James Cotton and Paul Butterfield

Two of Chicagos finest harp players , both legendary and unique in their own way.


James Cotton
Take Me Back
BP-2587 (1987)
Biography
Compact Disc: Order
Legendary harmonica master James Cotton, who played for years with Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters, returns to his roots on this self-produced album of blues standards.
"This is easily one of the best blues albums in years." - After Dark
"A tasty set of modern Chicago harmonica blues." - Cadence
Tracks
My Babe (Real Audio sample) Well, I Done Got Over It Clouds In My Heart (Real Audio sample) Take Me Back (Real Audio sample) Honest I Do Take Out Some Insurance Killing FloorDust My Broom Hungry Country Girl

He was born on July 1, 1935 in Tunica, Mississippi. He started playing harmonica at a very early age, reproducing simple songs and train sounds at age 6. One day, over KFFA radio from Helena, Arkansas, he heard Sonny Boy Williamson on the "King Biscuit Time" program. From then on he tried to play all of Sonny Boy's tunes that he heard. By the time he was nine, Cotton was making more money in tips playing in front of juke joints on a Saturday than his uncle was making in two weeks driving a tractor. At that point his uncle took young James to see Sonny Boy, who was so impressed by this nine-year-old echoing his style that he took James into his home, beginning an apprenticeship under Williamson's tutelage. Six years later, when Sonny Boy left Memphis, the fifteen year-old Cotton took over his band, playing in clubs and jukes all through the region.
In 1952 James got his own fifteen minute radio show on KWEM in West Memphis. By this time he had caught the attention of Sam Phillips, founder of Sun Records, and began recording with Howlin' Wolf and Willie Nix. By the end of 1953, he was recording his own material. The following year Muddy Waters, who had been hearing about Cotton from a lot of people, recruited James to play in his band. It was the beginning of a twelve year collaboration.
Wanting to stretch out and play his own music, Cotton formed his own band in 1966. It didn't take him long to establish himself as a solo artist. He signed with Verve, releasing four critically acclaimed albums, and was able to crossover into the blues-rock market of that era, performing at rock festivals and blues venues such as the Fillmores in San Francisco and New York and opening for a number of rock 'n' roll acts. In the 70's and 80's, the James Cotton Band, in various configurations, continued to record for a variety of labels.
In 1987, Blind Pig released Take Me Back, an album that returned Cotton to his roots and earned a Grammy nomination. Cotton intended to put together a collection of the blues standards that have most influenced rock in an effort to "set the record straight about the history of rock 'n' roll." Accompanied by blues luminaries and former bandmates Pinetop Perkins on piano, Sammy Lawhorn on guitar, and Sam Lay on drums, Cotton recorded a sterling set of classic blues tunes that successfully captures the spirit and sound of the early days of Chicago blues.


