Customer Reviews

I Was Walking Thorugh the Woods

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4 star:		(2)
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To this day, as curious as it might sound given his unquestionable longevity and depth of sustained feeling, there are those, actually, who cling to the faith that Buddy Guy has never truly beaten himself at his own game. This is the album which makes the argument, and it is ... near impossible to argue with it after all these years. Cut between 1960 and 1964 and issued in 1970, as part of the original "Chess Vintage Blues Series" which helped give a lot of blues newcomers their first one-stop taste of the hard classic Chicago blues (after their appetites were whetted by such acolytes as the Rolling Stones and John Mayall and the late-1960s British hotshot blues-rock stars who apprenticed with him - Eric Clapton and Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac in particular), this was spinal column-decalcifying blues which lived up to Guy's reputation as perhaps the hottest of the hotshots who made the West Side Chicago blues scene of the late 1950s-early 1960s (Junior Wells, Otis Rush, and Magic Sam sprang up from the same scene) the first serious challenge to the empire of Muddy, Sonny Boy and the Wolf.

There's an urgency to the music which almost suggests most of it was cut on the sneak - Guy, after all, was mostly employed during these years as a Chess sideman - and that urgency amplifies the holler-to-heaven of his vocals and the fluid slice of his guitar playing. It didn't hurt him that some of the crack Chicago studio men (Jack Myers, Fred Below, Lafayette Leake, Willie Dixon, and even future Earth, Wind and Fire mastermind Maurice White, then a drummer and a sharp one) were in on the action; likewise, his future best-buddy Junior Wells on three cuts - they know they've got a young gun here who can probably shoot their tails right out of the saddle, and they're smart enough to just turn on the rhythm machine and let Guy cut loose. A wall of buttery, almost soul-style saxophones punctuates several tracks (most notably, "Watch Yourself" and "My Time After Awhile") with a delicious urgency. Small wonder B.B. King was calling Guy his heir apparent at one point - the man plays here as though the only way you stop him is to break both his arms and his guitar over his head. Which, considering his facility for making two simple notes sound light years beyond anyone else's shredded two hundred, is probably what a lot of players wished they could get away with doing.

He hasn't lacked for cutting good albums in all the years since, and he remains as singular as his reputation always suggested. But even now listening to this album - and, to his one actual planned Chess album, "Left My Blues In San Francisco" - makes it only too easy to say Buddy Guy's spent his career since trying to get back to so impossible a plateau as the one he set himself here. That is how overwhelming the immediacy of this music remains. And it's no disgrace to believe he has not and will not top this, ever. He's madea... lot of excellent music trying. And he's still in his own league.

This is probably one of Buddy Guy's top three albums. It's on the Chess label so it is early Buddy Guy and not the later rock sound of Buddy Guy. This is straight Chicago blues, not rock and roll. A lot of these songs appear on the Chess collection of Buddy Guy's greatest hits but it is really worth owning the album. In my opinion, the album is a lost art today. Many bands make two good songs and fill the rest of the album with filler. There is no concern on how a current album hangs together. This album is a work of art as an album. What I mean is that you have to take the whole album as a work of art. This album is full of great songs and hangs together beautifully. If albums were rated as works of art this album (and the time in which it was made) would be comprable to Picasso's Blue Period. This is Buddy Guy's Blue or as it were Blues period and is an amazing work of art.

This is a great, great blues album. It is up there with the likes of Junior Wells Hoodoo Man Blues and it show cases all that is good with Buddy Guy and Chicagor Blues in general.

The album is short (less then 40 minutes), but intense. The supporting band is tight and this album really finds Buddy in the prime of his early career. Buddy's guitar playing and vocal styles are full of emotion and flair and the songs are a lot of fun. If you like the blues and in particular Chicago Blues this is a great album to buy.

This album brings together ten titles that George "Buddy" Guy recorded for Chess Records between 1960 and 1964. It is not an exhaustive compilation, which means that newcomers or casual listeners would be better served by the Chess compilation "Buddy's Blues - the Very Best of Buddy Guy", or Rhino's "The Very Best of Buddy Guy". But it is nevertheless a very enjoyable collection of songs from one of Buddy Guy's best periods. He is backed by Chicago blues veterans like Otis Spann, Fred Below, Jack Myers and Junior Wells, and songs like "Ten Years Ago", "Stone Crazy", "My Time After A While", the swaggering, up-tempo "Let Me Love You Baby", and the smouldering "First Time I Met The Blues", a tortured slow blues with a powerful vocal by Guy, all rank among his very best performances.

The arrangements are uniformly excellent, featuring some wonderful boogie piano playing courtesy of Otis Spann and Lafayette Leake, and, on most tracks, a small, punchy and well-scored horn ensemble. And there are a couple of very good songs here not found on either of the two above-mentioned compilations, including an alternate version of the Willie Dixon-penned slow blues "I Got A Strange Feeling", which features Jumior Wells playing gritty harmonica (the better-known version is usually titled "When My Lef Eye Jumps").
The horns, the powerful, high-energy performances, and the fact that these songs aren't tied to the traditional A-A-B blues structure, means that the material gathered on "I Was Walking Through The Woods" in many ways foreshadows the soul and soul-blues which was to evolve during the 1960s. And while I'd still advise you to pick up one of the two previously mentioned compilations as your first Buddy Guy-purchase, this one is by no means a throwaway. Great, great blues music here.

This is all you need to understand why Buddy Guy was a legend long before his duets with the likes of Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck. These sides from the early 60s just about break the mold as far as Chicago Blues is concerned. You might not like this, but then you don't like Chicago Blues. Simple as that.

This was the real deal before Blues influenced 60s Rock which, in turn, influenced latter day Blues. A great set of songs here, half of them Buddy Guy originals. If there were ever a song more representative of the genre than "Stone Crazy", I haven't heard it. If there were ever more effective Blues singing than in "I Got A Strange Feeling", I haven't heard it.

The support is excellent throughout, including some great turns on harp from Junior Wells, but the star is Buddy. As good as many of the songs are, the entry of Buddy's guitar is always a defining moment. No wonder so many legends list Guy as their primary influence.

Being from the early 60s, these recordings sound thinner than what you might be used to, but the overall sound quality is very good. All of the instruments are very clear, Buddy's guitar comes across like a bell, and there's no distortion. If you're looking for your very first purchase of a Chicago Blues album, you couldn't find a better choice.

This was my introductory album to Buddy Guy. It's early Buddy (don't expect the heavy Clapton-like guitar), but a must for any Buddy fan! I still love this disk!