#238 - Howlin' Wolf - Howlin' Wolf (1962)
MUSIC HISTORY COMPILED BY ADAM BERNARD:
BACKGROUND – HOWLIN’ WOLF
Howlin' Wolf, was at the forefront of transforming acoustic Delta blues into electric Chicago blues. Over a four-decade career, he recorded blues, R&B, rock and roll, and psychedelic rock. He is regarded as one of the most influential blues musicians of all time. The name "Howlin' Wolf" originated from Burnett's maternal grandfather who would admonish him for killing his grandmother's chicks from reckless squeezing by warning him that wolves in the area would come and get him. The family would continue this by calling Burnett "the Wolf".The blues historian Paul Oliver wrote that Burnett once claimed to have been given his nickname by his ido Jimmie Rodgers In 2023 Rolling Stone ranked Howlin' Wolf at number 59 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time
Howlin’ Wolf was born Chester Arthur Burnett (6/10-/1910– 1/10/1976) on a plantation in Mississippi. Born into poverty as one of six children, he went through a rough childhood where his mother kicked him out of her house, and he moved in with his great-uncle, who was particularly abusive. He then ran away to his father's house where he finally found a happy family, and in the early 1930s became a protégé of legendary Delta blues guitarist and singer Charley Patton. He was exposed to the blues from an early age through performers at plantation picnics and local juke joints. At the age of 17, Burnett gathered enough money to buy his first guitar. It was a date that Burnett reportedly never forgot until "the day he died".
Wolf got his trademark howl from the “blue yodel” of country singer Jimmie Rodgers, whom he admired. After his time in the military, he moved to West Memphis In 1951, Ike Turner, who was a freelance talent scout, heard Howlin' Wolf in West Memphis. Turner brought him to record several songs for Sam Phillips at Memphis Recording Service (later renamed Sun Studio). Phillips praised his singing, saying, "God, what it would be worth on film to see the fervour in that man's face when he sang. His eyes would light up, you'd see the veins come out on his neck and, buddy, there was nothing on his mind but that song. He sang with his damn soul." Howlin' Wolf quickly became a local celebrity. At the urging of Chess, he relocated to Chicago in late 1952. In Chicago, Howlin' Wolf assembled a new band and recruited the Chicagoan Jody Williams from Memphis Slim's band as his first guitarist. Within a year he had persuaded the guitarist Hubert Sumlin to leave Memphis and join him in Chicago. Sumlin's understated solos and surprisingly subtle phrasing perfectly complemented Burnett's huge voice During the 1950s, Howlin' Wolf had five songs on the Billboard national R&B charts: "Moanin' at Midnight", "How Many More Years", "Who Will Be Next", "Smokestack Lightning", and "I Asked for Water (She Gave Me Gasoline)". His first LP Moanin' in the Moonlight, was released in 1959. As was standard practice in that era, it was a collection of previously released singles. In the early 1960s, Howlin' Wolf recorded several songs that became his most famous, despite receiving no radio play: "Wang Dang Doodle", "Back Door Man", "Spoonful", "The Red Rooster" (later known as "Little Red Rooster"), "I Ain't Superstitious", "Goin' Down Slow", and "Killing Floor", many of which were written by Willie Dixon. Several became part of the repertoires of British and American rock groups, who further popularized them. Howlin' Wolf's second compilation album, Howlin' Wolf, was released in 1962.
During the blues revival in the 1950s and 1960s, black blues musicians found a new audience among white youths, and Howlin' Wolf was among the first to capitalize on it, touring Europe in 1964. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Howlin' Wolf recorded albums with others, including with Bo Diddley and Muddy Waters. The Howlin' Wolf Album, was recorded with many psychedelic rock and free-jazz musicians, and The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions were accompanied by the British rock musicians Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Ian Stewart, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts and others.
The Howlin' Wolf Album, like rival bluesman Muddy Waters's album Electric Mud, was designed to appeal to the hippie audience. The album had an attention-getting cover: large black letters on a white background proclaiming "This is Howlin' Wolf's new album. He doesn't like it. He didn't like his electric guitar at first either." The album cover may have contributed to its poor sales. Chess co-founder Leonard Chess admitted that the cover was a bad idea, saying, "I guess negativity isn't a good way to sell records. Who wants to hear that a musician doesn't like his own music?" Wolf himself referred to it as dog shit.
Wolf's last album was 1973's The Back Door Wolf. was entirely composed of new material, and was recorded with musicians who regularly backed him on stage. The album is shorter (a little more than 35 minutes) than any other he recorded, as a result of his declining health.
