Muddy.people

Of all the post-Fathers & Sons attempts at updating Muddy's sound in collaboration with younger white musicians, this album worked best because they let Muddy be himself, producing music that compared favorably to his concerts of the period, which were wonderful. His final album for Chess (recorded at Levon Helm's Woodstock studio, not in Chicago), with Helm and fellow Band-member Garth Hudson teaming up with Muddy's touring band, it was a rocking (in the bluesy sense) soulful swansong to the label where he got his start. Muddy covers some songs he knew back when (including Louis Jordan's "Caldonia" and "Let The Good Times Roll"), plays some slide, and generally has a great time on this Grammy-winning album. This record got lost in the shuffle between the collapse of Chess Records and the revival of Muddy's career under the auspices of Johnny Winter, and was forgotten until 1995. The CD contains one previously unreleased number, "Fox Squirrel".

William “Big Bill” Morganfield was born on June 19th, 1956 in Chicago, Illinois. Raised solely by his grandmother, he moved to south Florida early in his life. His father, McKinley Morganfield is better known as Muddy Waters, the Father of modern Chicago blues. Despite his father’s fame and talent, Big Bill Morganfield had little contact with him throughout his life, and built up his impressive career on his own. “Big Bill” Morganfield did not start his personal career until after receiving two bachelor degrees in English and Communications and becoming a teacher. After his father passed away in 1983, he began to take music seriously, refocusing his life on these goals. Still maintaining a career as a teacher, he spent several years focusing on the craft of blues guitar and then made a strong professional debut in 1996 with his group The Stone Cold Blues Band.

As the subtitle suggests, Space Hymn: The Complete Capitol Recordings (2003) contains all the material that Lothar & the Hand People cut during their three-year association with the label. The long-players Presenting… Lothar and the Hand People (1968) as well as Space Hymn (1969) are featured on this two-disc compendium, as well as the singles issued prior to their debut LP. Although Paul Conley (synthesizer/keyboards/Moog synthesizer), John Emelin (vocals/voices), Tom Flye (drums/percussion), Rusty Ford (bass), and Kim King (guitar/Moog synthesizer/amplifiers) were products of the fertile New York City rock & roll scene of the mid-'60s, the combo made their way via Denver, Colorado circa 1965…

James Yancey Jones, aka the Tail Dragger, Arkansas born and Chicago based. A Howlin' Wolf devotee, he even apes the Wolf's deep, gruff voice on occasion. But he has a distinctive, oak-solid voice of his own, singing and shouting his way through these 11 numbers, seven of which he wrote. Guitarists Rockin' Johnny, Johnny B. Moore, and Jimmy Dawkins are on one cut, and harmonicists Billy Branch and Martin Lang, bassist Aron Burton, and drummers Baldhead Pete and Rob Lorenz help out on others, all in tune with the Dragger's feverish notions. Primarily a pleader asking forgiveness for mean mistreating, he has the ultimate blues experience talking about love won and lost, wondering why, and stating his case…