Buddy Turns 90!!

Buddy Guy turned 90 on July 30th.  That's pretty amazing in itself, but the fact that the man continues to produce excellent music via new album releases or live performance is even more amazing.  I think his most recent release, Ain't Done With The Blues, might be his best release in at least 15 years.  He's still as much a force of nature on the guitar and vocals as he's ever been, still performing with a zest and energy that belies his advancing years.  He even gained a lot of attention appearing in last year's horror flick Sinners and getting a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance at this year's Oscars. 

We've written about Buddy Guy multiple times here at Friday Blues Fix, as you can see by a search of the blog.  Before you look, I apologize for some of the older posts that have messed up fonts.....I haven't figured out how to fix those....and also for those with videos that no longer play or audio clips that no longer play.....the audio clips are a major bone of contention for me since I put them on a site to share and the site shut down without allowing me to keep those files.  I haven't had time to go through all 500-something posts to make corrections, but I'm working on it......the texts within is still okay, but may be hard to read on some of the posts due to the goofy font changes.

Buddy Guy & Junior Wells - 1969 at Ann Arbor

Since we've covered him as much as we have, I thought I would skip the life story, which can be found on a couple of posts and just discuss Buddy Guy in general.  I have seen him probably as many times as I've seen any other blues artist, several times over a 20-25 year span, and he was one of the first blues guitarists I ever heard of, after B.B. King and Robert Johnson.  In articles and books about Eric Clapton, he referred to Buddy Guy numerous times, so I really wanted to hear more about him.

Back in those pre-internet days, information was hard to find and the blues itself had just started enjoying its resurgence after artists like SRV, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, and Robert Cray began to become popular.  Once that happened, some music magazines began putting blues artists on their covers and publishing articles about them.  I finally tracked down some information on Guy via a couple of magazines in the late 80's......Living Blues and Guitar Player, both of which featured cover stories on Guy.

Also in the late 80's, MCA Records began reissuing some of Chess Records' old albums.  They started with releases from Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry (at least these were the first ones I happened to see).  They also began releasing a six volume set call The Blues that really opened my eyes and ears to the Chess Records lineup and catalog.  These volumes were where I first heard Buddy Guy and Volume 1 included his song "First Time I Met The Blues."  This tune was written by Little Brother Montgomery, who played piano on the track, and was released in 1960 as a single by Chess.  All in all, it was a pretty good introduction to Buddy Guy as a singer and guitarist and it certainly made me want to hear more.

Fortunately, additional reissues started appearing and various collections, such as Atlantic Blues: Chicago, which included several tracks teaming Guy with longtime partner Junior Wells, several reissues from Vanguard Records, including his wonderful A Man and the Blues (with Otis Spann on piano) and the incredible anthology set Chicago!  The Blues!  Today!, and also Delmark Records' albums, including Hoodoo Man Blues, both teaming Guy with Wells.  Chess Records also began reissuing some of their Buddy Guy collections.  One of my favorite finds at the time, at least in my more rock music-oriented days, was Alligator Records' reissue of Guy's album Stone Crazy!, originally released as The Blues Giant on the French label Isabel.  

However, like most blues artists at the time (late 80's), Guy hadn't released any new product in several years, so I tried to round up everything that I could find.  This was a trend that I ended up following for several artists and the digging deeper into the blues really expanded my listening and my knowledge of what was out there.  I really enjoyed this aspect of the blues....I was sort of a hunter-gatherer in the blues aisles at whatever record store I could find.

Of course, again fueled by the sudden resurgence in the popularity of the blues, Buddy Guy did get to record new material, beginning in 1991 with Damn Right I Got The Blues for Silvertone Records.  By this time, I'd been able to see Guy live, first with Junior Wells at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in 1989 and with his band at the Chunky Rhythm and Blues Festival on a hot July evening in 1990.  At Chunky, my future wife and I managed to make it all the way to the front of the stage to see him in all of his electric blues guitar glory.  

On his return to the studio, I was delighted to hear one of the best songs that he performed at Chunky that night, an almost-frantic cover of Eddie Boyd's "Five Long Years" that sounded just as good as it did on the stage the previous year.  The album was loaded with covers or updated versions of songs Guy had cut previously, but that was okay because a lot of people were hearing these songs for the first time by Guy.  It was also loaded with guest stars (Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Mark Knopfler, The Memphis Horns, etc...), but it was nearly impossible to upstage Buddy Guy on this return engagement.

