Key to the Highway                     

2017-05-24                                                                                                           

Magic Sam  

Paul Butterfield Blues Band  
Luther Allison  
Michael Bloomfield                                                 

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No time for long write-ups, in fact I just got started on this show within the last 24 hours.  The upside is that I took albums I knew really well and, therefore, some of my very favorite stuff, all Chicago Blues spanning the mid-60s to the mid-70s.

Magic Sam has been one of my favorites, along with Howlin’ Wolf and Freddie King, since discovering him right after he died.  Having released singles beginning in the 50s, Sam’s first album, West Side Soul, was recorded in July and October of 1967 for Delmark Records and earned album of the year kudos for the label the year after the label had garnished the same award the previous year with Junior wells’ Hoodoo Man Blues.  My personal favorite, Black Magic, came out the next year but Sam’s life and career was cut short soon after its release.

Probably within the last decade I admitted to myself that Luther Allison had supplanted his contemporaries Sam and Freddie as my all time favorite Bluesman.  His limited earliest releases were on Delmark as well, but today we hear the best of his output for the Motown label as their first and maybe only Blues artist.  His first two albums for the Detroit Soul company, Bad News is Coming (1972) and Luther’s Blues (1974), comprise the bulk of his portion of this show.  Luther cut a third disc for the label, Night Life, but I heard either directly or through friends that it wasn’t worth wasting my time or money, but a third CD in my collection, the highly recommended Motown Years 1972-1976, has three tracks from the album included (as opposed to about half of the first and the full second release) of which we only chose That’s What Love Will Make You Do as being worthwhile for this airing.  Each of my three discs contain previously unreleased material, including our closing set of two live performances at the Ann Arbor Blues Festivals of 1972 and 1973.

What needs to be said about the Paul Butterfield Blues Band’s eponymous 1965 first album?  For me at least, they and John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers were the groups that made me look up the authors of their tunes and led to the discovery of the music I would come to love so much.  We present the entire first side of the LP and a couple of tunes from side two.

Butterfield was the harmonica playing vocalist and he had two guitarists, Elvin Bishop and Michael Bloomfield.  You hear some Bloomfield stuff from the CD Don’t Say That I Ain’t Your Man!  Essential Blues 1964-1969, three tunes from December 1964 featuring Charlie Musselwhite (there are a couple more from this session which were already presented in their Butterfield versions) followed by Albert’s Shuffle from the Super Sessios LP with Al Kooper and three live tunes from 1968 and 1969 San Francisco concerts and a studio number, Don’t Think About It from the It’s Not Killing Me album thrown in between.

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Since it is still relatively new, I thought I’d mention that KKUP is now streaming on the internet and, while it is still in a developing stage, we have been putting out the word.  I’m not all of that good with high-tech stuff, but it seems pretty easy to access.  If you go to our website at KKUP.org you will see on the home page a strip of options immediately above the pictures of the musicians the next to the last option being LISTEN ONLINE.  By clicking this, it brings up a choice of desktop or mobile.  I can only speak for the desktop but after maybe a minute I was receiving a crystal clear feed.  As already mentioned, this is still a work in progress and we are currently limited to a finite number of listeners at any one time.  I mention this so you will be aware to turn off the application when you are not actually listening.  (I put the player in my favorites bar for the easiest of access.)  Now we can reach our listeners in Los Gatos and Palo Alto, even my family in Canada.  Let your friends elsewhere know they can now listen to your favorite station, and while they have the home page open they can check out our schedule.

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Mama Mama, Talk to Your Daughter
That’s All I Need
I Feel So Good (I Wanna Boogie
I Found a New Love)
Lookin’ Good
Sweet Home Chicago
   Magic Sam

Born in Chicago
Shake your Money Maker
Blues with a Feeling
Thank You Mister Poobah
I Got My Mojo Working
Mellow Down Easy
Screamin’
Last Night
Look Over Yonder’s Wall
   The Paul Butterfield Blues Band

Little Red Rooster

Raggedy and Dirty
The Stumble
Evil is Going On
Dust My Broom
Take My Love (I Want to Give It All to You)
Someday Pretty Baby
Luther’s Blues
Now You Got It
That’s What Love Will Make You Do
San Jose
   Luther Allison

I’ve Got You in the Palm of My Hand

Goin’ Down Slow
Feel So Good
Albert’s Shuffle
Mary Ann
Don’t Think About It
It Takes Time
Carmelita Skiffle
   Michael Bloomfield

Last Night I Lost the Best Friend I Ever Had

Medley: I’m Gonna Miss My Baby / Bad News Is
     Coming / The Thrill is Gone
   Luther Allison