Muddy Waters: Live At Mr. Kelly's-1972 Chess Orange & Blue Label 1st Edition LP

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Used 1972 Chess Orange & Blue Label Stereo Release of Bandleader/Master Composer/Guitarist/Pioneering Blues Vocalist McKinley Morganfield AKA Muddy Waters Entitled Muddy Waters Live at Mr. Kelly's, Produced by Ralph Bass, Production Supervision by Bob Scerbo, Engineer Is Bruce Swedien, Remix Engineer Is Gary Starr, Album Originally Recorded Live at Mr. Kelly's in Chicago - "Muddy Waters Live(At Mr. Kelly's)shows precisely how fortuitous Muddy Waters' history with Chess Records was. With the notable exception of Bo Diddley's Beach Party, the company tended to record its top artists in concert very late or, more often, not at all. Howlin' Wolf got one concert album so late in his career that he was merely a shadow of the legend he'd established for himself, and the label's resident blues harp virtuosi Little Walter and Sonny Boy Williamson II were never captured in concert. Waters was luckier. This album, recorded during two June 1971 gigs at one of Chicago's top clubs, was the third full-length concert release of his career; and he had a decade of life and music still in front of him and remained very much the embodiment of his own legend. The core of the band that would work with him for the rest of the '70s was already with him, and the man himself was in excellent form -- in voice and on slide guitar -- aided by Sammy Lawhorn and Pee Wee Madison. There might not be the same sense here of a career-second-wind-in-progress that there was with his later live album for Johnny Winter's Blue Sky label -- the performance is powerful and confident, more than bold and celebratory -- but on "Strange Woman," "Blow Wind Blow," and "Country Boy," for example, the effect of hearing a master of the blues virtuoso band in action is overpowering. His takes on Williamson's "Nine Below Zero," T-Bone Walker's "Stormy Monday Blues," John Lee Hooker's "Boom, Boom," and Jimmy Reed's "You Don't Have to Go," all reconfigured in Muddy's own style, are also worth hearing. There might have been more flash on the later Winter-produced sides, but this LP is not to be ignored, and not just by Chess completists -- it's a hell of a lot more essential than Electric Mud, and heralds the superb Indian summer of Waters' history at Chess, during which he recorded Can't Get No Grindin' and The Woodstock Album." - Sensational Personnel for the Septet Features Legendary Composer Muddy Waters on Slide Guitar and Vocals, Paul Oscher on Harmonica, James Madison & the Brilliant Samuel Lawhorn on Guitars, Joe Perkins on Piano, Calvin Jones on Bass and the Amazing Willie Smith on Drums! - Selections on Side One Are the Muddy Waters Penned What Is that She Got, the Jimmy Reed Classic You Don't Have to Go, the Ralph Bass/Muddy Waters Song Strange Woman & Original Muddy Waters Compositions Blow Wind Blow, Country Boy - Tracks for Side Two Consist of Sonny Boy Williamson(II)'s Nine Below Zero, the T-Bone Walker Classic Stormy Monday Blues, the Muddy Waters Penned Mudcat(Instrumental), the John Lee Hooker Standard Boom Boom and Original Muddy Waters Composition C.C. Woman - Used Copy, Cover Is Slightly Faded with a Light Surface Ring, Front Cover Has a Label Sticker from a Radio Station or a D.J., Record Mint- - Stereo Recording, Product Code CH 50012 - California Residents Add 9.75% Sales Tax - International S & H Extra -