Since 1991, Guy has released sixteen additional albums of new material, thirteen studio and three live (one acoustic with Junior Wells, and one that included three studio tracks).  And while there were some of these (Slippin' In, Last Time Around - Live at Legends, Sweet Tea, Born to Play Guitar, and Ain't Done With the Blues) that I liked more than others, they were all good quality releases, but the ones above are the ones that I play most often.  I think Guy has settled in nicely with his current producer/songwriter/drummer Tom Hambridge.  I think Hambridge really "gets" Guy as far as a songwriter goes and the production is an ideal fit for the blues and rock audiences that hear Guy these days.  

That being said, I actually prefer the earlier stuff when I choose to listen to Buddy Guy these days.  I wasn't necessarily this way when I first started listening to him, but I've sort of moved back to the earlier recordings from the Chess and Vanguard (Guy's time with Chess and Vanguard is a bit inconsistent because they really didn't know how to utilize him, but the good stuff is great and the lesser material is still solid, but maybe dated by today's standards) sessions, plus his work with Junior Wells that was released by Atlantic in the early 70's, their various Montreux shows, and on Evidence Records.  The two of them complimented each other so well.  

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy his current releases.....I think I've listened to Ain't Done With the Blues more than any of his newer releases other than Slippin' In, but he was in a bit of a slump before teaming up with Hambridge and I don't really think it was his fault as much as people/record companies/record execs/etc....trying to take him away from what he did best.  Hambridge has more or less taken the best of the early Buddy Guy and combined it with what modern audiences like to hear without compromising his talent.....even the guest stars on selected cuts usually works really well.

Buddy Guy and Christone "Kingfish" Ingram

I actually got to see him live around 2012 and it was an interesting audience.  Guy played at the MSU-Riley Center in Meridian.  Some of the Riley Center season ticket holders at that time were older folks who usually came to make an appearance, stayed about an hour and silently slipped out.  Well, Guy came out blasting, guitar screaming, drums crashing, screaming the vocals....the band was pumped up.  I've never seen so many blue-haired ladies making their way out of the theatre after five-ten minutes.  He was 76 when he appeared at the Riley Center, probably older than some of the departing audience, and bounced around the stage like he was 20 years younger.

My point is that we are very fortunate to have Buddy Guy still with us.  There have been a few blues artists who made as long or longer than him, but he still plays with an energy and enthusiasm that's palpable to his audience and that's probably what attracted a lot of us to his music in the first place.  It's still there.  He's a direct link, one of the few left, to the Chicago blues scene of the 1950's.  That's really hard to believe for someone who started listening to the blues some 40 years ago, but he's one of the last sources.  We're lucky to have him.

I really miss a lot of others who have pass away....I still really miss B.B. King and Junior Wells for sure, and Luther Allison was another favorite.  The Rolling Stones are still making music into their early 80's, but I'm not really sure that they will be when/if their 90's roll around....you never can tell.  Meanwhile, Buddy Guy rolls on like Old Man River.  Happy Birthday, Buddy!!  Hope to see you and hear you for many more years to come!!

Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue #25

Here we are with our 25th edition of one of Friday Blues Fix's favorite topics.  As we've said before, this theme is one of the blog's oldest, dating back to FBF's early days as a weekly email sent to co-workers.  It serves as a great way to introduce new and old tunes to new and old blues fans.  

For those unfamiliar with the format, we offer a song from the early days of the blues (Something Old), a song from a recent blues artist (Something New), a blues artist covering a rock song or vice versa (Something Borrowed), and finally, someone who epitomizes the blues.....usually a legendary artist (Something Blue).  Got it?  Great, here we go...... 

For Something Old, check out Otto Virgial.  There is next to nothing on the internet about Virgial's life, other than he was born in 1906 in Lowndes County, MS and he recorded a grand total of four songs for Bluebird Records in 1935.  There aren't even any pictures of him that can be found, no info about his performing career, when he passed away, or where he lived, although two of his songs have "Rome" in them, including the song we will hear today, "Little Girl in Rome."

Virgial had to have been singing about tiny Rome, MS, which is an unincorporated community in Sunflower County on US 49W.  It's about 3 miles north of the Mississippi State Penitentiary (Parchman) and 5 miles south of Tutwiler and there are less than 200 people who live there today...they do have a post office, according to Google Maps.  

