Showing posts with label blues legend. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blues legend. Show all posts

Earl Hooker, Blues Master (American Made Music) Review

Earl Hooker, Blues Master (American Made Music)
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Earl Hooker, Blues Master (American Made Music) ReviewEarl Hooker was one of the most influential guitarists that ever lived; not just in the blues, but in many different musical styles. His mastery of slide guitar and the wah-wah pedal (many times combining BOTH, thus creating a truly hair-raising sound) are legendary. But sadly, Earl Hooker is all but obscure now, owing to his early death (he died in 1970 at age 39 from tuberculosis), his uneven recording career (he only made 3 "true" albums; he recorded many obscure 45 rpm sides and guest appearances), and even his famous name association (he is half-cousin to the late boogie king John Lee Hooker) didn't seem to help him achieve real stardom; one he so greatly deserved!
As all of the previous reviewers have pointed out, this is an extensively researched book, chock-full of interviews with many of the legends Hooker played with in his seemingly short career (Pinetop Perkins, Big Moose Walker, A.C. Reed, B.B. King), each one giving detailed accounts of Hooker's somewhat eccentric behavior, his lifelong battle with TB, but most of all and importantly, his undeniable guitar prowess. Unfortunately, by the time Hooker began to get noticed for his amazing natural talent and hard work, TB overtook him, causing his untimely death.
This is an excellent book, both for true Earl Hooker fans, and new ones alike. He had so much more to give the world of music, and had he lived, he most certainly would've attained the same success and legendary status as Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy and Albert King, just to name a few. Essential reading!Earl Hooker, Blues Master (American Made Music) OverviewThe life and early death of a South Side guitar genius, the greatest unheralded Chicago blues-maker
Jimi Hendrix called Earl Hooker "the master of the wah-wah pedal." Buddy Guy slept with one of Hooker's slides beneath his pillow hoping to tap some of the elder bluesman's power. And B. B. King has said repeatedly that, for his money, Hooker was the best guitar player he ever met.
Tragically, Earl Hooker died of tuberculosis in 1970 when he was on the verge of international success just as the Blues Revival of the late sixties and early seventies was reaching full volume.
Second cousin to now-famous bluesman John Lee Hooker, Earl Hooker was born in Mississippi in 1929, and reared in black South Side Chicago where his parents settled in 1930. From the late 1940s on, he was recognized as the most creative electric blues guitarist of his generation. He was a "musician's musician," defining the art of blues slide guitar and playing in sessions and shows with blues greats Muddy Waters, Junior Wells, and B. B. King.
A favorite of black club and neighborhood bar audiences in the Midwest, and a seasoned entertainer in the rural states of the Deep South, Hooker spent over twenty-five years of his short existence burning up U.S. highways, making brilliant appearances wherever he played.
Until the last year of his life, Hooker had only a few singles on obscure labels to show for all the hard work. The situation changed in his last few months when his following expanded dramatically. Droves of young whites were seeking American blues tunes and causing a blues album boom. When he died, his star's rise was extinguished. Known primarily as a guitarist rather than a vocalist, Hooker did not leave a songbook for his biographer to mine. Only his peers remained to praise his talent and pass on his legend.
"Earl Hooker's life may tell us a lot about the blues," biographer Sebastian Danchin says, "but it also tells us a great deal about his milieu. This book documents the culture of the ghetto through the example of a central character, someone who is to be regarded as a catalyst of the characteristic traits of his community."
Like the tales of so many other unheralded talents among bluesmen, Earl Hooker, Blues Master, Hooker's life story, has all the elements of a great blues song -- late nights, long roads, poverty, trouble, and a soul-felt pining for what could have been.
Sebastian Danchin is a freelance writer and record producer. He also creates programs for France's leading radio network, Radio-France, and is the blues editor for France's leading jazz magazine, Jazzman. His previous books, among others, include Les Dieux du Blues (Paris: Editions Atlas, 1995) and Blues Boy: The Life and Music of B. B. King (University Press of Mississippi, 1998).

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Moanin' at Midnight: The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf Review

Moanin' at Midnight: The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf
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Moanin' at Midnight: The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf ReviewI was sitting with Hubert Sumlin in the Green Room of Jazz Alley last week, when Mark Hoffman peeked through the doorway. The customary mischievous twinkle in his eye was augmented by an excited sense of urgency. In his hands he held a book; not just any book, but one he had written himself. This particular copy was a gift for Hubert, because Hubert had provided a critical link in the book's research. How could anyone write the definitive biography of Howlin' Wolf without consulting the man who'd been Wolf's guitarist for 25 years?
Hubert grinned, Mark bubbled with appreciation. Crisp new pages and a freshly-pressed sepia close-up of a cigarette-puffing Howlin' Wolf on the cover. Someone set the finished product down on the table; that's when I grabbed it and started leafing through. It was impossible to resist.
Moanin' at Midnight, The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf, finally gives the blues world back its missing link. When Howlin' Wolf left this earth in January 1976, he took with him his stories, his imposing presence and his immensely powerful voice. Fortunately, he left behind his recordings, which, for a generation now, are all we've had by which to remember him. Fortunately also, Wolf had many friends and associates who refused to let go of his memory, and were willing to share their recollections with co-authors Hoffman and James Segrest.
Throughout the book, Hoffman and Segrest use words like gargantuan, ferocious and primal to describe Wolf's persona. If you ever were lucky enough to see Wolf perform, you know why. But even the surviving videos are enough to get the point across. It was not only the man's size that was intimidating, it was the way he wrapped his huge and startling voice around a song. It was his big hands dwarfing a guitar neck or reducing a harmonica to relative invisibility. As the equally legendary record producer Sam Phillips remarked the first time he heard Wolf on the radio in 1951, "This is where the soul of man never dies."
Moanin' at Midnight is as thorough as a biography can be, but to Hoffman and Segrest the project was clearly a labor of love. A dozen years, hundreds of hours of interviews, cross-country commutes to glean insights into a personal hero, the relentless pursuit of detail...the devotion is unmistakable, and it shows.
What Hoffman and Segrest have accomplished with their book is nothing short of magnificent. What they have given us, at long last, is the big picture of Chester Arthur Burnett, aka Howlin' Wolf . At 6'3" (some say 6'6") and nearly 300 pounds, Burnett demands a big picture. Wolf was not only a bluesman's bluesman, he really was larger than life.
If you have any doubts, ask Hubert Sumlin.Moanin' at Midnight: The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf Overview

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