Eric Clapton
Submitted: 02/05/2010 05:26 PM

The weight of becoming a guitar god in the '60s never seemed to slow Clapton's creativity, though he has had some close calls while overcoming addiction and other tragedies. Originally lauded for his lightning-fast guitar licks, it's arguably Clapton's soulful blues playing that merits the "Clapton is God" refrain. After performing in a slew of influential and certifiably Classic Rock bands in the '60s -- and chumming around with guitar greats like Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, and John McLaughlin -- Clapton launched a successful, provocative solo career, quickly finding his own voice as a singer and ballad writer. Borrowing heavily from Freddie King, Clapton's playing continues to find new styles worthy of a blues injection: he's recorded R&B crossover hits, unplugged singer-songwriter fare, and even incognito trip-hop projects (as x-sample). - Jessy Terry

Ray Charles
Submitted: 02/07/2010 02:39 PM

Heaven and earth battle it out in the music of Ray Charles, who combined gospel with the best of secular music and helped give birth to soul, rock, and hard bop. His early work showed the silky influences of the Nat "King" Cole trio and the piano blues great Charles Brown. Charles combined their sophisticated styles with R&B and gritty gospel to create his signature sound: hard, snappy piano combined with exquisite vocals that fall somewhere between a preacher gone bad and a yearning romantic balladeer. Charles absorbed styles like a sponge: big band jazz, country and pop were all added to his musical arsenal, and he built up a musical empire that kept him in the public eye for decades up until his untimely death, at the age of 73, in June 2004. Just prior to his passing, Charles cut his first duets record with such fans as Norah Jones, Willie Nelson, and Elton John, which illustrates a multi-generational sampling of the artists who list him as a prime influence. An American institution, Ray Charles' rendition of "Georgia on My Mind" has even become that state's anthem. If only the other 49 states could be as fortunate. - Nick Dedina

Stevie Ray Vaughan
Submitted: 01/21/2010 02:21 PM

The loss of Stevie Ray Vaughan in a 1990 helicopter crash was a rock (and blues) death on par with the loss of Jimi Hendrix and Otis Redding, so deeply was the public moved. Vaughan had been the catalyst for a massive blues revival in the 1980s, with a distinctive guitar tone and a string of singles that managed to cross over to mainstream rock radio. This was somewhat detrimental to his image, as Vaughan was at heart a pure blues guitarist, and his mainstream success did more to damage any authenticity he might have enjoyed as an obscure axeman, especially with purist blues fans. But in the years since his death Vaughan's music has come to represent a pinnacle of Texas or Modern Blues, and no longer seems like the call to arms for beer-swollen George Thorogood fans that it did at the height of his popularity. All his early studio albums are worth checking out (they're certainly better than Robert Cray's), but the real fun begins with Vaughan's live recordings, on which he repeatedly goes wholly over the top. - Mike McGuirk

B.B. King
Submitted: 02/04/2010 03:34 PM

The undisputed king of the blues, B.B. "Blues Boy" King will go down in history as one of the most important electric guitarists and blues singers ever. King's vocals are smooth and rich as they emote wailing cries and good-hearted humor, while every sound he plays on the guitar is instantly recognizable by his distinct vibrato, vocal guitar style and authorship of hundreds of the most classic blues riffs. Drawing on the single-note playing of T-Bone Walker, King's style has influenced several of the greatest rock, blues and jazz artists of the latter half of the twentieth century, including Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan, among others. Most important is the fact that, with one note, B.B. King can tell a story that touches the deepest roots of your soul. - Jessy Terry

Bonnie Raitt
Submitted: 02/03/2010 03:16 PM

Raitt got her start in the folk clubs of Cambridge, Mass., in the 1960s, playing Country Blues and bottleneck guitar. She learned directly from many of her heroes, such as Fred McDowell and Sippie Wallace, working as a combination chauffeur/babysitter to them when they passed through town on tour. Raitt got her own record deal in the '70s and developed a large and devoted following with her beautiful, soulful singing and spot-on slide guitar prowess. Although Raitt is a songwriter, she's always had a great ear for others' material, making John Prine's "Angel From Montgomery" virtually her own. In the late '80s Raitt made a record with producer Don Was that completely reignited what was a flagging career. The presciently titled Nick of Time won a slew of Grammy Awards and sold millions. In typically cool fashion, Raitt took blues pioneer Charles Brown and a group of other veteran performers on the road with her, spreading the wealth of her newfound success. - Tom Heyman

