As previously mentioned, this was originally a six-volume series when released on LP in the 70's. Volume 1 of the LP series featured Jimmy Johnson, Eddie Shaw, and Left Hand Frank and Volume 2 included Carey Bell, Magic Slim, and Big Moose Walker. When shifting to the CD format, Bell's set was added to Volume 1 and two artists from the Volume 3 LP (Lonnie Brooks and Pinetop Perkins) were added to the Volume 2 CD, so only one group from the first three volumes didn't make it onto the first two CD volumes - nothing like "not making the cut" or anything like that....they would get their chance in the next CD volume, which was released at the same time. There was no two-year gap, like the LP's....three in 1978 and three in 1980.
So, Volume 2's artists were The Lonnie Brooks Band, Johnny "Big Moose" Walker, Magic Slim and the Teardrops, and Pinetop Perkins featuring Sammy Lawhorn (Lawhorn was billed on the LP, for some reason, but not on the cassette or CD format issued in the early 90's). Each act got four songs to show their talents, and each act took full advantage and made an impression.
Growing up in Louisiana and Texas, Brooks got to hear many of the great blues bands at the time, including T-Bone Walker, Gatemouth Brown, B.B. King, and others, but he got his first job as a guitarist with Clifton Chenier, the King of Zydeco, and he really loved the New Orleans R&B of Fats Domino and Little Richard. Once he got to Chicago, he began to add more blues to his repertoire and managed to combine aspects of all the music he loved into his brand of blues, giving him a unique sound.
Brooks recorded a couple more sides as Guitar Jr., but changed his stage name to Lonnie Brooks since there was already a Guitar Jr. in Chicago (Luther Johnson, Jr., who we'll hear from later in the series), and formed his own band, playing regularly on the South and West sides of the city and into Indiana, cutting sides for various labels, and eventually an album that's now a collector's item.
Brooks' band for the Alligator session included Bob Levis (second guitar), Rob Waters (keyboards), Harlan Terson (bass), and Casey Jones (drums). The opening track is a pretty faithful cover of "Don't Answer The Door," originally recorded by Jimmy Johnson in 1964 on Magnum Records, and later covered by B.B. King, Phil Guy, and Melvin Taylor, among others. The remainder of his tracks are all originals, a couple of which remained part of his act for most of his life, "Two Headed Man," "Cold, Lonely Nights." The closer, "Move Over Little Dog," was reminiscent of his earlier recordings - a mix of blues, R&B, and rock n' roll.
Brooks would go on to work for Alligator for the rest of his career, recording eight albums for the label, beginning with 1979's Bayou Lightning and wrapping up with 1999's Lone Star Shootout, a collaboration with Long John Hunter and Phillip Walker. He passed away in 2017 at 83, but his sons, Ronnie Baker Brooks and Wayne Baker Brooks are fine blues guitarists in their own right, with Ronnie recently releasing his own album on Alligator, the excellent Blues In My DNA.
After a stint in the army during the Korean War, he recorded several sides that didn't sell, but still worked a lot over the next 20 years behind Earl Hooker, Elmore James, Otis Rush, Sunnyland Slim, Muddy Waters (playing bass), Ricky Allen, Howlin' Wolf, Eddie Shaw, and Junior Wells, backing him on "Messin' With The Kid." He played on memorable tracks with Muddy Waters ("You Shook Me") and Elmore James ("Shake Your Moneymaker") in the 60's. He also recorded with Earl Hooker, Son Seals, and Rush and, in the 70's, he backed Jimmy Dawkins, Mighty Joe Young, and Louis Myers, and released his own album on ABC Records in 1970.
On his Alligator sessions, Walker was backed by Myers on guitar, Bob Stroger on bass, and Chris Moss on drums. Walker was a master on the keyboards and his vocal style was warm and relaxed. His set list included a Willie Dixon track (the rollicking "Would You, Baby"), one from Joe Josea and Jules Taub (the driving "Sunnyland Blues") and two Walker originals (the slow blues "Worry, Worry" and "Cry, Cry Darling"). The latter two feature some nice fretwork from Myers as well as Walker's stellar piano.
Walker continued to record and perform, his second album was released in the mid 80's, but he suffered a stroke in 1991 and subsequent strokes left him unable to perform. He died in a Chicago nursing home in 1999 at age 72. Despite his lack of recordings, the ones he did release are all worth hearing and it's sad that he wasn't better known than he was, but his appearance here did increase his standing in the blues world for sure.
