ELVIS – NBC – TV SPECIAL (LP) (US) RCA LPM 4088 Released: December 1968

(29 votes, average: 3.38 out of 5)

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Howlin’ Wolf – “The Real Folk Blues” Recorded in Chicago, Illinois between 1956 & 1965. (In the mid-’60s, Chess Records released a great series of compilations by some of its best blues artists, all of them called THE REAL FOLK BLUES) “Killing Floor,” “Built for Comfort”,”Three Hundred Pounds of Joy”, “Natchez Burning,” “Tail Dragger” and more.

Personnel: Howlin’ Wolf (vocals, guitar, harmonica); Hubert Sumlin*, Willie Johnson, Otis “Smokey” Smothers, Jody Williams (guitar); J.T. Brown (tenor saxophone); Donald Hankins (baritone saxophone); Johnny Jones, Lafayette Leake, Hosea Lee Kennard (piano); Willie Dixon, Buddy Guy, Andrew Palmer (bass); Sammy Lay, Earl Phillips, Junior Blackman (drums).

“Howlin’ Wolf ranks among the most electrifying performers in blues history, as well as one of its greatest characters. He was a ferocious, full-bodied singer whose gruff, rasping vocals embodied the blues at its most unbridled. A large man who stood more than six feet tall and weighed nearly 300 pounds, Howlin’ Wolf cut an imposing figure, which he utilized to maximum effect when performing. Howlin’ Wolf cut his greatest work in the Fifties for the Chicago-based Chess Records. Many songs with which he is most closely identified – “Spoonful,”  “Back Door Man,”  “Little Red Rooster”  and “I Ain’t Superstitious”  – were written for him by bluesmen Willie Dixon, a fixture at Chess Records who also funneled material to Wolf’s main rival, Muddy Waters. Howlin’ Wolf himself was an estimable songwriter, responsible for such raw classics as “Killing Floor,”  “Smokestack Lightning”  and “Moanin’ at Midnight.” 

In 1910, Howlin’ Wolf was born on a Mississippi plantation in the midst of a blues tradition so vital it remains the underpinning for much of today’s popular music. His birth name was Chester Arthur Burnett; “Howlin’ Wolf”  was a nickname he picked up in his youth. He was exposed to the blues from an early age through such performers as Charley Patton and Willie Brown, who performed at plantation picnics and juke joints. Wolf derived his trademark howl from the “blue yodel”  of country singer Jimmy Rodgers whom he admired. Although he sang the blues locally, it wasn’t until he moved to West Memphis in 1948 that he put together a full-time band. Producer Sam Phillips recorded Howlin’ Wolf at his Memphis Recording Service (later Sun Records) after hearing him perform on radio station KWEM. Some of the material was leased to Chess Records, and in the early Fifties Howlin’ Wolf signed with Chess and moved to Chicago. He remained there until his death. (The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

*On a personal note, I just saw Hubert Sumlin playing an all Howlin’ Wolf set with a group including David Johansen and James Blood Ulmer – it killed!

(28 votes, average: 4.36 out of 5)

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Have you met Miss Jones?   This is “the great” Grace Bumbry from Kerstan in Germany.

(22 votes, average: 4.05 out of 5)

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“LP Cover Lover” is a great site! I really enjoy it. Maybe you can use this little gem from Germany. There’s no year on it, but I guess it’s from the early sixties. “Tanzmusik fà ¼r die reife Jugend” means “Dance Music For The Mature Youth”. The picture on the cover shows how much fun the mature youth is having. The music is played by “Karlchen’s Ballhaus-Rhythmiker”. You could translate it with “Little Carl’s Dance Hall Rhythmicians” . They surely know their foxtrot, tango, polka, waltz, and even samba! There are many gorgeous details. The booze in the foreground, the windmill on the painting in the background, the fancy black dress of the woman in the foreground. The dancing couple… Wouldn’t we all like to be invited to such a party?”   Regards, Jan Derrer (Switzerland)

(21 votes, average: 4.05 out of 5)

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Grace and Wilbur Thrush — “Rapture!”

(24 votes, average: 2.92 out of 5)

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Champion Jack Dupree. Atlantic Records. 1961.

(20 votes, average: 3.80 out of 5)

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Steppenwolf’s second record.   1968.   Includes “Magic Carpet Ride”.

(27 votes, average: 3.56 out of 5)

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Thanks to Laura Levine for this very cool one (that I’ve never seen): “Thought you might enjoy this one. (Brooklyn!) At first I thought it must be a Harvey cover as well, but the credit on the back cover reads PANCHO PACHECO. (?)“

(29 votes, average: 2.69 out of 5)

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“Color Blind” is a straightforward slice of Texas blues-rock. Out of place on International Artists, the psych label of The Thirteenth Floor Elevators, etc. but a surprisingly hidden gem of roadhouse rock from the late sixties.

(16 votes, average: 2.56 out of 5)

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“Did You Ever Hear The Blues?” BIG MILLER (1922-1992) does “deep blues” by Langston Hughes. United Artists.

Clarence Horatio Miller’s first influence in music came from his father’s church but he also heard the blues sung by men working on the railroad. In the 30s, while still a student, he formed a band, but with the outbreak of World War II he joined the army. After serving in the Pacific and in Europe, he began entertaining his fellow soldiers. In 1949 he joined Lionel Hampton’s band, then had a five-year spell with Jay McShann. Miller had a commanding style and his rich voice lent itself especially well to the material he favoured. His influences in the blues were Joe Turner, Jimmy Rushing, T-Bone Walker and Jimmy Witherspoon, whom he followed into the McShann band. He also admired the ballad style of Billy Eckstine. Miller’s abiding interest in the blues was such that writer-poet Langston Hughes wrote a series of songs especially for him.

Langston Hughes (1902 – 1967) published more than three dozen books during his life, starting out with poetry and then expanding into novels, short stories, and plays. He is closely associated with the Harlem Renaissance, the flowering of African-American literature and music in New York City following World War One, but he wrote poetry, books, and newspaper columns right through into the 1960s. Hughes’s work often spoke plainly about the lives of ordinary black people, which in later years earned him a reputation as one of the major black voices of the 1900s. His works include the poetry volumes The Weary Blues (1926) and Shakespeare in Harlem (1942), the novel Not Without Laughter (1930), and the short story collection The Ways of White Folks (1934). He wrote two personal memoirs: The Big Sea (1940) and I Wonder as I Wander (1956).

(19 votes, average: 4.63 out of 5)

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