Nothing but ......

Friday, April 14, 2006

London sessions

By the late 50's the blues almost died in the US. Fortunately the British Pop Explosion of the early 60's regenerated new interest in the blues. As a matter of fact, I think it is safe to say that without British groups / people like the Stones, The yardbirds / Clapton, Winwood, but also Van Morrison, etc. the blues would not have survived!
So it is not surprising that a lot of blues musicians during the 60's came to Europe to play, jam and record. Some stayed for years or didn't even return at all.
The Album I'm offering today is the 'mixed' result of one of these endeavors. In may 1970 Howlin' Wolf came to London only to record with the, at that time already, famous Eric Clapton, Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman. And....It didn't work from the start. So in order to salvage the project, there was later a keyboard (Steve Winwood) mixed in and even some horns. So what we got here is a collection of legends and no chemistry. Strangely enough it is of this album that in 2003 a 'deluxe edition' was released with a second disc. This disc is filled with alternate takes, alternate mixes and even more overdubbing.
I always listen to this album with mixed feelings. The line up is impressive, I really like Howlin' Wolf, etc. But still......
Make sure that you listen to track 9 on disc 1. This track is a 'false start' of the song 'Red Rooster' with some studio discussion between Howlin' Wolf and Clapton (already on the original album).





The password = "scrooge".
Please delete these files within 24 hours. If you like this music buy the album and support the industry

posted by Scrooge at 1:00 am

5 Comments:

  • Hi Scrooge, your blog looks great, I'm new to blues and learning and so excited to find it (Caesar Tjalbo's link).

    But... I've tried Skip James, Elmore James, and Aretha -- none will open for me. I get the same "not a rar file" error as the other commenter under the Skip James.

    I use a Mac and Safari, have tried UnRarX, MacPar, and Stuffit. I've never had any trouble like this with any other blog, and I use Caesar, Regnyouth, HansZun, etc.

    Thought you'd want to know.. appreciate your efforts!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:59 am  

  • Apparently there is a problem with the .rar files I creating in combination with Mac's. Hang on in there until I can figure this out!

    By Blogger Scrooge, at 10:42 pm  

  • I'm having the same problem with your files and I'm on a mac too. So frustrating, you have so many fascinating posts!

    Thanks for trying!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:25 pm  

  • Hi Scrooge [ of hallo ;-) ]

    Noticed you have the london sessions from Howlin' Wolf but they timed out, could you please upload them again ?

    Thanks a million

    Rob / pluisjemp3s@hotmail.com

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:32 am  

  • This album started my interest in the blues. It was a good introduction to the blues for a rock fan. After listening to this I started going to see some of the blues acts live shows. Howlin' Wolf, Willie Dixon, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee, Taj Mahal, Buddy Guy, B.B. King etc. I even got to shake B.B. King's hand! The friend that I was with did too, then he looked at his hand and asked B.B. "Does it wear off?" and B.B. replied "Yes, you better take guitar lessons within the week." ha ha ha, I'll never forget that.

    I've never heard "the second album" of this release but unfortunately the link seems dead. I will have to do some hunting now!

    Nice site, keep it up, Scrooge.

    Paul (from Canada)

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:46 pm  

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