PAUL BUTTERFIELD
In the 1960's in the blues clubs on Chicago's south side, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band was setting off the first depth charges of what would come to be a worldwide blues explosion. Its main role model was the reigning Hoochie Coochie Man himself, Muddy Waters. Did Butterfield and the band play and sing Muddy's music as well or as enduringly as Muddy did? Even the band with all its legendary brashness, might well concede that one to Muddy. But as musical trendsetters and subversives, popularizers of the blues and prototypes for at least a a generation of blues bands, the Butterfield band holds its own and has indeed, in Muddy's words "carried on."
At A TIME WHEN the typical nationally-marketed white blues was either acoustic, solo oriented folk music or the enthusiastic but generally unconvincing covers of British invasion bands, it was the racially-integrated Butterfield group who brought to the fore a ground breaking take on electric Chicago blues with all its grit and ferocity. Butterfield's vocals had all the toughness and passion of the kings of the ghetto bandstands where the School Of Blues was in session, and his heavily amplified harmonica was firmly in the Little Walter tradition (with a strong sense of James Cotton's huge tone and power and a great appreciation of the use of hands to provide nuance). But he also always had a strong sense of himself ("I think I'm better than all the people who are trying to reform me," he allegedly wrote for a school year book), which tanslated into an everpresent sense of style on top of the tradition aggressiveness.
ATTITUDE HAD A LOT to do with the bands image, beyond the chip on the leader's shoulder. Perhaps because its members came from musical and cultural backgrounds outside the Chicago blues idiom, they took some license with it. Their de facto anthem, "Born In Chicago" was in part a declaration of something original to contibute to the blues repertoire (via Nick Gravenites composition in this case) without sacrificing the mean, hard point of view. The groups two guitarists also blended more modern guitar influences into the harmonica-led Delta motif, once describing their ensemble approach as "The Muddy Waters band with B.B. King on lead guitar." Mark Naftalin was a solid, well schooled pianist but was heard more often on the organ, than a progressive and jazzy edge to a blues band. Of course, all this rested on the foundation of a seasoned hard-core rhythm section, to the occasional irritation of Howlin' Wolf, former employer of bassist Jerome Arnold and original drummer Sam Lay.
WITH OUT QUESTION the band was charaismatic. Even the studied sleaze of the first album cover had so much blues pull for searching white eyes that it lured young guitarist Robben Ford to buy it, thereby identifing his calling and changing his life forever. That effect happened so often, in so many ways, that Butterfield and his band aquired the same sort of style-setting status among the growing white blues (and rock) audience as Muddy once had, in his world, when southern black migrants to the cities were defining the music. Many modern players echo Butterfields harp techniques. Mike Bloomfield was the first white American blues guitar hero, with an inclculable influence. Elvin Bishop's considerable impact came as much from his good timing, barstool persona as it did from his highly original guitar playing. The band even had a literally electrifing efect on the larger musical scene as accompanists: its 1965 Newport appearance with Bob Dylan was widely heralded as a revolutionary (and controversial) event in folk music.
INITIALLY, THE BAND used Chicago blues to turn on a whole new coterie of listeners (and imitators), enough to achieve stardom and also enough to reflect some of the spotlight on some of their mentors. The Butterfield band led many followers to explore the whole idiom. (B.B. King singled out Bloomfield for praise in helping him cross over to a white audience and stated at the time, "I'm grateful...because to me, it seemed to open a few doors for us that seemed like they (were) never going to open.") Band members played on and/or produced breakthrough records by Muddy, James Cotton, Otis Rush, John Lee Hooker and others, not to mention Dylan. But the band's musical trailblazing went rapidly past electric club blues. Their extended improvisations brought jazz and non-western sensibilities not only to the Butterfield band, but to countless, garages and stages. When a horn section was added and emphasis shifted toward R & B, much notice was taken and, along with Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago, the group recieved renown as pioneers in the use of R & B horns in white popular music. And while the band's increasing adventures into fussion weren't always seemless or successful, they nervertheless had an anticipatory spirit which reflectd Butterfield's continuing determination to make music his way. The transformation during these times appeared to be happening at warp speed. Though Butterfield and company demonstrated plenty of appreciation for their contemporaries and predecessors, boundries and categories never seemed to matter much to the band. They seemed to take pride in trampling more than a few, from incursions into the ghetto blues scene onward through musical history.
THE MUSIC OF the Paul Butterfield Blues Band was many things...a cry for recognition of a harder, fiercer kind of blues than white ears were used to; an accomodation of diverse musical influences with a personal verve and virtuosity; and a celebration of freedom to reinvent the context for its musical voice as it went along. Even those who would chalk the last up to youthful impudence must acknowledge that it was a perfect mirror for the ascendent spirit of the times (especially the psychedelic ballroom circuit), where other impudent souls were striving to reinvent culture and society with emphasis on tolerance and diversity, and music was the main bearer of the message for those who knew how to tune in. Surely the empathy between the group's aspirations and those of its audience had a lot to do with the bands popularity. In both cases, the results weren't always pretty, but they were bold, idealistic and ambitious -- and they changed the landscape forever. ..Dick Shurman .....February 1995
Paul Butterfield (1969)