Wolf's last public performance was in Chicago in November 1975. He shared the bill with B.B. King among others. Wolf reportedly gave an "unforgettable" performance, even crawling across the stage during the song, "Crawling King Snake." The crowd gave him a five-minute standing ovation. When he got off the stage after the concert was over, a team of paramedics had to revive him
Burnett's health began declining in the late 1960s. He suffered his first heart attack in 1969 as he and Hubert Sumlin were traveling to a show at the University of Chicago. He fell against the dashboard of the car he was riding in, and Sumlin, who was driving, pulled over and grabbed a two-by-four piece of wood that was lying in the road. Sumlin then rammed the wood into Burnett's back, which kick-started his heart. Three weeks later, while he was in Toronto for a gig, Burnett suffered additional heart and kidney problems, but refused an operation recommended by doctors, telling his wife that "he needed to keep working". In 1970, Burnett was involved in a serious car accident that sent him flying through the windshield, which caused extensive damage to his kidneys. For the rest of his life, he received dialysis treatments every three days, which was administered by his wife Lillie. A year later, Burnett suffered another heart attack, and his kidneys had failed. He also began suffering from high blood pressure as well. By May 1973, Burnett was back performing again. The bandleader, Eddie Shaw, was so concerned for Burnett's health that he limited him to performing six songs per concert. In January 1976, Burnett checked into a VA Hospital for kidney surgery. Three days before his death, a carcinoma was found in his brain. He died from a combination of the tumor, heart failure, and kidney disease on January 10, 1976, at the age of 65
In 1980, Burnett was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame, and was also inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as an early influence, and the Hall of Fame located in his hometown of West Point, Mississippi, in 1995. In 1994, the U.S. Postal Service issued a 29-cent commemorative postage stamp depicting Howlin' Wolf. In 2005, a Howlin' Wolf Blues Museum opened in West Point, Mississippi, and an annual festival is held there. A Howlin' Wolf recording of "Smokestack Lightning" was selected for a Grammy Hall of Fame Award, He is also a 3x winner of the Blues Foundation Awards.
Burnett was influenced by other popular blues performers of the time, including the Mississippi Sheiks, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Ma Rainey, Lonnie Johnson, Tampa Red, Blind Blake, and Tommy Johnson. Two of the earliest songs he mastered were Jefferson's "Match Box Blues" and Leroy Carr's "How Long, How Long Blues". The country singer Jimmie Rodgers was also an influence. Burnett tried to emulate Rodgers's "blue yodel" but found that his efforts sounded more like a growl or a howl: "I couldn't do no yodelin', so I turned to howlin'. And it's done me just fine"
Howlin’ Wolf was a major influence on artists like The Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton. He also had a chance influence on The Godfather of Soul. Burnett was sent to Fort Gordonin Georgia while he was in the military, and he would play his guitar on the steps of the mess hall after his shift int he kitchen was done. A young James Brown, who came to the Fort nearly every day to earn money shining shoes and performing buck dances for the troops, first heard him play there.
ALBUM BACKGROUND – HOWLIN’ WOLF
Howlin' Wolf is the second album from the Chicago blues singer/guitarist Howlin' Wolf. It is a collection of twelve singles previously released by the Chess label from 1960 through 1962. Because of the illustration on its sleeve), the album is often called The Rockin' Chair Album, a nickname even added to the cover on some reissue pressings of the LP.
Howlin' Wolf's second album brings together some of the blues great's best singles from the late '50s and early '60s. The Rockin Chair Album represents the cream of Wolf's Chicago blues work. Those tracks include "Spoonful," "The Red Rooster," "Wang Dang Doodle," "Back Door Man," "Shake for Me," and "Who's Been Talking?" Also featuring the fine work of Chess house producer and bassist Willie Dixon and guitarist Hubert Sumlin, Rockin' Chair qualifies as one of pinnacles of early electric blues, and is an essential album for any quality blues collection.
In 1985, the album won a Blues Music Award by The Blues Foundation for 'Classics of Blues Recordings—Album'. Willie Dixon, who wrote most of the album and played bass on some of it, described it as "an outrageous set of sex songs.
The cast of blues performers on this album that runs deep, but the most notable is Buddy Guy, who plays bass on portions of this album. Other names include Freddy Robinson, Jimmy Rogers, Otis "Big Smokey" Smothers and Hubert Sumlin on guitar. Henry Gray, Johnny Jones & Lafayette Leake were featured on piano, and some of the drummers included were Fred Below and Sam Lay.