Etta James
Submitted: 02/07/2010 02:38 PM

From the mid-1950s to the present, Etta James' powerful, soul-charged voice has become deeper and rougher, with a rich texture and heartfelt inflections. It goes without saying that the woman known as "Mama" is aging like California wine, and she can still open wounds in her songs and come out standing strong. When she was five years old, Jamesetta Hawkins amazed the congregation of her church choir. When she belted out Gospel songs with absolute spiritual fervor, it was clear that the child was a musical prodigy. Her career as a singer began when she recorded "The Wallflower" with Johnny Otis in 1954 for Modern Records. A year later, the song topped the charts. In 1960, she moved to Chess Records and soon began cranking out hits such as the driving, jiving, southern soul smash "Tell Mama," which Janis Joplin covered later that decade. Since then, she has recorded for Island and Elektra, experimenting with rock and jazz, but always returning to her Gospel-soaked roots and southern soul. - Eric Shea

Muddy Waters
Submitted: 01/29/2010 07:08 PM

Muddy Waters was one of the few key players of the postwar Chicago Blues scene who actually influenced the music that influenced him. His swollen, grandiloquent vocals were an instrument unto themselves and his beefy electric slide playing breathed new life into music heavily influenced by the Delta Blues. Waters, who grew up on the Mississippi Delta in Clarksdale listening to the music of Son House, moved to Chicago in 1943. In 1948, he recorded "I Can't Be Satisfied" and "I Feel like Going Home." The former became his first national R&B chart topper, and influenced the Rolling Stones' "I Can't Get No Satisfaction," and his 1950 song "Rollin' Stone" inspired the band's name. Waters assembled one of the meanest bands in blues history, the Headhunters, comprised of Little Walter, Baby Face Leroy Foste, and Jimmy Rogers. In 1951, Waters cranked out four hits, "Louisiana Blues," "Long Distance Call," "Honey Bee," and "Still a Fool" which rapidly climbed the charts and prompted Leonard Chess (founder of Chess Records) to play on the 1952 hit, "She Moves Me." Waters' renditions of "You Shook Me" and "I Just Wanna Make Love To You" turned on a sea of blues-obsessed British musicians who made him their new God. The Stones couldn't believe their eyes when they went to visit the legendary Sun Studio in Memphis only to find their God painting the ceiling. They put together an intimate gig and jammed with Waters on "I Just Wanna Make Love to You." By his death in 1983, Waters was already a legend in music. He had influenced the sound of Chicago Blues, as well as anyone who ever picked up on the music to which he lent his King Midas touch. - Eric Shea

Keb' Mo'
Submitted: 01/23/2010 02:20 PM

Keb' Mo's unique style lies somewhere between the soul of Delta Blues and the melodic feel of contemporary folk, bundled in a story-like framework. Whether delivering a sparse solo song or fully arranged bluesy pop, Mo's rich vocals and earthy acoustic plucking attract both newer and older blues audiences, as evidenced on his stunning self-titled debut Keb' Mo'. His songwriting style occasionally disturbs purists; like Robert Cray, Keb' Mo' has found ways to write a blues tune without remaining in the traditional twelve-bar format. Nonetheless Keb' Mo' has made quite a niche for himself on many adult alternative radio stations, due in part to the polished, warm sound of his compositions. - Jessy Terry

Howlin' Wolf
Submitted: 01/04/2010 12:31 PM

Forget about Screamin' Jay Hawkins' B-movie mania and Alice Cooper's gory stage show. At 6'3" and 300 lbs., Howlin' Wolf used to approach the stage on all fours, screaming his whiskey-rotted scream, getting into character in a frightening show of pure emotional intensity that scared the living doodie out of anybody within a hundred yards of the roadhouse shacks where he played. With an influence spanning far beyond the limits of blues, Howlin' Wolf stands as one of the premier figures in American music. A supernaturally booming voice fraught with paranoia, anxiety and freaked-out possession threatens to bust the speakers wide open, even on the "easy" numbers. The band that played behind this towering giant is as much a part of the genius -- thanks to the diabolically nasty guitar work of Willie Johnson and Hubert Sumlin. Sumlin's precise single-note phrases defy all accepted blues rules. They barge in all over the place, chaotically fathering a seamless rhythm that often runs in a dissonant tangent to the rest of the band. Howlin' Wolf's best songs feature this dynamic clash of sounds; fervently repeated two-chord mantras gather a spine-shaking momentum as the Wolf twitches and shrieks his deepest fears. Howlin' Wolf may not have been the most versatile of musicians, but the sheer power of his delivery and sonic force of his music is something that has been imitated by many but matched by none. - Mike McGuirk