Virgial was your basic Mississippi Delta blues guitarist and singer, playing standard tuning with solid vocals, no fancy guitar play here, covering traditional blues themes about receiving a letter from his girl in Rome (he recorded the song in Chicago).  I had never heard the song until Hudspeth and Taylor covered it for their album Ridin' the Blinds, releasing it as a single.  That version led me to track down the original version on YouTube.  All four Virgial tracks can be found on Mississippi Blues Volume 4 1935 - 1955 on Document Records (which also contains tracks by Robert Johnson and Robert Lockwood Jr.).  I found three of them on the massive JSP Records 4-CD box set When the Levee Breaks (Mississippi Blues) that can be found at a nice price and contains all the pre-war Delta blues that you will ever need to hear.

photo by JB Lawrence

For Something New, we have Amani Burnham.  This 20-year-old was born in Ethiopia and raised in Connecticut, he leads a trio in the tradition of SRV and Hendrix and his sound is influenced heavily by them.  He recently released his debut album on Blind Pig Records, Roots & Wings, and it's a powerhouse from start to finish.  This track, "The Last Thing I Remember," is a terrific slow blues which features some dynamite fretwork, along with Burnham's solid vocals.

Burnham started out on drums, but moved to guitar during the lockdown, writing most of his songs for the album during that period.  He also posted videos of his playing on Instagram, where his "Hoochie Coochie Man" video earned tons of views and the attention of Blind Pig Records, who signed him in the spring of 2025.  He's an excellent songwriter and, well, the guitar work speaks for itself, so be sure and dig deeper into the music of Amani Burnham.....get on board right here at the beginning!!

For Something Borrowed, we go back to 1980, when Eric Clapton released his live album, Just One Night, then on RSO Records but later on Polydor Records.  Clapton was pretty hot on the radio back in those days, so it sold pretty well.  The big hit on the album was the live version of J.J. Cale's "Cocaine."  It got a lot of radio play in east central Mississippi.....I can safely say that.  For awhile, every time you turned on the radio, that song was playing.

I actually didn't buy Just One Night until one summer a couple of years later.  It was a pretty long album and I could play it all the way to where I was attending college when I traveled from home.  I got to hear it plenty over a couple of years driving back and forth.  This was really before I started getting into the blues, so this album helped introduce me to the music, especially Clapton's terrific take on Otis Rush's "Double Trouble."

At the time, I didn't even know that every time I drove to college I was passing through Otis Rush's birthplace Philadelphia, MS on the way.  I really didn't discover Rush's music until a couple of years later and when I heard his harrowing version on Cobra Records several years later,  I was already sold as a fan, but those Cobra sides (discussed here a few weeks back), sealed the deal on one of my favorite blues guitarists (also, listen to Rush's masterful live version of "Double Trouble" recorded at Antone's 10 Anniversary Celebration).  I must give Eric Clapton a tip of the hat for introducing me to Otis Rush's music, and so many other blues artists' music as well.

For Something Blue, you just can't go wrong with Bobby "Blue" Bland.  I mean.....hey, he has "Blue" in his name, right?  Last fall, I read Charles Farley's biography of Bland, Soul of the Man, and I recommend it to anyone who digs his music.  Via Farley's book, I learned a lot about Bland and it encouraged me to dig deeper into his recordings.  I originally heard his Malaco catalog because that was his current music when I started listening to the blues, but I dug deep into his Duke recordings after hearing his album Two Steps from the Blues, which should be in every blues fans' album collection.  

That being said, I've been digging into his ABC/Dunhill/MCA Recordings from the 70's and early 80's and, while they may not be as consistent as his earlier Duke recordings (which, truthfully, had the occasional rough patches as well), there were some fantastic tunes delivered during this period.  "I Wouldn't Treat A Dog (The Way You Treated Me)," from his Dreamer album released in 1974 was one of the best tracks from this period.  The music and the production was a bit more updated and polished than his Duke sides, but that magnificent voice is still a force to be reckoned with......this one definitely belongs with the best sides in Bobby "Blue" Bland's musical catalog.

I was fortunate enough to see Bland in April of 1990 at the annual Zoo Blues festival that was held to benefit the Jackson Zoo in Jackson, MS.  It was a pretty big lineup that featured Denise LaSalle and Delbert McClinton, but Bland closed the show and drew a huge crowd.  It was amazing how he worked the crowd and delivered his set list.  His voice had deteriorated a bit by then....he had replaced his famous squall with a snort on some songs, but that delivery was still intact and the crowd just loved it! No question that Bobby "Blue" Bland fits the bill for Something Blue!!

