Electric Mud
Encyclopedia
Electric Mud is a studio album by Muddy Waters
. Released in 1968, it is a concept album
which imagines Muddy Waters as a psychedelic
musician. Producer Marshall Chess
suggested that Muddy Waters record experimental, psychedelic blues tracks with members of Rotary Connection
in an attempt to revive the blues singer's career.
The album peaked at #127 on the Billboard
Pop Albums
chart
. It was controversial for its fusion of electric blues
with psychedelic elements, but was influential on psychedelic rock
bands of the era.
formed Cadet Concept Records
as a subsidiary of Chess Records
. The label's first release was the self-titled debut album of the psychedelic
band Rotary Connection
, whose members Chess described as "the hottest, most avant garde
rock
guys in Chicago
". As a result of the album's success, Chess felt that he could revive the career of bluesman Muddy Waters by recording an album of experimental, psychedelic blues
with members of Rotary Connection as Muddy Waters' backing band. Chess hoped the new album would sell well among fans of psychedelic rock
bands influenced by Muddy Waters. According to Muddy Waters, "Quite naturally, I like a good-selling record. I was looking at it because I played for so many of these so-called hippies that I thought probably I could reach them."
In place of Muddy Waters' regular musicians were Gene Barge, Pete Cosey
, Roland Faulkner, Morris Jennings, Louis Satterfield, Charles Stepney
and Phil Upchurch
. Cosey, Upchurch and Jennings joked about calling the group "The Electric Niggers". Marshall Chess liked the suggestion, but Leonard Chess
refused to allow the name.
The album incorporates use of wah-wah pedal
and fuzzbox. Marshall Chess augmented the rhythm of Muddy Waters' live band with the use of electric organ
and saxophone
. Blues purists criticized the album's psychedelic sound. According to Marshall Chess, "It was never an attempt to make Muddy Waters a psychedelic artist; it was a concept album like David Bowie
being Ziggy Stardust." Muddy Waters said of the album's sound, "That guitar sounds just like a cat — meow — and the drums have a loping, busy beat."
"I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man" incorporates free jazz
influences, with Gene Barge
performing a concert harp
. Muddy Waters performs the vocals of "Let's Spend the Night Together
", a cover of The Rolling Stones
' 1967 single, in gospel
-soul
style.
According to Buddy Guy
, "[Muddy Waters couldn't] feel this psychedelic stuff at all...and if the feeling is gone, that's it. You can't get too busy behind a singer. You've got to let him sing it." Muddy Waters' previous albums replicated the sound of his live performances. Working with a studio band rather than his own was problematic for Muddy Waters, who could not perform material from the album live. He stated "What the hell do you have a record for if you can't play the first time it's out? I'm so sick of that...If you've got to have big amplifiers and wah-wahs and equipment to make you guitar say different things, well, hell, you can't play no blues."
The title of the album did not refer to the use of electric guitar
, as Muddy Waters had played the instrument since he first signed to Chess Records. The use of the term "electric" is used in a psychedelic context. The recording band for Electric Mud also recorded with Howlin' Wolf
, resulting in The Howlin' Wolf Album
.
The Electric Mud album cover artwork was eclectic and reflected McKinley Morganfield's fashion preferences during 1968. The front cover of the original 33 RPM vinyl commercial release during 1968 in the USA featured two graphic versions; a white background with black text, and a second, less known black background with white text. The back cover and inner gate fold artwork was published identical, as was the small booklet of photos accompanying the release. Viewing of various Electric Mud album cover graphics can be found by searching Google's Images metasearch capabilities.
Pop Albums
chart
, it was Muddy Waters' first album to hit on the Billboard and Cash Box charts. Although American critics panned the album, it was better received in England. According to Marshall Chess, "It was the biggest Muddy Waters record we ever had at Chess, and it dropped instantly. The English accepted it; they are more eccentric."
the following year, incorporating elements of the sound of Electric Mud. According to Cosey, "I'll never forget, as soon as I walked into the studio for the follow-up and Muddy saw me, he threw his arms around me, said 'Hey, how you doing, boy, play some of that stuff you played on that last album.'" Following strong criticism of the album, Muddy Waters claimed that he disliked the album and its sound, and that he did not consider the album to be blues
. He stated, "Every time I go into Chess, [they] put some un-blues players with me [...] If you change my sound, then you gonna change the whole man." In the biography The Mojo Man, Muddy Waters stated "That Electric Mud record was dogshit. But when it came out, it started selling like wild, but then they started sending them back. They said, 'This can't be Muddy Waters with all this shit going on, all this wha-wha and fuzztone.'"