Taj Mahal
Submitted: 01/16/2010 02:21 PM

Here is a man who has closely studied and preserved the roots music of African Americans since he began playing the Boston folk scene in the 1960s. He studied the history and formulas of Caribbean, West African, Zydeco, rock, jazz, and R&B. In fact, it was always the music of Country Blues that has influenced most of his own music. After learning how to play a multitude of instruments, Taj Mahal moved to Los Angeles and teamed up with Ry Cooder to form the Rising Sons, who split after one single was released (more songs from these sessions were released in the 1990s). Taj Mahal finally recorded his first solo album in 1968, shortly before playing an incredible performance of the Banks/Parker hit, "Ain't That a Lot of Love" on the Rolling Stones' Rock & Roll Circus with the late, great Jessie Ed Davis on lead guitar. Following what his fans believe to be his prime years, Taj Mahal went on to experiment with whatever music genre he was infatuated with at the time, and also wrote some scores for the stage as well as television and film. Those who know his music well can testify that when he played Country Blues, the Taj was at his best. His rich soulful singing has an ultra-deep dynamic range that fits perfectly with the driving shuffle-beats and bass bounce of this particular blues subgenre. - Eric Shea

John Lee Hooker
Submitted: 01/30/2010 04:24 PM

For over fifty years the foot-stomping King of the tone-drone, infinite boogie has delivered a multitude of musical styles within the realm of blues music. He has also hopped around more record labels (under pseudonyms) than Woody Guthrie did boxcars. Born in Mississippi, "the Hook" began to play in the club scene on Hastings Street post-WWII when he relocated to the Motor City. In 1948, he recorded "Sally Mae" and "Boogie Chillen," the primeval-sounding hit B-side that best showcased his rustic, deep, and dark, guttural vox. In 1962, the contagious "Boom Boom" leaked from its peak on the R&B charts and trickled down onto the airwaves of mainstream pop. It wasn't until his 1989 album The Healer that Hooker began recording his celebrated albums with guest musicians. From that pivotal album to 1999's Best of Friends collection, the Hook has played with a diverse gathering of musicians such as Bonnie Raitt, Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, Keith Richards, Van Morrison and Robert Cray, to name a few. - Eric Shea

Joe Bonamassa
Submitted: 01/31/2010 01:44 PM

A blues guitarist first but also a lover of great rock riffs, Joe Bonamassa is liable to pull out just about anything in live performances. Sections from Yes' "Starship Trooper" are well documented but Bonamassa also tosses in the "mosh" part from Deep Purple's "Perfect Strangers" at times, a riff any rock fan hears in his or her sleep. Often cited as the best guitarist of his generation, Bonamassa tends toward the chorded lead asides of Billy Gibbons and bears an almost uncanny resemblance to Cream-era Clapton more than Stevie Ray Vaughan or B.B. King, although those two influences are still very much present in Bonamassa's playing. They're just not the first names that come to mind when he takes a solo. Like many of his peers -- Kenny Wayne Shepherd, "Monster" Mike Welch, etc. -- Bonamassa was sitting in with bands and playing live shows before he was a teenager, and his first album, A New Day Yesterday, came out when he was just 23 years old, in 2000. Subsequently Bonamassa steadily toured and released records, with eight under his belt thus far, Live From No Place In Particular being the most recent.

Leo Dyer
Submitted: 08/25/2009 11:22 AM

Dr. John
Submitted: 01/15/2010 02:57 PM

Before making his name as a major New Orleans pianist, Dr. John was known as Mac Rebennack, a successful session guitarist who was forced to find a new instrument after being accidentally shot in the hand. As Dr. John, he garnered a reputation for performing in all-out Mardi Gras regalia, bringing a theatrical aspect to his shows that surprisingly never detracted from his soulful music. His hearty vocals have a thick Louisiana twang filtered through deep, earthy grit, while his rollicking keyboard and piano playing travel from home-style New Orleans R&B and jazz to spaced-out psychedelia, mixed into a secret musical gumbo that no one has quite figured out. He's probably best known for his '70s classic "Right Place, Wrong Time," a song that reached new levels of stripped-down voodoo Funk and was boosted by the help of supreme Cajun groovers, the Meters. - Jessy Terry

Susan Tedeschi
Submitted: 01/15/2010 02:57 PM

Billboard Magazine has called Susan Tedeschi "honest-to-God great." She spins out steaming, cinematic blues with her smoking hot guitar. Think of a passionate and sultry mix of Etta James and Bonnie Raitt. - Nick Dedina

