Junior Wells: At Home With The Blues Godfather

Marc Pokempner is a respected Chicago photographer whose pictures have wound up everywhere from Newsweek magazine to the Field Museum of Natural History. He's best known in music circles for his classic photos of blues musicians. But on the evening of January 14, 1975, he was just a "stone camera nut" (in the words of bluesman Junior Wells) who decided to spend the evening of his 27th birthday at Theresa's, the late, lamented South Side blues bar. You can hear him bantering off-mic with the late blues harp titan on Live At Theresa's 1975 (Delmark), a new Junior Wells release of a 31-year-old club set. Just the un-P.C. dialogue tracks by themselves are a trip, but it's mainly all about the music.
Living in a time and place where the blues is a major tourist trade and even the most jerkwater bar band can play a half-baked shuffle on autopilot, this album is a much-needed reminder that there's nothing like Chitown blues, done right, at the top of its game. Classic blues legends like Sammy Lawhorn, Phil Guy and Byther Smith alternate on guitar, and even when Wells is taking off on some bizarre rap, there is nothing questionable about his vocals and his well-controlled harmonica work. By the time Wells made this album, the blues revival of the late '60s had already lost its steam. Even though he had already built up a sizable rep playing in rock venues like the Fillmore in San Francisco, playing on shows with the biggest rock bands of the time, he still gigged regularly in small, black-owned juke joints like Theresa's and Queen Bee. To give you an idea of what this show ain't, seek out Junior Wells Sings Live At The Golden Bear (Mercury). Or better still, just leave it in the racks if you see it. This 1969 album was recorded at a Los Angeles jazz club to an audience that sounds half-dead (and he's introed by a stiff, unexcited emcee who probably thought he was at a ballet recital). It probably was a good payday for Wells, but to be truthful he doesn't sound too thrilled about the whole situation himself.

It was a different story at Theresa's. Even though this gig was a good six years after the Golden Bear show, you get the impression that Wells could have fed off of a crowd this lively at any time. He sounds at home, with the band, the musicians and maybe even the bartender for all we know. We could call this one of the best historical recordings of the year, but the music lives and breathes like it was recorded a half-hour ago.