According to Robert Gordon in Can't Be Satisfied: The Life and Times of Muddy Waters, the valet of Jimi Hendrix later told Pete Cosey that Hendrix would listen to "Herbert Harper's Free Press News" for inspiration before performing. Led Zeppelin
bassist John Paul Jones
cited Electric Mud as the inspiration for the riff of "Black Dog
". Allmusic reviewer Richie Unterberger panned the album as being "crass".
In Lost in the Grooves: Scram's Capricious Guide to the Music You Missed, Gene Sculatti wrote that "The rhythm seems to anticipate hip-hop
by three decades." Chuck D
stated that he had been introduced to Electric Mud by a member of Public Enemy, which sparked an interest in Muddy Waters' earlier work, and in roots-oriented blues. The documentary series The Blues
, produced by Martin Scorsese
, depicts the recording band for Electric Mud performing with Chuck D and members of The Roots
. Cypress Hill
samples "Tom Cat", from this album, on the interlude "Ultraviolet Dreams", from their self-titled debut album
, as does Natas
on their song "See You In Hell" from the album N of tha World
. The rock/funk-oriented arrangement of "Mannish Boy
" present on this album is sampled and featured prominently on the Gorillaz
B-side "Left Hand Suzuki Method".
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
. Released in 1968, it is a concept album
Concept album
In music, a concept album is an album that is "unified by a theme, which can be instrumental, compositional, narrative, or lyrical." Commonly, concept albums tend to incorporate preconceived musical or lyrical ideas rather than being improvised or composed in the studio, with all songs contributing...
which imagines Muddy Waters as a psychedelic
Psychedelic music
Psychedelic music covers a range of popular music styles and genres, which are inspired by or influenced by psychedelic culture and which attempt to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues-rock bands in the...
musician. Producer Marshall Chess
Marshall Chess
Marshall Chess is the son and nephew of the founders of Chess Records, the Chicago-based independent record label that first recorded an unprecedented list of African-American, blues and early rock and roll artists such as: Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Bo Diddley, Sonny Boy...
suggested that Muddy Waters record experimental, psychedelic blues tracks with members of Rotary Connection
Rotary Connection
Rotary Connection was an American psychedelic soul band, formed in Chicago in 1966. The highly experimental band was the idea of Marshall Chess, son of Chess Records founder Leonard Chess. Marshall was the director behind a start-up label, Cadet Concept Records, and wanted to focus on music outside...
in an attempt to revive the blues singer's career.
The album peaked at #127 on the Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
Pop Albums
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
chart
Billboard charts
The Billboard charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs or albums in the United States. The results are published in Billboard magazine...
. It was controversial for its fusion of electric blues
Electric blues
Electric blues is a type of blues music distinguished by the amplification of the guitar, bass guitar, drums, and often the harmonica. Pioneered in the 1930s, it emerged as a genre in Chicago in the 1940s. It was taken up in many areas of America leading to the development of regional subgenres...
with psychedelic elements, but was influential on psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or influenced by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in United States and the United Kingdom...
bands of the era.
Production
In 1967, Marshall ChessMarshall Chess
Marshall Chess is the son and nephew of the founders of Chess Records, the Chicago-based independent record label that first recorded an unprecedented list of African-American, blues and early rock and roll artists such as: Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Bo Diddley, Sonny Boy...
formed Cadet Concept Records
Cadet Records
Cadet Records was started as Argo Records in 1955 as the jazz subsidiary of Chess Records. Argo changed its name in 1965 to Cadet to avoid confusion with the similarly named label in the UK...
as a subsidiary of Chess Records
Chess Records
Chess Records was an American record label based in Chicago, Illinois. It specialized in blues, R&B, soul, gospel music, early rock and roll, and occasional jazz releases....
. The label's first release was the self-titled debut album of the psychedelic
Psychedelic music
Psychedelic music covers a range of popular music styles and genres, which are inspired by or influenced by psychedelic culture and which attempt to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues-rock bands in the...
band Rotary Connection
Rotary Connection
Rotary Connection was an American psychedelic soul band, formed in Chicago in 1966. The highly experimental band was the idea of Marshall Chess, son of Chess Records founder Leonard Chess. Marshall was the director behind a start-up label, Cadet Concept Records, and wanted to focus on music outside...
