JOHNNY WINTER: The Essential
JOHNNY WINTER
The Essential
Columbia/Legacy
This double-disc overview of key studio tracks, drawn from material that originally appeared on the Columbia, Blue Sky and Legacy labels, as well as an abundance of anarchic live sides (including two selections from Woodstock) captures the virtuosic Beaumont, Texas-born, albino blues-rocking legend at his prime in the late 1960s and 1970s. With his wildly acrobatic guitar breaks, blistering speed and take-charge aggression on both the electric and acoustic bottleneck, Johnny Winter has unalterably influenced generations of younger players looking to latch onto some of the deftest yet hottest licks ever committed to tape. His eerily total command-and clever re-invention of material by rhythm ‘n’ blues geniuses like B.B. King, Little Richard, Jimmy Reed and Chuck Berry as well as his revival of Chicago bluesman Muddy Waters’ floundering career, has also won him the adulation of serious musicologists as well. And then there’s his vivid version of Bob Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited,” an adrenalized redo of John Lennon’s “Rock And Roll People” and a nearly incendiary recall of the Rolling Stones’ “Jumpin’ Jack Flash.” Justifiably, more than a third of the selections compiled here are from Winters’ extraordinary live album projects, highlighted by an explosive redo of J.B. Lenoir’s “Mama, Talk To Your Daughter” (one of those Woodstock tracks), an electrifying interpretation of B.B. King’s “It’s My Own Fault” from Johnny Winter And/Live (Winter’s caustic version of which, famously, led to producer John Hammond signing him to Columbia with a then unheard-of $600,000 advance) and a juke joint-loud, feverish take on Muddy’s early smash “Rollin’ And Tumblin’” from Live At The Fillmore East. Winter is also an accomplished and quite prolific songwriter. Check out the atmospheric, bottleneck-driven “Dallas,” a stunning, explosive-riff-after-riff ridden “I’m Yours And I’m Hers” and the screamer “Leland Mississippi Blues” for example – all culled from his eponymously-titled, million-selling debut. Listeners wishing to dig a little deeper should check out his Live Bootleg Series: Volume Seven was also recently released.
— Gary von Tersch