Friday Blues Picks (7/17/26)

I just wrapped up my reviews for this month's edition of Blues Bytes, so I wanted to let you blues lovers know about a couple more new releases that are well worth your listening time, so let's get started.....

Way back in 1987, your humble correspondent made his first trip to the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.  My friend Scotty called me as I was getting off work and told me he had two tickets for the midnight show on the Riverboat President, a show featuring the Fabulous Thunderbirds (my favorite band at the time) with special guests Bonnie Raitt, Lazy Lester, Katie Webster, Dr. John, Duke Robillard, Rockin' Sidney, and the Roomful of Blues horn section.

Now, I had never even been to New Orleans in my 23+ years of existence, so I was anxious to see the show and take in the festival and the city.  We got there in time to look around the city a bit and get on board the President.  John Lee Hooker opened the show with a solo set that was awesome and then the Thunderbirds came on.  The show was set up like an revue, with each guest getting to do a couple of songs and moving on to the next act.  

Near the end, the Roomful horns took the stage and I was really impressed with them, particularly their charismatic tenor sax man, Greg Piccolo.  They put on a great show.  I saw the entire Roomful of Blues band at the Fairgrounds the next day, where they backed Earl King, having backed him on King's Black Top Records release, Glazed.  Their performances led me to check out some of their recordings, where I was surprised that Piccolo not only played sax, but sang and served as the de facto leader of the band.  

Piccolo wrote some songs on several of Roomful's releases, even cutting his own solo album for Black Top in 1990, Heavy Juice, before he departed for a solo career in the mid 90's, leading his own band, also called Heavy Juice.  Now 75, he's released several albums since going solo and also plays with Heavy Juice and his Greg Piccolo Jazz Trio in addition to sitting in with other artists, but he recently released his sixth album, Who Knows What The Future Holds (MoMojo Records).

This release (produced by Terry Manning, who passed away soon after sending the first mix for review) focuses more on Piccolo's songwriting and his vocals.  The songs cover a variety of styles from the jump blues that Roomful of Blues is renowned for, to old time rock n' roll, classic R&B, soul, and a bit of jazz.  Don't worry, there's plenty of Piccolo's tenor sax as well, but he does a great job with vocals, showing a lot of range over the various styles.

Providing standout support for Piccolo are Shinichi Otsu (keys), Dean Shot (guitar), Paul Tomasello (bass), with horns from Al Gomez and Mark "Kaz" Kazanoff of the Texas Horns.  This is an entertaining set that shows Piccolo to be a talented songwriter and singer as well as a first-call tenor sax man....a great album of classic blues and R&B.

Blues fans may not be familiar with Ryan "Bluwrath" Newman but, trust me, you soon will be.  Newman was a young guitar prodigy, learning all of The Beatles tunes before he was seven years old, but he was introduced to Jimi Hendrix as an eight-year-old, and when he first heard "The Wind Cries Mary," his future as a blues guitarist was set.  He was reportedly asked to leave the Berklee School of Music for playing too loud, but he has developed into a first-rate blues and rock guitarist influenced by Hendrix, SRV, B.B. and Albert King, John Mayer, and Jeff Beck, while crafting his own unique playing style.  

Wrath of Blues (Feverbarn Records) is Newman's debut release and it's pretty awesome.  He covers several well-known blues classics along the way on these 14 tracks, from the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan to B.B. and Albert King to Jeff Beck, Earl King, Aretha Franklin, Mose Allison, and Hoagy Carmichael(!).  He even covers "Texas Flood" and "Dust My Broom".....and his versions of these tunes manages to acknowledge the original sources as well as presenting his own personal approach to each one.  He's also a pretty good singer, though he does use several other vocalists on three or four songs.....keyboardist Vic Washington and singers Arlene Wow and Anita Antoinette. Newman also wrote one of the songs on the album, a nice slow blues that's really well done.

Newman currently fronts Righteous Continental, a power blues trio who appears on one of the tracks here.  He also plays with The Incredible Amplifires, whose harmonica player guests on one track.  The remainder of the band is considerable with additional guitars, horns, keys, bass and drums.  However, the large cast doesn't take away from the talents of this powerful new guitarist, who should be raising eyebrows for an extended time to come.  This is one that blues and blues-rock fans definitely need to investigate.