, whose members Chess described as "the hottest, most avant garde
Avant-garde music
Avant-garde music is a term used to characterize music which is thought to be ahead of its time, i.e. containing innovative elements or fusing different genres....
rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
guys in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
". As a result of the album's success, Chess felt that he could revive the career of bluesman Muddy Waters by recording an album of experimental, psychedelic blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
with members of Rotary Connection as Muddy Waters' backing band. Chess hoped the new album would sell well among fans of psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or influenced by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in United States and the United Kingdom...
bands influenced by Muddy Waters. According to Muddy Waters, "Quite naturally, I like a good-selling record. I was looking at it because I played for so many of these so-called hippies that I thought probably I could reach them."
In place of Muddy Waters' regular musicians were Gene Barge, Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey is an African-American guitarist most famous for playing with Miles Davis' band between 1973 and 1975. His fiercely flanged and distorted guitar bore comparisons to Jimi Hendrix...
, Roland Faulkner, Morris Jennings, Louis Satterfield, Charles Stepney
Charles Stepney
Charles Stepney was a producer, arranger, songwriter and musician famous for his Orchestral Psychedelic soul sound with Chicago's Cadet/Chess records in the 1960s/1970s and afterwards with Earth, Wind & Fire....
and Phil Upchurch
Phil Upchurch
Phil Upchurch is an American jazz and R&B guitarist and bassist.Upchurch started his career working with The Kool Gents, The Dells, and The Spaniels before going on to work with Curtis Mayfield, Otis Rush and Jimmy Reed. He then returned to Chicago to play and record with Woody Herman, Stan Getz,...
. Cosey, Upchurch and Jennings joked about calling the group "The Electric Niggers". Marshall Chess liked the suggestion, but Leonard Chess
Leonard Chess
Leonard Chess was a record company executive and the founder of Chess Records. He was influential in the development of electric blues.- Early life :...
refused to allow the name.
The album incorporates use of wah-wah pedal
Wah-wah pedal
A wah-wah pedal is a type of guitar effects pedal that alters the tone of the signal to create a distinctive effect, mimicking the human voice...
and fuzzbox. Marshall Chess augmented the rhythm of Muddy Waters' live band with the use of electric organ
Electric organ
In biology, the electric organ is an organ common to all electric fish used for the purposes of creating an electric field. The electric organ is derived from modified nerve or muscle tissue...
and saxophone
Saxophone
The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
. Blues purists criticized the album's psychedelic sound. According to Marshall Chess, "It was never an attempt to make Muddy Waters a psychedelic artist; it was a concept album like David Bowie
David Bowie
David Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
being Ziggy Stardust." Muddy Waters said of the album's sound, "That guitar sounds just like a cat — meow — and the drums have a loping, busy beat."
"I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man" incorporates free jazz
Free jazz
Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...
influences, with Gene Barge
Gene Barge
Gene Barge, a founding member of the 1960s band The Church Street Five, was born in Norfolk, Virginia in 1926, is an accomplished tenor and alto saxophonist and composer in several bands....
performing a concert harp
Pedal harp
The pedal harp is a large and technically modern harp, designed primarily for classical music and played either solo, as part of chamber ensembles, as soloist with or as a section or member in an orchestra...
. Muddy Waters performs the vocals of "Let's Spend the Night Together
Let's Spend the Night Together
"Let's Spend the Night Together" is a song written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, and originally released as a single by The Rolling Stones in 1967...
", a cover of The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
' 1967 single, in gospel
Gospel music
Gospel music is music that is written to express either personal, spiritual or a communal belief regarding Christian life, as well as to give a Christian alternative to mainstream secular music....
-soul
Soul music
Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...
style.
According to Buddy Guy
Buddy Guy
George "Buddy" Guy is an American blues and jazz guitarist and singer. He is a critically acclaimed artist who has established himself as a pioneer of the Chicago blues sound, and has served as an influence to some of the most notable musicians of his generation...
, "[Muddy Waters couldn't] feel this psychedelic stuff at all...and if the feeling is gone, that's it. You can't get too busy behind a singer. You've got to let him sing it." Muddy Waters' previous albums replicated the sound of his live performances. Working with a studio band rather than his own was problematic for Muddy Waters, who could not perform material from the album live. He stated "What the hell do you have a record for if you can't play the first time it's out? I'm so sick of that...If you've got to have big amplifiers and wah-wahs and equipment to make you guitar say different things, well, hell, you can't play no blues."
The title of the album did not refer to the use of electric guitar
Electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
, as Muddy Waters had played the instrument since he first signed to Chess Records. The use of the term "electric" is used in a psychedelic context. The recording band for Electric Mud also recorded with Howlin' Wolf
Howlin' Wolf
Chester Arthur Burnett , known as Howlin' Wolf, was an influential American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player....
