Buddy Guy and Friends
Info
|
Label |
Castle |
|
|
Released |
1996 |
|
|
Original year of release |
1996 |
|
|
Recorded |
1979 to 1981 |
|
|
Total playing time |
CD1 79:22 |
|
|
Producer |
? |
|
|
||
|
Buddy Guy |
Guitar, Vocals |
|
|
Phil Guy |
Guitar, Vocals (P) |
|
|
Other artists unknown |
||
Tracks
written by |
playing time |
||
|
Disk 1: |
|||
| 1. |
Buddy Guy |
4:32 |
|
| 2. |
Buddy Guy |
4:41 |
|
| 3. |
Buddy Guy |
5:26 (P) |
|
| 4. |
Buddy Guy |
9:27 |
|
| 5. |
Buddy Guy |
3:01 |
|
| 6. |
Jackson |
5:07 (P) |
|
| 7. |
---Humbert Sumlin: All I can do |
Humbert Sumlin |
5:12 |
| 8. |
---Lurrie Bell: Smokin' dynamite |
Lurrie Bell |
5:33 |
| 9. |
Buddy Guy |
6:40 |
|
| 10. |
Buddy Guy |
7:07 |
|
| 11. |
--- Jimmy Dawkins: Higwayman blues |
Jimmy Dawkins |
7:41 |
| 12. |
---Guitar Shorty: My way or the highway |
Kearney |
5:45 |
| 13. |
Buddy Guy/Arlen/Mercer |
9:10 |
|
|
Disk 2: |
|||
| 1. |
Buddy Guy |
5:01 |
|
| 2. |
Buddy Guy |
6:23 |
|
| 3. |
Buddy Guy |
4:49 |
|
| 4. |
Phil Guy |
5:18 (P) |
|
| 5. |
--- Guitar Shorty: You gave me the blues |
Kearney |
5:11 |
| 6. |
L.C. Davis/J.W. Scott |
5:45 (P) |
|
| 7. |
---Jimmy Dawkins: Have a little mercy |
Jimmy Dawkins |
7:59 |
| 8. |
Buddy Guy |
7:12 (P) |
|
| 9. |
--- Guitar Shorty: Shorty jumps in |
Kearney/Grand |
5:57 |
| 10. |
Buddy Guy |
8:55 (P) |
|
| 11. |
Jarrett |
4:39 |
|
| 12. |
Buddy Guy |
7:22 |
|
Extra Info
Original liner notes:
BUDDY GUY is a guitarist who combines technical wizardry, lightning fast fingerwork and bucket loads of 'feel', that extra component that they don't teach at music college! He's the greatest blues guitarist of all time and 'God' to all those who are hip.
Buddy's stylistic roots are in the postwar Louisiana/Southern blues scene which surrounded him as he was growing up. He was born in the blues town of Baton Rouge and played gigs as a teenager with local blues greats such as Silas Hogan. But, Buddy was a new generation, he was being influenced by the likes of Guitar Slim and B.B. King and also, I believe, Buddy had that extra personal drive that made him look for the 'big time'. By the late fifties he was in Chicago and making his first commercial recordings. Soon he was signed to the mighty Chess organisation. In spite of the stylistic ambivalence due to the uncertainty of the 1960's blues market he cut a number of great records and also became something of a 'house guitarist' for many Chess sessions by other artists. When the international white audience caught on to the blues, Buddy was ready for that too and his series of vanguard albums contain some hot moments.
But, it was his period with JSP Records between 1979 and 1981, where he was allowed the freedom to record what he wanted, how he wanted, that reflects Buddy Guy's highest artistic achievement. Three classic albums were cut - LIVE
AT THE CHECKERBOARD - D.J. PLAY MY BLUES and BREAKING OUT. All three were vastly different sessions but show Buddy at the cutting edge of genre and style. The live tracks here come from the Live At The Checkerboard album. The Checkerboard was Buddy's own club on the Southside. This is Buddy before his 'home crowd', a mixture of neighbours, friends, fellow musicians and a sprinkling of enterprising white blues fans who got to the Checkerboard before it became a part of the Chicago blues tourist industry. The Checkerboard was very different from Buddy's current club legends. Buddy's guitar playing on that night was simply stunning. It's remarkable that that album is the only commercially recorded album cut at a Southside Chicago club before a local audience. The D.J. Play My Blues album is the source of four tracks here. It's the ultimate Buddy Guy album, sheer perfection. Just listen to the guitar solo on 'Blues At My Baby's House' too. Breathtaking. The perfect combination of intellect, emotion and technical ability. Four tracks here come from the Breaking out album which was Buddy's experiment, mainly, with rock and funk rhythms. It's a storming, intense album with passionate performances. Interestingly, it looks forward about ten years to his recent hit albums in style and approach. Check out Buddy's version of the soul anthem, 'You Can Make It If You Try', absolutely delightful.
Also making a big contribution to these recordings is PHIL GUY, Buddy's younger brother. He's playing absolutely spot on second guitar on all of Buddy's tracks and is featured as leader on several cuts here. Some of Phil's tracks also feature Buddy and some don't. Phil, obviously, also comes from the same background and has the same pot pourri of musical influences as Buddy but has managed to carve out for himself a stylistic niche of his own. Phil's own two JSP albums show a creative and thinking musician as well as demonstrating some of the toughest and most robust performances you could possibly wish for.
And what of the 'friends' on this album? These are no mere fillers but artists and recordings with a direct connection to Buddy Guy, his music and career. There was once a time when JIMMY DAWKINS, BUDDY GUY, OTIS RUSH and MAGIC SAM were all spoken of in the same breath - young lions of the 1960's Chicago blues scene. If Jimmy Dawkins' career has remained disappointing in commercial terms, he has still managed to record some very, very fine albums and write some very strong and interesting songs/. As one of the 'club' of Westside Chicago blues guitarists, Jimmy Dawkins firmly belongs alongside Buddy Guy.
GUITAR SHORTY recorded, like Buddy Guy, for the shortlived Cobra and artistic labels in Chicago at the end of the fifties. It is reputed that Willie Dixon took a young Buddy Guy to see Shorty's wild stage show (it's still wild in the 1990's!) also. Incredibly, he had to wait until 1991 to follow up his 1950's recordings. These tracks are from his handy award winning JSP album that set Shorty's career rocketing up again.
"LURRIE BELL is to Chicago blues today what Buddy Guy was to the fifties" a reviewer once wrote about Lurrie Bell. Sadly, Lurrie has missed some golden career opportunities but he's still around, still relatively young and may yet make it to his deserved place. This track here is a stunning piece of work on a song previously recorded and made famous by Buddy Guy. In fact, he nearly outdoes Buddy Guy's own performance of the song.
HUBERT SUMLIN is the blues guitarists' blues guitarist. He has an utterly distinctive style which adorned most of HOWLIN' WOLF'S classic recordings. His post Wolf career has been disappointing and sporadic but he has at least managed to record one great album. BLUES GUITAR BOSS on JSP is the album this cut comes from and it's a successful against the odds album due to the preparation, sympathy, care and diligence put into it by all concerned.
The recordings contained on this double CD set are not by musicians re-cutting old successes but are examples of the creative renaissance the real blues has gone through in the past seventeen years. These are men who know their music, who play to their strengths, are top of their game. And, in Buddy Guy himself there is also that genre busting element of specialness, that indefinable X factor of character and spirit that marks out the most gifted and special, the stuff truly that legends are made of.
John Stedman, London 1996.