Howlin' Wolf Moanin' In The Moonlight (1962)

Howlin' Wolf's first and second Chess albums are essential listening of the highest order. They were compiled - as were all early blues albums - from various single sessions (not necessarily a bad thing, either), and blues fans will probably debate endlessly about which of the two albums is the perfect introduction to his music. But this CD reissue renders all arguments moot, as both album appear on one disc, making this a true best buy. Wolf's debut opus – curiously tacked on here after his second album - features all of his early hits ("How Many More Years," "Moanin' at Midnight," "Smokestack Lightning," "Forty Four," "Evil," and "I Asked for Water [She Gave Me Gasoline]"), and is a pretty potent collection in its own right. But it is the follow-up (always referred to as "the rocking chair album" because of Don Bronstein's distinctive cover art) where the equally potent teaming of Willie Dixon and Wolf produced one Chicago blues classic…

Chester Arthur Burnett, known as Howlin' Wolf, was a Chicago blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player, originally from Mississippi. With a booming voice and looming physical presence, he is one of the best-known Chicago blues artists. Musician and critic Cub Koda noted, "no one could match Howlin' Wolf for the singular ability to rock the house down to the foundation while simultaneously scaring its patrons out of its wits." Producer Sam Phillips recalled, "When I heard Howlin' Wolf, I said, 'This is for me. This is where the soul of man never dies'". Several of his songs, including "Smokestack Lightnin'", "Back Door Man", "Killing Floor" and "Spoonful", have become blues and blues rock standards. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 51 on its list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time."

Howlin' Wolf's second album brings together some of the blues great's best singles from the late '50s and early '60s. Also available as a fine two-fer with his debut, Moanin' in the Moonlight, the so-called Rockin' Chair Album represents the cream of Wolf's Chicago blues work. Those tracks afforded classic status are many, including "Spoonful," "The Red Rooster," "Wang Dang Doodle," "Back Door Man," "Shake for Me," and "Who's Been Talking?" Also featuring the fine work of Chess house producer and bassist Willie Dixon and guitarist Hubert Sumlin, Rockin' Chair qualifies as one of pinnacles of early electric blues, and is an essential album for any quality blues collection.

In its original form, Crown's Howlin' Wolf Sings the Blues LP was a patchwork compilation of sides cut for the Modern label in 1951-1952, including three songs that had previously showed up on RPM singles, a bunch of outtakes not released on 45, and a couple instrumentals that weren't even the work of Howlin' Wolf himself. The material hails from that confusing junction in his discography where his first Memphis recordings were being leased to both Modern and Chess, which is why material from that era has tended to get released on different labels. Certainly the Wolf's Modern sessions could have been better represented than they were by this 1962 album, but it's still groundbreaking early electric blues, though not quite up to the peaks he'd scale with his best Chess sessions of the mid-'50s to the mid-'60s…