, resulting in The Howlin' Wolf Album
The Howlin' Wolf Album
-Personnel:*Howlin' Wolf – guitar, harmonica, vocals*Gene Barge – horn, electric sax*Pete Cosey – guitar, bowed guitar*Hubert Sumlin – guitar*Roland Faulkner – guitar*Morris Jennings – drums*Don Myrick – flute*Louis Satterfield – bass...
.
The Electric Mud album cover artwork was eclectic and reflected McKinley Morganfield's fashion preferences during 1968. The front cover of the original 33 RPM vinyl commercial release during 1968 in the USA featured two graphic versions; a white background with black text, and a second, less known black background with white text. The back cover and inner gate fold artwork was published identical, as was the small booklet of photos accompanying the release. Viewing of various Electric Mud album cover graphics can be found by searching Google's Images metasearch capabilities.
Reception
Electric Mud sold 150,000 copies within the first six weeks of release. Peaking at #127 on the BillboardBillboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
Pop Albums
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
chart
Billboard charts
The Billboard charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs or albums in the United States. The results are published in Billboard magazine...
, it was Muddy Waters' first album to hit on the Billboard and Cash Box charts. Although American critics panned the album, it was better received in England. According to Marshall Chess, "It was the biggest Muddy Waters record we ever had at Chess, and it dropped instantly. The English accepted it; they are more eccentric."
Legacy
Muddy Waters recorded After the RainAfter the Rain (Muddy Waters album)
After the Rain is a 1969 album by Muddy Waters, a follow-up to the previous years' Electric Mud and sharing many of the musicians from that album...
the following year, incorporating elements of the sound of Electric Mud. According to Cosey, "I'll never forget, as soon as I walked into the studio for the follow-up and Muddy saw me, he threw his arms around me, said 'Hey, how you doing, boy, play some of that stuff you played on that last album.'" Following strong criticism of the album, Muddy Waters claimed that he disliked the album and its sound, and that he did not consider the album to be blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
. He stated, "Every time I go into Chess, [they] put some un-blues players with me [...] If you change my sound, then you gonna change the whole man." In the biography The Mojo Man, Muddy Waters stated "That Electric Mud record was dogshit. But when it came out, it started selling like wild, but then they started sending them back. They said, 'This can't be Muddy Waters with all this shit going on, all this wha-wha and fuzztone.'"
According to Robert Gordon in Can't Be Satisfied: The Life and Times of Muddy Waters, the valet of Jimi Hendrix later told Pete Cosey that Hendrix would listen to "Herbert Harper's Free Press News" for inspiration before performing. Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin were an English rock band, active in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Formed in 1968, they consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham...
bassist John Paul Jones
John Paul Jones (musician)
John Paul Jones is an English multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, composer, arranger and record producer. Best known as the bassist, mandolinist, and keyboardist for English rock band Led Zeppelin, Jones has since developed a solo career and has gained even more respect as both a musician and a...
cited Electric Mud as the inspiration for the riff of "Black Dog
Black Dog (song)
"Black Dog" is a song by English rock band Led Zeppelin, the lead off track of their fourth album, released in 1971. It was also released as a single in the United States and Australia with "Misty Mountain Hop" on the B-side, and reached #15 on Billboard and #11 in Australia.In 2010, the song was...
". Allmusic reviewer Richie Unterberger panned the album as being "crass".
In Lost in the Grooves: Scram's Capricious Guide to the Music You Missed, Gene Sculatti wrote that "The rhythm seems to anticipate hip-hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
by three decades." Chuck D
Chuck D
Carlton Douglas Ridenhour , better known by his stage name, Chuck D, is an American rapper, author, and producer. He helped create politically and socially conscious rap music in the mid-1980s as the leader of the rap group Public Enemy.- Early life :Ridenhour was born in Queens, New York...
stated that he had been introduced to Electric Mud by a member of Public Enemy, which sparked an interest in Muddy Waters' earlier work, and in roots-oriented blues. The documentary series The Blues
The Blues (film)
The Blues is a 2003 documentary film series produced by Martin Scorsese, dedicated to the history of blues music. In each of the seven episodes, a different director explores a stage in the development of the blues...
, produced by Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
, depicts the recording band for Electric Mud performing with Chuck D and members of The Roots
The Roots
The Roots is an American hip hop/neo soul band formed in 1987 by Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter and Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They are famed for beginning with a jazzy, eclectic approach to hip hop which still includes live instrumentals...
