Cut at the 1974 Montreux Jazz Festival with Stones' bassist Bill Wyman anchoring the rhythm section, the set captures some of the ribald musical repartee that customarily distinguished the pairing of Buddy Guy and Junior Wells, though they certainly break no new ground as they roll through their signature songs.
This is a piece of musical history. Buddy Guy, simply one of the greatest blues performers there has ever been performing in front of his home audience, his neighbours, friends and fellow musicians in his own club which was very much situated in the Chicago ghetto. It was 1979. The blues had been pronounced dead by the music industry but in the hands of musicians like Buddy and people running little labels, booking clubs and tours under difficult financial situations there was a pretty healthy heartbeat - it's just that no one was paying much attention! It took a few more years but how things changed! These days things seemed to have slipped back somewhat but nowhere near how things were back then. But why did a revival happen' Because stuff like this was happening - Buddy was cooking that night…
To call this collection of tunes from blues legend Buddy Guy definitive is not a stretch by any means, as it is a cohesive, thoughtful, chronological collection that accurately represents all of his changes and phases through six decades. Overall, it is a mellow compilation that showcases many of Guy's laid-back songs, several with longtime partner Junior Wells. It's sprinkled with the many all-star bluesmen he has collaborated with over the years, and is tastefully programmed to offer what is essentially cream of the crop blues from one of its enduring legends. Your hear music issued on singles, LPs and CDs recorded from 1958 through 2004 via various recordings done for the Artistic, Chess, Delmark, Vanguard, Blue Thumb, Atco, Evidence, Alligator, JSP, Blind Pig, and Silvertone labels. It really is a comprehensive overview of Guy's best known songs, and gives fans or neophytes an accurate big picture of why Buddy Guy remains one of the most influential artists in American popular music.
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."
As close as Buddy Guy's ever likely to come to recapturing the long-lost Chess sound. Cut live at his popular Chicago nightspot, Buddy Guy's Legends, with guitarist G.E. Smith's horn-leavened Saturday Night Live Band and pianist Johnnie Johnson in lush support, Guy revisits his roots on sumptuous readings of "I've Got My Eyes on You," "Ain't That Lovin' You," "My Time After Awhile," and "First Time I Met the Blues." No outrageous rock-based solos or Cream/Hendrix/Stevie Ray homages; this is the Buddy Guy album that purists have salivated for the last quarter century or so.
The classic pairing of Buddy Guy and Junior Wells has been captured many times on vinyl, cassette, and disc over the years, but rarely with such intimacy and subtle, restrained energy as on this wonderful collection. Buddy Guy plays mostly 12 string guitar, and Junior laces his signature lines through the songs, engaging Guy in the kind of musical dialogue that only old friends can have. This is acoustic street-corner blues at its best, performed with incredible expressiveness, ease, and joy. One gets the feeling these two are just sitting down for a friendly jam session on a Saturday afternoon, and when things get loose, their laughter flows almost as freely as the music. Guy really shines on some of these tracks, his guitar lines fast, smooth, percussive, and seemingly effortless…
Buddy Guy's music has changed a great deal since this album was recorded in Chicago in 1981. It is possible that Guy has never sounded better than this, tearing into some deep indigo blues, letting his guitar wail loud on every cut, and playing with inspiration, especially on the title cut and "Dedication to the Late T-Bone Walker," a track that seems to spring from some place deep within himself. Nor was he the only one on fire at the sessions. Brother Phil Guy shares the guitar work and contributes vocals to both "Garbage Man Blues" and "Mellow Down." The recording makes no attempt to capture a wide audience. This is Buddy Guy playing and feeling the blues, pure and simple, without any sense of compromise - and it's all the better for it, putting much of the rest of his catalog into perspective. Rarely is the blues this heartfelt - and rarer still is it so well played. If this were his only recorded legacy, he'd still warrant the stature he's achieved.
This slim yet potent sampler of Guy's excellent early-'60s work for Chess will no doubt please newcomers looking for a bargain introduction to the blues guitarist/vocalist's prime sides. With his guitar tapped for maximum intensity, spiky and tremolo-heavy, and those vocals all pathos-rich screams and in-the-pocket bravado, Guy especially hits bedrock on the blues-personified narrative "The First Time I Met the Blues" and the perennial "My Time After a While"; from lean combo cuts to horn-rich swingers, the remaining tracks never stray too far from this high-quality mark. And ensuring a fine ride throughout, regal blues veterans like Junior Wells, Otis Spann, and Fred Below help provide the tasty accompaniment. A solid shot from one of Chicago blues' second-generation stars.
Hailed by Classic FM as “one of today’s most exciting young composers” Rebecca Dale is a London based composer, working most often with large orchestral and choral forces in the worlds of cinema and theatre. Night Seasons is an album about hope, looking for the light in difficult times, written during a time of personal dif- ficulty while her father was terminally ill. With works written for choir and cello it strives to be a hopeful album, reaching for the wonder around us. Rebecca Dale says “It’s been one of the great privileges of my life to be able to write for cellist heroes of mine to whom I grew up listening. I also got to have fun setting some famous poems… I am indebted to everyone who has created this album with me”.