Another new band, The Shaelyn Band, was formed in 2020 in Florida and has enjoyed some success touring the eastern part of the U.S. and making it to the semi-finals in the 2024 I.B.C. in 2024.  They are fronted by Shaelyn Mulberry, who is a dynamite vocalist.  She and drummer Tim Mulberry also wrote all 14 of the songs on their third release, appropriately titled Chapter 3 (House of Berry Productions).  The five piece band also includes guitarist Eric Guess, Moses Maldonado (trombone), Isaiah Gaytan (trumpet), Curtis Harris (bass), plus backing vocalist Win Carlson.

The songs are more or less modern updates on traditional blues topics and the band does an outstanding job throughout.  Shaelyn's vocals are the real story here.  She's quite talented and moves easily between blues, funk, rock and soul, with a couple of tracks that take on a countrified southern rock feel.  I haven't heard the band's previous two releases, but listening to Chapter 3 may lead me to check those albums out.....this is a rock-solid set of blues and soul from a fine band and vocalist.

Our Blast From The Past this week is not an album.  It's a book that I've been trying to track down for several years.  I first encountered Robert Ealey on his two releases for Black Top Records (Turn Out the Lights and I Like Music When I Party).  He was one of the most interesting vocalists I'd ever heard at the time.  He was also mentioned in Alan B Govenar's enlightening and essential book Texas Blues:  The Rise of a Contemporary Sound, along with several other Dallas/Fort Worth musicians.  

Over time, I had heard about Robert Ealey and His Five Careless Lovers, a Fort Worth band that never made it to the studio, but were a tremendous influence that's felt even to this day.  Their only recording was a 1971 live release, Live at the New Blue Bird Nite Club (produced by a young T-Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton) that's available on LP or via streaming and it was a long sought-after collector's item until Record Town Records (which was owned by the Bruton family) reissued it in 2021.

Author Joe Nick Patoski, who's written biographies of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Willie Nelson, and Selena, as well as a history of the Dallas Cowboys. grew up in Fort Worth and was an eyewitness to the short-lived history of this band, which consisted of Ealey (vocals), the Reverend Good Rockin' Ralph Owens (keyboards), Freddie Cisneros (guitar), Sumter Bruton (guitar), Jackie Newhouse (bass) and Mike Buck (drums).  In 2020, Patoski wrote The Ballad of Robert Ealey and His Five Careless Lovers, which is an oral history narrated by Cisneros (who went on to play with Jimmy Don Smith and the Cold Cuts and his own band The Sheetrockers), Bruton (who joined Ealey in the Juke Jumpers and also ran Record Town until the family sold it in 2018), Newhouse (who later played with Stevie Ray Vaughan, Anson Funderburgh, the Leroi Brothers and Alan Haynes), and Buck (who co-founded the Leroi Brothers, played drums for the Fabulous Thunderbirds and the Texas Mavericks and currently co-owns Antone's with his wife, guitarist Eve Monses).

The band stayed together in its original form until Buck exited in 1975 and it eventually dissolved a couple of years later, but the recollections shared by the surviving members (Ealey died in 2001 and Owens passed in 2006) are priceless, from how the band came together, their numerous gigs in the Fort Worth area, stories of their numerous supporters, and all the close calls and near-misses they endured over their short history.  The book is relatively slim, but is loaded with rare pictures of the band in action and stories that you probably won't see anywhere else. 

As Patoski put it in the introduction:

"This was genuine Texas blues, the hometown stuff those British bands had been stealing from and sending back to American youth for the past decade.  Only unlike the Brits, this was the real deal, skipping along a gliding rhythm called the Fort Worth Shuffle.  Ain't seen anything like it since."

If you're a fan of Texas blues, particular the DFW brand, you need to read this book.  Here's Patoski and some of the surviving members talking about Robert Ealey back in 2020 promoting the upcoming release of the album that should give you a taste of what's in the book as well.

Friday Blues Picks (7/10/26)

Here are a couple of upcoming releases that blues fans should have on their radar.....some cool releases to battle this serious summer heat.

One of the earliest blues artists that I was aware of was Taj Mahal.  His records were always prominent in record stores and I can remember seeing him on television when I was in high school before I even got into the blues.  Over the years, Mahal has incorporated reggae, jazz, and soul into his repertoire and he does all of them exceedingly well.  He's never really stood still as far as his music goes......always trying out new sounds or improving on what he's already mastered.

