Customer Reviews

Chess Blues Classics 1957-67

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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

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?

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.

Like its companion volume, "Chess Blues Classics 1947-1956", this CD offers some of the best tracks by some of the best blues musicians of Chicago's famed Chess label.
One or two selections are debatable, and "Chess Blues Classics" is of no interest to the more experienced blues fan in that it doesn't include any rarities. But if you're a newcomer and would like to explore classic electric blues, this is a very fine place to start doing so.

"Chess Blues Classics 1957-1967" includes two excellent cuts by harp legend Aleck 'Rice' Miller (Sonny Boy Williamson II), namely "Help Me" and the magnificent "Fattening Frogs For Snakes", as well as fine selections by John Lee Hooker, Buddy Guy, and legendary bluesmen Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and slide guitarist Elmore James. And Otis Rush's too rarely heard "So Many Roads, So Many Trains", with its smouldering slow guitar solo, is here as well.

Several of these tracks count among the greatest electric blues performances ever issued, including Howlin' Wolf's "Little Red Rooster" and John Lee Hooker's "One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer".
4 1/2 stars. A great place to start.

Brings together a very strong collection of the best blues artists of the era. Really enjoyed listening to the masters perform at their craft. Like to see more of their work in a combined format.

This is a great primer of Chess artists and songs but a better one is the 2 CD set called "Willie Dixon, the Chess Box." Willie wrote, produced, and played bass on Muddy Water's "Hoochie Coochie Man'", "I Just Want to Make Love to You", "Little Red Rooster" and "You Need Love", (which Led Zepplin ripped off and called Whole Lotta Love. (Willie sued them for copyright infringement and won.) Howlin Wolf's "Back Door Man", I Ain't Superstitious", "Spoonful", and "Little Red Rooster." Little Walter's "My Babe" and "Dead Presidents." Bo Diddley's "You Can't Judge a Book by it's Cover." Koko Taylor's "Wang Dang Doodle" and many others. Willie Dixon WAS Chess records, even more than Leonard and Phil.

I bought this CD 4 years ago, not knowing a whole lot about the blues, and it is now one of my favorite albums. An excellent anthology of the classic blues. Anyone who considers themselves a music fan should listen to this CD.

A short and sweet review:

If you like Chicago Blues but don't know a whole lot about them, this isn't a bad compilation. But if you prefer the accoustic sound of real Southern blues, especially Delta Blues, you're going to be very disappointed. This is NOT Robert Johnson's blues. This sounds loud...it sounds electric...it sounds BIG. Rock 'n' Roll evolved directly from the Chicago Blues sound in the mid-50s, and the music here actually demonstrates a backwards flow...in the late-50s and early-60s, Chicago Blues was being influenced by the Rock 'n' Roll it had spawned a few years earlier.

There's nothing wrong with that...as long as you like that sound. This reviewer doesn't.