Buddy+guy

Considering the troubled background of this album (Eric Clapton, Ahmet Ertegun, and Tom Dowd only ended up with eight tracks at a series of 1970 sessions in Miami; two years later, the J. Geils Band was brought in to cut two additional songs to round out the long-delayed LP for 1972 release), the results were pretty impressive. Buddy Guy contributes dazzling lead axe to their revival of "T-Bone Shuffle"; Junior Wells provides a sparkling remake of Sonny Boy's "My Baby She Left Me," and Guy is entirely credible in a grinding Otis Redding mode on the Southern soul stomper "A Man of Many Words."

Once again working with producer/songwriter Tom Hambridge – the bluesman's main collaborator since 2008's Skin Deep – Buddy Guy serves up a straight-ahead platter with Born to Play Guitar, his 28th studio album. Many of Guy's latter-day records loosely follow a theme, but Born to Play Guitar is pretty direct: just a collection of songs designed to showcase Buddy's oversized Stratocaster. Which isn't to say there's either a lack of variety or pro forma songwriting here. Hambridge cleverly colors Born to Play Guitar with a few bold, unexpected flourishes: the sweeps of sweet strings that accentuate "(Baby) You've Got What It Takes," a duet with Joss Stone that lightly recalls Etta James' Chess Records work; the big, blaring horns of "Thick Like Mississippi Mud" that moves that track out of the Delta and into an urban setting; the acoustic "Come Back Muddy" which performs that trick in reverse, pushing Chicago blues back down south.

Here's everything that fleet-fingered Buddy Guy waxed for Chess from 1960 to 1966, including numerous unissued-at-the-time masters, offering the most in-depth peek at his formative years imaginable. Stone Chicago blues classics ("Ten Years Ago," "My Time After Awhile," "Let Me Love You Baby," "Stone Crazy"), rockin' oddities ("American Bandstand," "$100 Bill," "Slop Around"), even a cut that features guitarist Lacy Gibson's vocal rather than Guy's ("My Love Is Real") – some 47 sizzling songs in all.

Living Proof is Buddy Guy's 26th studio album. After nearly fifty years in the music business, this was Buddy's highest charting album ever, peaking at #46 on the main Billboard album chart. The album loosely follows the progression of Buddy Guy's life. "Living Proof was designed partially as an aural autobiography from the legendary Buddy Guy, opening up with the stark summation “74 Years Young,” then running through songs that often address some aspect of a working musician's life."

Buddy Guy revitalized his career when he signed with Silvertone Records in the early '90s. His first album for the label, Damn Right, I've Got the Blues, was a smash success, earning critical acclaim, awards, and sales hand over fist. Prior to that record, he was a legend only among blues fans; afterward, he was a star. Although it was a bit too rock-oriented and slick for purists, Damn Right was a terrific album, setting the pace not only for Guy but for modern electric blues in the '90s. As the decade wore on, Guy continued to make albums for Silvertone, some of them a little complacent, others quite excellent. Buddy's Baddest: The Best of Buddy Guy attempts to summarize those years in 14 songs, including three previously unreleased cuts.

This Grammy-winning comeback set brought Buddy Guy back to prominence after a long studio hiatus. There are too many clichéd cover choices – "Five Long Years," "Mustang Sally," "Black Night," "There Is Something on Your Mind" – to earn unreserved recommendation, but Guy's frenetic guitar histrionics ably cut through the superstar-heavy proceedings (Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Mark Knopfler all turn up) on the snarling title cut and a handful of others. The Expanded Edition of Damn Right, I've Got the Blues features two bonus tracks, "Doin' What I Like Best" and "Trouble Don't Last."

On Buddy Guy's second Silvertone release, he continues the practice of guest appearances begun on Damn Right, I've Got the Blues. In this case, the notables include Paul Rodgers, Travis Tritt, and John Mayall. The finest combination comes when Bonnie Raitt joins Guy on John Hiatt's "Feels Like Rain." Raitt's gritty vocals and sweet slide guitar add a pleasing nuance to the bittersweet track, and it is ultimately the high point of the record. Certain critics and blues purists have derided Guy's search for mainstream success as evidenced by his penchant for guest appearances and non-traditional blues forms, but Guy sounds fantastic in these unconventional situations (witness his burning version of the Moody Blues' "I Go Crazy").

Live at Legends captures the raging bluesman during a blistering set at his club in early 2010, playing pretty much exactly what you'd expect: "Damn Right I Got the Blues," "Best Damn Fool," and medleys of "I Just Want to Make Love to You/Chicken Heads," "Boom Boom/Strange Brew," and "Voodoo Chile/Sunshine of Your Love." That said, this isn't a complaint. While it's true that Guy and his crack band have his show down cold - this same basic set has been around for at least a decade with some additions and substitutions made while on tour playing larger venues - they throw down each and every time. Given that this is his club, the senses of immediacy and a certain closeness are present here whereas they're missing on other live recordings.

The Godfather of contemporary blues, who took modern Chicago blues and embellished it with the bite, fire, and flash of rock & roll, Buddy Guy had not yet broken through in America (although he was much appreciated in Europe) when he recorded three albums for JSP Records between 1979 and 1981, including this, the middle one, which found Guy working with a solid session band of guitarists Doug Williams, William McDonald, and Phil Guy, saxophonist Maurice John Vaughn, keyboardists Gene Pickett and Eddie Lusk, bassists Nick Charles and J.W. Williams, and drummers Merle Perkins and Ray Allison. It's vintage Guy, and shows the raw but applied talent and showmanship that would eventually bring him the large American audience he so justly deserved in the 1990s. A 2008 re-release added three bonus tracks.