Muddy Waters – The Chess Box – MCA CHD3-80002 

Even to this blogger, there is a certain pressure felt when trying to impart the importance of the musical landscape alteration that came about due to the efforts of the great bluesman Muddy Waters.  Arguably, Waters’ blues visions and excursions continue to influence countless musicians, across many musical genres, and his consequence in the blues and beyond cannot in any way be overstated.

If you are seeking a definitive over-arching document of the man’s weighty blues offerings, this broad compilation is the one you need.  Over the course of this collection, though the recording partners differ and the very societal times themselves change, Waters is the unifying link, the constant, and the very foundation of what still remains the abiding blues found here.

This vast compilation signifies the zenith of urban blues, and intensely exemplifies the transition of acoustic country blues into a hard city medium, the spot where the line between performance, art form, and song messaging blur.  This broad 72-song assemblage comes with a 32-page booklet jam-packed with both biographical and session information.  From his first sides for the Artistic label in 1947, through all the definitive Chess label outings concluding in 1972, Waters’ inspiration upon, and mastery of, the blues genre shines brightly.  Waters’ performing groups were always believed to be the proving grounds for blues sidemen, many of whom became post-World War II blues stars on their own merits.  A short list of these blues artists includes harmonica players Little Walter, Junior Wells, James Cotton, George Smith, Walter Horton, and Mojo Buford.  Great guitarists also graced Waters’ groups, including Jimmy Rogers, Sammy Lawhorn, Pee Wee Madison, Buddy Guy, Luther “Guitar Junior” Johnson, and Bob Margolin.  Piano masters galore took their rotations in Waters’ great band aggregations, including Pinetop Perkins, Lovie Lee, and the great Otis Spann.  Drummers include Willie Smith and Elga Evans, as well as bass players of far-reaching talent like Willie Dixon and Calvin Jones.  The opportunity to perform and record with Waters was appropriately considered an honor.  His blues continuously pressed forward with an insistence, resolve, and overt sexuality that brought women to their weakened knees, and men to the heights of their stout machismo.  The early 1960s British blues revival was primarily stimulated by the labors of a short list of post-World War II blues giants, of which Waters was the leading measuring yardstick.  The illustrious British rock group, The Rolling Stones, in fact took their group’s name from one of Waters’ tunes.  Alongside the complete Robert Johnson collection, this Waters compilation would be recommended as one of the two most important to own, if only two anthologies could be possessed. 

Song Titles

Space constraints prohibit the listing of all titles.  Instead, the following individual disc information conveys the time period covered by each respective CD.

CD One

1947 to January 1954.

CD Two

April 1954 to August 1959.

CD Three

July 1960 to March 1972.

Highly-essential without any reservation whatsoever!