. Cypress Hill
Cypress Hill
Cypress Hill is an American hip hop group from South Gate, California. Cypress Hill was the first Latino hip-hop group to have platinum and multi-platinum albums, selling over 18 million albums worldwide...
samples "Tom Cat", from this album, on the interlude "Ultraviolet Dreams", from their self-titled debut album
Cypress Hill (album)
Steve Huey of Allmusic calls Cypress Hill's debut "a sonic blueprint that would become one of the most widely copied in hip-hop."In 1998, the album was selected as one of The Source's 100 Best Rap Albums...
, as does Natas
Natas (group)
Natas is an American hip hop group from Detroit, Michigan.-History:Esham met Mastamind as a student at Osborne High School, who gave him a three-song demo tape of his music, leading the two to form the group with Esham's longtime friend, T-N-T, deciding on the name Natas, an acronym for "Nation...
on their song "See You In Hell" from the album N of tha World
N of tha World
- Personnel :* Esham the Unholy aka Black Hitler — rapping* T-N-T aka The Dynamite Kid — rapping* Mastamind aka Mr. Hellraiser — rapping- Musicians :* Mike P...
. The rock/funk-oriented arrangement of "Mannish Boy
Mannish Boy
"Mannish Boy" is a blues standard first recorded by Muddy Waters in 1955. It is an arrangement of Bo Diddley's "I'm a Man"...
" present on this album is sampled and featured prominently on the Gorillaz
Gorillaz
Gorillaz is an English musical project created in 1998 by Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. This project consists of Gorillaz music itself and an extensive fictional universe depicting a "virtual band" of cartoon characters...
B-side "Left Hand Suzuki Method".
Track listing
Musicians
- Muddy WatersMuddy WatersMcKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
– vocalSingingSinging is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments... - Gene Barge – tenor saxophoneTenor saxophoneThe tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor, with the alto, are the two most common types of saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B, and written as a transposing instrument in the treble...
, producerRecord producerA record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music... - Phil UpchurchPhil UpchurchPhil Upchurch is an American jazz and R&B guitarist and bassist.Upchurch started his career working with The Kool Gents, The Dells, and The Spaniels before going on to work with Curtis Mayfield, Otis Rush and Jimmy Reed. He then returned to Chicago to play and record with Woody Herman, Stan Getz,...
– guitarGuitarThe guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
s - Roland Faulkner – guitars
- Pete CoseyPete CoseyPete Cosey is an African-American guitarist most famous for playing with Miles Davis' band between 1973 and 1975. His fiercely flanged and distorted guitar bore comparisons to Jimi Hendrix...
– guitars - Charles StepneyCharles StepneyCharles Stepney was a producer, arranger, songwriter and musician famous for his Orchestral Psychedelic soul sound with Chicago's Cadet/Chess records in the 1960s/1970s and afterwards with Earth, Wind & Fire....
– organOrgan (music)The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...
, arrangerArrangementThe American Federation of Musicians defines arranging as "the art of preparing and adapting an already written composition for presentation in other than its original form. An arrangement may include reharmonization, paraphrasing, and/or development of a composition, so that it fully represents...
, producer - Louis Satterfield – bassBass guitarThe bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
- Morris Jennings – drumsDrum kitA drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....
Additional personnel
- Stu Black – engineerAudio engineeringAn audio engineer, also called audio technician, audio technologist or sound technician, is a specialist in a skilled trade that deals with the use of machinery and equipment for the recording, mixing and reproduction of sounds. The field draws on many artistic and vocational areas, including...
- Marshall ChessMarshall ChessMarshall Chess is the son and nephew of the founders of Chess Records, the Chicago-based independent record label that first recorded an unprecedented list of African-American, blues and early rock and roll artists such as: Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Bo Diddley, Sonny Boy...
– producer - Meire Murakami – designDesignDesign as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan...
- Bill Sharpe – cover designAlbum coverAn album cover is the front of the packaging of a commercially released audio recording product, or album. The term can refer to either the printed cardboard covers typically used to package sets of 10" and 12" 78 rpm records, single and sets of 12" LPs, sets of 45 rpm records , or the front-facing...
- Abner Spector – mixingMix engineerA mix engineer, also referred to as "mixing engineer", is a person who, once all instruments, voices, and sounds, etc., have been recorded, creates what is called the final version of a song, hence the term "mix engineer"...
- Vartan – art directionArt directorThe art director is a person who supervise the creative process of a design.The term 'art director' is a blanket title for a variety of similar job functions in advertising, publishing, film and television, the Internet, and video games....
Chart positions
| Chart (1968) | Peak Position |
|---|---|
| Pop Albums Billboard 200 The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists... |
127 |