Hoodoo Man Blues [Bonus Tracks]

1	Snatch It Back and Hold It / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 2:54
2	Ships on the Ocean / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 4:08
3	Good Morning Little Schoolgirl / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 3:57
4	Hound Dog / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 2:11
5	In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 3:48
6	Hey Lawdy Mama / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 3:15
7	Hoodoo Man Blues / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 2:08
8	Early in the Morning / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 4:50
9	We're Ready / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 3:44
10	You Don't Love Me, Baby / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 2:27
11	Chitlin Con Carne / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 2:15
12	Yonder Wall / Junior Wells Chicago Blues Band 4:15
13	Hoodoo Man Blues Bonus Track / Alternate Take 2:50
14	Chitlin con Carne Bonus Track / Alternate Take 3:20

Barnes & Noble

Hoodoo Man Blues is a Desert Island classic. The Memphis-born Wells may have been influenced by two of the great harpists from the region, John Lee Sonny Boy Williamson and Rice "Sonny Boy Williamson" Miller, but on Hoodoo he's a fully mature player brimming with the style and mannerisms -- muscular snarling and swooping harp -- that defined his sound, joined by guitarist Buddy Guy. This 1965 recording was one of the first albums by a "major" blues musician on the new designer labels (Delmark), and it departed from all other contemporary styles. "Snatch It Back and Hold It," "Chitlin Con Carne," and the title track are funky, gritty, and 1960s urban, drawing as much on James Brown and organ combo grooves as on solacious Delta blues like "Good Morning Schoolgirl." This album is full of the ratchet rhythms which connect the thumb pops and vocal yowls of '20s delta blues to the slinky funk of Sly Stone and harmolodics of Blood Ulmer to the sample of "We're Ready" by hip-hoppers Arrested Development. Don Palmer

All Music Guide

One of the truly classic blues albums of the 1960s, and one of the first to fully document the smoky ambience of a night at a West Side nightspot in the superior acoustics of a recording studio. Wells just set up with his usual cohorts -- guitarist Buddy Guy (billed as "Friendly Chap" on first vinyl pressings), bassist Jack Myers, and drummer Billy Warren -- and proceeded to blow up a storm, bringing an immediacy to "Snatch It Back and Hold It," "You Don't Love Me," "Chitlin con Carne," and the rest of the tracks that is absolutely mesmerizing. [This version contains alternate takes of "Hoodoo Man Blues" and "Chitlin con Carne."] Bill Dahl