Slim was born Morris Holt in Torrence, MS in 1937, where he first picked up the guitar at age 11. His family later moved to nearby Grenada, where he learned more guitar from a schoolmate named Sam Maghett. Later, he followed Sam, now known as Magic Sam, to Chicago and became his bass player. Sam gave Holt (who was tall and skinny at the time) his nickname of Magic Slim, but Slim soon became frustrated with his lack of opportunity...he wanted to play guitar and lead his own band and just wasn't good enough at the time.
Slim moved back to Grenada, where he drove a truck and worked on his music, teaching his brothers Nick and Douglas to play. They formed a band and played throughout the Grenada area. In the mid 60's, he returned to Chicago and reformed the Teardrops, the band he had been playing with before he moved back to Mississippi and began working a number of clubs in the Windy City, becoming one of the tightest bands in town.
The 1978 edition of the Teardrops included Slim's brother, Nick Holt, on bass, Coleman "Daddy Rabbit" Pettis on second guitar, and Joel Poston on drums. Their four-song setlist included several songs that became regular selections on Slim's future albums, "Stranded On The Highway," "Dirty Mother For You," and "Spider In My Stew." The last tune was Jimmy Reed's "Don't Say That No More," which was as good as those tunes that preceded it.
Slim went on to become one of Chicago's most prolific blues recording artists, with albums on Rooster Blues and Blind Pig Records in the U.S., Wolf Records and Black and Blue in Europe, and even a collection of French recordings that ended up on the Alligator album Raw Magic not long after these sessions. I probably have more Magic Slim recordings that any other blues artist and they are always top notch...his musical repertoire was amazing and his live sets are always entertaining.
Slim moved to Lincoln, Nebraska in the mid-90's, home of the Zoo Bar, which was the source for five excellent live releases for the band, and continued to record and perform until his death in 2013 at age 75.
In Helena, Perkins eventually joined Robert Nighthawk's radio program on KFFA before switching to Sonny Boy Williamson's King Biscuit Time radio show, where he stayed for a while. He did continue to play with Nighthawk and backed the slide master on his 1950 Chess side, "Jackson Town Gal." He soon joined Earl Hooker and toured with him, recording Clarence "Pinetop" Smith's "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie" for Sam Phillips' Sun Records in 1953). Perkins learned to play piano by listening to Smith's old records, and his association with "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie" earned him his nickname.
Perkins moved to Illinois and left the music business for a number of years before he rejoined Hooker, backing the guitarist on an Arhoolie Records album in 1968. Near the end of the decade, he joined Muddy Waters' band after Otis Spann left in 1969. He backed Waters for ten years before forming the Legendary Blues Band with Waters drummer Willie "Big Eyes" Smith in the late 70's, and they played together through the early 90's, recording several albums for Rounder Records.
Prior to Perkins' association with the Legendary Blues Band, the piano man had released an album for the French Black & Blue label in 1976 and these superb four tracks for Living Chicago Blues in 1978...a terrific cover of Willie Love's "Take It Easy, Baby," Avery Parrish's slow burning "Blues After Hours," Memphis Slim's "Little Angel Child," and J.B. Lenoir's boisterous "How Much More Long."
Perkins' amiable vocals and nimble keyboards are backed by a fine band of Waters alumni - Sammy Lawhorn and Luther "Guitar Junior" Johnson on guitars, Calvin Jones on bass, and Willie "Big Eyes" Smith on drums.
In 1980, Perkins, Smith, Jones, and Johnson (with guitarist Bob Margolin and harmonica player Jerry Portnoy) quit Waters' band over a salary dispute and all except Margolin and Johnson formed The Legendary Blues Band. Perkins eventually became a solo artist and recorded multiple albums over the next 25 years, remaining active until his death in March of 2011 at the age of 97.
So there you have Volume 2 of Living Chicago Blues. Three of the four artists featured on this set went on to have lucrative recording and performing careers....sadly Walker's subsequent health issues rendered him unable to capitalize like the others. Looking back, it's hard to imagine that prior to this volume's release, Lonnie Brooks, Magic Slim, and Pinetop Perkins would have had to have been considered underrecorded. Thanks to this release, their fortunes changed. Stay tuned for a future post looking at the third volume of this indispensible series.
