie House, Sr., was a musician, playing the tuba in a band with his brothers and sometimes playing the guitar. He was a church member but also a drinker; he left the church for a time, on account of his drinking, but then gave up alcohol and became a Baptist deacon. Young Eddie House adopted the family commitment to religion and churchgoing. He also absorbed the family love of music but confined himself to singing, showing no interest in the family instrumental band, and hostile to the blues on religious grounds.  When House's parents separated, his mother took him to Tallulah, Louisiana, across the Mississippi River from Vicksburg, Mississippi. When he was in his early teens, they moved to Algiers, New Orleans. Recalling these years, he would later speak of his hatred of blues and his passion for churchgoing (he described himself as "churchy" and "churchified"). At fifteen, probably while living in Algiers, he began preaching sermons.  At the age of nineteen, while living in the Delta, he married Carrie Martin, an older woman from New Orleans. This was a significant step for House; he married in church and against family opposition. The couple moved to her hometown of Centerville, Louisiana, to help run her father's farm. After a couple of years, feeling used and disillusioned, House recalled, "I left her hanging on the gatepost, with her father tellin' me to come back so we could plow some more." Around the same time, probably 1922, House's mother died. In later years, he was still angry about his marriage and said of Carrie, "She wasn't nothin' but one of them New Orleans whores".  House's resentment of farming extended to the many menial jobs he took as a young adult. He moved frequently, on one occasion taking off to East Saint Louis to work in a steel plant. The one job he enjoyed was on a Louisiana horse ranch, which later he celebrated by wearing a cowboy hat in his performances. He found an escape from manual labor when, following a conversion experience ("getting religion") in his early twenties, he was accepted as a paid pastor, first in the Baptist Church and then in the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. However, he fell into habits which conflicted with his calling--drinking like his father and probably also womanizing. This led him after several years of conflict to leave the church, ceasing his full-time commitment, although he continued to preach sermons from time to time.
QUESTION: what did house do from there?
IN: The Wildhearts are an English rock group, formed in 1989 in Newcastle upon Tyne. The band's sound is a mixture of hard rock and melodic pop music, often described in the music press as combining influences as diverse as The Beatles and 1980s-era Metallica. However, this characterization is denied by the band, who see their influences as being far broader, as shown in the song "29 X The Pain", which lists many of group leader Ginger's influences. Despite several top 20 singles and one top 10 album in Britain, the Wildhearts have not achieved major commercial success, owing in part to difficulties with record companies and many internal problems often relating to recreational drugs and depression.

The Wildhearts formed in late 1989, after Ginger was sacked from the Quireboys. An often-told story from this time period is that Ginger decided to start his own band after falling down a flight of stairs with a bottle of Jack Daniel's but emerging with the bottle intact. Had the bottle smashed, he would have slit his wrists with the shards, but instead he resolved to form a band in which he could exercise his songwriting skills, rather than just playing guitar as in his previous bands. Throughout the band's career, Ginger has written almost all the songs himself.  Initially called the Wild Hearts (two words), the band originally included singers Snake (ex-Tobruk) and Dunken F. Mullett (ex-Mournblade), who both joined for short periods. Nine demos were recorded in 1989 and 1990 with Snake singing on four and Dunken on five. These demos remain unreleased and displayed a sound resembling Guns N' Roses, with the Wildhearts sound still to be developed. Some of the demos were produced by Ric Browde and intended for an EP release that never materialized, though these demos are occasionally found on unofficial releases. In March 1991, Ginger reluctantly took over on lead vocals despite his reservations, as he has never thought himself a good singer.  After many early personnel changes, the line-up solidified around Ginger on guitar and vocals, CJ (Christopher Jagdhar) on guitar and vocals, Danny McCormack on bass and vocals, and Dogs D'Amour drummer Bam. This line-up released two EPs in 1992, Mondo Akimbo a-Go-Go and Don't Be Happy...Just Worry.
QUESTION:
What record label did they first sign with?