Buddy Guy
Submitted: 02/05/2010 05:26 PM

Eric Clapton calls Buddy Guy his favorite blues guitarist. Put his amazing guitar playing together with a singing voice that is its equal and you have pure blues heaven. Guy went to Chicago in 1957 and hung out with legends such as B.B. King. He put out a series of impressive records on the Cobra label but it is his '60s work that still knocks your socks off to this day. His guitar jams and tortured vocals are so dynamic it makes one wonder why anybody ever bothered with Blues Rock. Guy's career went through a hard stretch in the '70s and '80s, but it came back with a vengeance in the '90s. Buddy Guy's music is as strong as ever and his wild, onstage energy has earned him capacity crowds at venues all over the world. - Eric Shea

Fats Domino
Submitted: 02/07/2010 02:39 PM

The good times start the second the needle hits a Fats Domino record. His Boogie-Woogie piano style meshes seamlessly with his charmingly laid-back vocals. He put out hit after hit during the '50s -- "Ain't That a Shame," "I'm Walking," and "Blueberry Hill" still float by on late night K-Tel commercials. A follower of the New Orleans R&B tradition, Domino was one of the few founders of rock 'n' roll who was widely respected by jazz and blues fans. When pop passed him by, he was still embraced in clubs and concert halls around the world. His last hit was a cover of "Lady Madonna" -- a song that the Beatles structured as an homage to his classic style. - Nick Dedina

Dinah Washington
Submitted: 02/05/2010 05:26 PM

A great jazz and pop vocalist who excelled at the blues, Dinah Washington had a sharp, powerful voice that she wielded with knife-like precision. Washington's open and direct (yet smartly controlled) style was extremely popular throughout the 1950s with black audiences, and by the late-'50s she had crossed over to the white pop market with big hits such as "What A Diff'rence A Day Makes," which combined a jazz and blues feel with Nashville-style arrangements. Washington loved after hour jam sessions, and also released a stellar series of jazz albums on Mercury (now Verve Records) that included many of the greatest musicians of the day. Known for her full figure, strong personality, hard-living lifestyle, and multiple marriages, Washington was something of an Elisabeth Taylor/Marilyn Monroe for the African-American community: always in the news, she was almost as famous for newspaper headlines, funny quips, and her fun fashion sense as she was for her music. She died of an accidental overdose while going on a crash diet in December 1963. Washington rightly remains extremely popular in jazz and vocal circles, and she's a major influence on R&B in general and artists such as Ray Charles, Etta James and Aretha Franklin in particular. - Nick Dedina

Derek Trucks
Submitted: 01/19/2010 11:49 AM

Child prodigy Derek Trucks is a fiery guitar slinger whose slow-burn slide style owes a lot to the legends of the blues. Like a younger version of Stevie Ray Vaughan (sans the been-at-the-bottle-too-long growl), Trucks' jams duplicate the dips and twists of Buddy Guy and Al King. A kid no more, Trucks now fronts his own band, a formidable blues unit deeply rooted in Southern Rock soil. - Chad Driscoll

Kenny Wayne Shepherd
Submitted: 01/21/2010 02:21 PM

Picking up a guitar at age seven and mastering Stevie Ray's moves by the time he was 13, Kenny Wayne Shepherd was hyped, pushed and packaged for mass consumption on a major league scale in the early 1990s. His arrival came almost simultaneously with fellow youngster guitar hotshots Jonny Lang and Zakk Wylde. The result was total over exposure and widespread dismissal by the majority of blues purists. Shepherd's debut album, Ledbetter Heights, however, was surprisingly genuine, forcing folks to take a closer look at the kid. Through the next several albums, Shepherd's once-ubiquitous TV appearances petered out, and he was allowed an opportunity to grow both physically and musically. After a trio of heavy duty blues rock LPs, where he played more like Jimi than Muddy, Shepherd returned to Delta blues (as well as jump and good ol' electric blues) with 2007's 10 Days Out (Blues From the Backroad), a refreshingly under-polished collection of live cuts featuring all sorts of guest appearances, from Hubert Sumlin to B.B. King. - Mike McGuirk

Jonny Lang
Submitted: 01/23/2010 02:20 PM

Jonny Lang rocketed out of his adopted hometown of Minneapolis at the age of 13, astonishing the world with his splashy guitar playing and a grizzled bluesman's voice that seemed to belong to someone five times his age. The tow-headed boy had dreamed big, obsessively learning how to play guitar, then convincing his parents that he should forgo school and take to the road. "My mom eventually was okay with it, and just told me to 'Be safe and call home a lot.'"

