It’s been 45 years since Hound Dog Taylor & The Houserockers entered a Chicago recording studio to cut the album that would change the face of American music forever. That self-titled release came out in August 1971 and launched an American institution, Alligator Records. Label boss Bruce Iglauer ran the operation from an efficiency apartment in the Windy City. In the subsequent decades, his imprint would issue roughly 300 titles, including releases from Koko Taylor, Albert Collins, Luther Allison, and Lil’ Ed and The Blues Imperials, among many, many others. When quality blues records were hard to come by and majors turned their attention to the latest fashions, Iglauer stuck it out, giving a loyal fan base music they didn’t know they were missing. To see the Alligator logo on an album’s spine meant you were getting something handpicked from a friend who loved that music as much as you did. Maybe even more.
2016 live archive release from the southern rockers. Live From A&R Studios: New York, August 26, 1971 was initially a radio broadcast that originally aired on WPLJ. This set features the band steamrolling through a set of songs including "Statesboro Blues, " "Trouble No More, " "One Way Out, " "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" and "Hot 'lanta." The recording was widely bootlegged, but has been remixed from the original multi-track recording. The quality, dynamic performance and ambience encompassed herein all at once make for a quite staggering sonic experience, one that fans of this legendary act in it's original line-up will relish alongside the groups other essential releases.