Chess Blues Classics 1957-67

Various Artists - Blues - Modern/Electric | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 25, 1997)
• Original Release Date: March 25, 1997
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Chess
• ASIN: B000005KQF
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #34,295 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #12 in Music > Blues > Regional Blues > Detroit Blues
  • #26 in Music > Blues > Regional Blues > Memphis Blues
  • #39 in Music > Blues > Harmonica Blues

Track Listings

1. Sitting on Top of the World

2. Fattening Frogs for Snakes

3. Key to the Highway

4. Take the Bitter With the Sweet

5. Spoonful

6. So Many Roads, So Many Trains

7. Madison Blues

8. The Red Rooster

9. You Shook Me

10. Help Me

11. Baby, What You Want Me to Do [Live]

12. My Time After Awhile

13. We're Gonna Make It

14. I Got What It Takes

15. One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer

16. I'd Rather Go Blind

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Track list with accurate credits, November 3, 2008

By 

Barb - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chess Blues Classics 1957-67 (Audio CD)

Amazon has inserted songwriter names into the track list rather than performer names. Here is how it should read:

1. Sitting on Top of the World - Howlin' Wolf
2. Fattening Frogs for Snakes - Sonny Boy Williamson
3. Key to the Highway - Little Walter
4. Take the Bitter With the Sweet - Muddy Waters
5. Spoonful - Howlin' Wolf
6. So Many Roads, So Many Trains - Otis Rush
7. Madison Blues - Elmore James
8. The Red Rooster - Howlin' Wolf
9. You Shook Me - Muddy Waters
10. Help Me - Sonny Boy Williamson
11. Baby, What You Want Me to Do (live) - Etta James
12. My Time After a While - Buddy Guy
13. We're Gonna Make It - Little Milton
14. I Got What It Takes - Koko Taylor
15. One Bourbon, One Scotch and One Beer - John Lee Hooker
16. I'd Rather Go Blind - Etta James

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Teasin' Pleaser...., June 17, 2004

By 

yygsgsdrassil "yygsgsdrassil" (Crossroads America) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chess Blues Classics 1957-67 (Audio CD)

The Chess Blues Classics. Bellisimo, Baby. Great for an intro to the Chicago style post-Delta electric blues music--heck, this is great even if you're a longtime fan. This chronicles Chess Records move to their Michigan Ave. digs and the consolidating of some of their satellite small record companies into one big happy homestead. Bass man extraordinaire Willie Dixon becomes the Chess A & R man, and these Blues? They wail, Man, they wail! Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy, Howlin', Etta, John Lee Hooker, Buddy Guy!!!! When the Buddy Guy track comes on, you notice how much smoother the recording technology, hence, the Blues itself, becomes. A Little Milton cut has sessionmen Charles Stepney on piano and Maurice White on drums. Etta James house rocks a live audience in Nashville. Willie gives a tune to KoKo Taylor. And Hooker does the Last Call...will you love this? Do you have to ask?

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars When Blues Was The Dues, June 18, 2008

By 

Alfred Johnson (boston, ma) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Chess Blues Classics 1957-67 (Audio CD)

I have recently done a few commentaries on the legendary Sun Records label that produced more than its share of both black blues and white rockabilly stars as well as a galaxy of early rock and roll idols and classic songs. If one were to ask what other record company might have had such influence in those days that natural response should be Chicago's Chess Records that caught many of the black blues artists as they headed North to reach their own stardom once the limits of what Memphis had to offer a black recording artist gave out. This album is a 50th Anniversary tribute to many of those who made stardom or, at least, were one-shot johnnies (and janes) on that label from 1957-67.

No Chess Record tribute can be complete, can moreover even be considered as such, unless the name Howlin' Wolf is mentioned. He is represented here by one of the all time great blues songs (and maybe rock and roll as well) Little Red Rooster (as well as Sitting on Top of The World). I know I flipped out the first time I heard it covered by Mick Jagger and The Rolling Stones in the early 1960's. When I heard the Wolf do it I went crazy. Others who stand out here are a litany of blues greats- Etta James, Koko Taylor, Elmore James and on and on. But here is the tip of the day. What you are getting this for is the Wolf's Little Red Rooster (okay, maybe also for Elmores's Madison Blues) and that is just fine.