During the late 90's and early 2000's, Taj Mahal & the Phantom Blues Band won back-to-back Grammys for two excellent albums (1998's Senor Blues and 2000's Shoutin' in Key).  The PBB has toured frequently with Mahal since then, but are also a working band by themselves, having released several great albums of their own.  Mahal recently released Time (Resonatin' Records/Thirty Tiger), which is taken from sessions recorded back in 2010 with the PBB, other than keyboardist Mike Finnigan who is replaced by Jon Cleary and Mick Weaver on piano and organ respectively.

If you're familiar with Taj Mahal's music, you know it will be a mix of blues, soul, reggae, jazz, and anything else that comes to mind during the recording process.  There are some really good songs among these ten tracks....a few of my favorites are Mahal's reworking of Bob Marley's "Talkin' Blues," which features co-lead vocals from Ziggy Marley, Bob's son, Mahal's cover of "Ask Me 'Bout Nothing (But The Blues)," the Bobby "Blue" Bland classic, and the wonderful title track, written by Bill Withers, but never recorded.....Mahal and producer Steve Berkowitz (who worked with Withers and brought the song to the session) got permission from Withers' widow to include it on the album.  I'm not sure why Withers never recorded the song, or for that matter why Taj Mahal never released Time until now, but I'm sure glad both things happened and blues fans will be, too.

Sherri Harding is a Canadian soul singer and she recorded her previous album, A Million Pieces, in Muscle Shoals.  That effort was successful, so for her latest album, Storyland (Instant Replay Music), she brought some of Muscle Shoals to Ottawa in the form of guitarist Kevin Holley, who backed Little Richard and the Amazing Rhythm Aces, among others.  She also used the Muscle Shoals horns, who recorded their tracks in Muscle Shoals.  

All this being said, it wouldn't mean a thing if Ms. Harding didn't have the voice to put in front of the music, and she certainly has that.  It's not the over-the-top variety vocal style that is sometimes prevalent in modern blues.  She sings with a easy, confident assurance and listeners actually hear and understand the vocals.  I really enjoyed her delivery on all of these songs, which were written by Richard Cooper, who also produced.

The songs are a mix of soul, blues, a bit of jazz, and R&B thrown in.  She sound great on all of them, but she really has a way with the blues and soul-flavored tracks are standout, particularly "Down In The Shoals," which really captures the swamp, soulful essence of the Muscle Shoals sound.  This is a great release with fine work from Harding and the entire band.  

We'll look at a couple more new releases next week but meanwhile, another cool release that I recently found in the "Blast from the Past" department is a collection of the early recordings of Earl Hooker.  We profiled Hooker many years ago on the blog, but all you need to know is that Hooker was one of the finest guitarist to ever play the blues.  His slide guitar was just amazing and he was incredibly creative as a player with a clear and distinctive style, comfortable playing blues, jazz, country, and even rockabilly.  He wasn't as confident with his singing as he was with his playing, so he often backed other singers in Chicago, but he was a decent vocalist himself.  Hooker also battled tuberculosis for most of his life, which caused gaps in his playing career and eventually took his life at the too-young age of 40 in 1970.

A couple of years ago, the UK label Jasmine Records released The Electrifying Blues Guitar of Earl Hooker:  Ride Hooker Ride 1953 - 1962.  Hooker's recordings for Chief, Profile, and Age Records have been pretty well-documented over the years (see Paula Records' Blue Guitar) and they are often considered his best work.  Most of them are included in this set, but the real treat with this set is the inclusion of 17 of his earliest recordings, several of which have never been issued on CD prior to this album.  That includes ten tracks Hooker recorded for Sun Records with Pinetop Perkins on piano, Willie Nix on drums, and Boyd Gilmore on one vocal in 1953.

The sound on these recordings is actually better than the Chief, Profile, and Age tracks that are on the Paula release and Hooker is backed by a pretty impressive group of performers including Perkins, Nix, and Gilmore, Junior Wells, Johnny "Big Moose' Walker, A.C. Reed, Lafayette Leake, Fred Below, and Reggie Boyd.  The instrumentals are just dynamite and find Hooker playing blues, country, and rockabilly.  Two of the noteworthy previously unissued tracks are "Steel Guitar Rag" and "The Huckabuck," and it makes you wonder what in the world Sam Phillips was thinking when he put these songs on the shelf.  If you are a fan of blues guitar, then you need some Earl Hooker in your collection and this is a great place to get started.