The risk paid off, and Lang quickly shot to the top of the blues charts, earning his first platinum record by the time he was sixteen for Lie To Me. He picked up his second platinum album for Wander This World in 1998 -- the same year he opened for the Rolling Stones. In 1999, he performed at Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura's inauguration, then traveled to the White House to perform for Clinton (where he presented the president with an autographed Fender Guitar). The next month he was personally invited to perform at Mick Jagger's 56th birthday party at the musician's estate in the South of France, where he jammed with Jagger, Bono, Elton John and Ron Wood. But then the wunderkind seemed to drop off the face of the earth, not releasing any more albums for five years.

Lang was not idle during that time. He gigged sporadically with the likes of B.B. King, Aerosmith, and Jeff Beck; got married to actress Haylie Johnson; quit his two-pack a day cigarette habit; gave up drinking; moved to Los Angeles; and all but turned his back on his beloved blues. When his third album, Long Time Coming, appeared in mid-2004, the musician was not only sampling Eminem, but had also cut down on his trademark guitar pyrotechnics and eliminated any blues laments. Instead, his songs now explored the space between rock and seductive soul.

"I'm not a blues singer," he explained unapologetically, "and I'm not really a blues writer either, or anything. I just feel like I love singing things that take a journey melodically." The journey this still-young musician is currently taking seems to follow a much more spiritual path. He not only became a committed Christian, but began penning lyrics for many of his own songs -- something he hadn't previously done, and something that made Long Time Coming a more coherent and fully-realized effort than his earlier albums. - Jaan Uhelszki

Bobby "Blue" Bland
Submitted: 01/21/2010 02:21 PM

One of the few bluesmen who's solely known for his singing, Bobby "Blue" Bland has been a major player in blues since the mid-1950s. Often working with B.B. King, and always showcasing a voice that can be as smooth a silk one minute and deeply tortured the next, Bland had a string of hits in the '50s and '60s. Early on, his work was straight-up Texas country, but as he aged his music and singing style laid much of the groundwork for what's called "soul blues" today. - Mike McGuirk

Marc Broussard
Submitted: 12/17/2009 01:43 PM

When you grow up in Lafayette, La., you pretty much have to go out of your way to find bad food or bad music, as Marc Broussard can attest to. The son of Ted Broussard (guitar player for the Boogie Kings) never had to go far to be surrounded by a myriad of musicians of all styles (albeit mostly Cajun or roots-related). Perhaps that's why traces of Dr. John, a young Lee Dorsey and various other soulful singers can be heard in his voice. His sound is more twangy than tangy, but not as full-blown "alt country" as someone like Jay Farrar. - Eric Shea

Lightnin' Hopkins
Submitted: 01/22/2010 02:23 PM

Instantly recognizable with his wandering acoustic style and coarse, emotive singing, Lightnin' Hopkins remains one of the giants of country blues. His career as a bluesman started as far back as the 1920s, jamming with Blind Lemon Jefferson and eventually working as his personal guide, but it wasn't until the big folk blues boom of the '60s that he enjoyed any real recognition, cutting hundreds of songs for as many labels and selling-out college coffeehouses all over the country. A nimble craftsman with language, Lightnin's deeply personal lyrics could be both hilariously funny and starkly harrowing depending on his mood. He was famous for making words up on the spot to fit the occasion, making his live recordings unpredictable and of particular interest. With a staggering body of work that spans from the '60s right up to his death in the '80s and includes such classic narrative blues as "Bald Headed Woman" and the eerie "Black Ghost Blues," Lightnin' Hopkins is an essential figure in the history and appreciation of the blues. - Mike McGuirk

Albert King
Submitted: 01/23/2010 02:20 PM

Albert King's 6'4" stature was dwarfed only by the massive sound he made when he wrapped his huge hands around a Flying V guitar, pulling rather than pushing on the strings due to his left-handed, upside-down approach. King's trademark wailing blues guitar complemented his deep, heavy vocals, either one of which could touch your soul. Among his greatest admirers were Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix and especially Stevie Ray Vaughan, each of whom pilfered many of King's famous licks and passed them on to new generations. The imitation didn't faze King, who confidently reassured his followers that he could outplay any one of them on any given night. On his classic hit "Born Under a Bad Sign," King was backed by Booker T. and the MG's, who provided a Stax Soul foundation that he drew upon for many of his later hits. Though King is somewhat underappreciated, the majority of rock and blues guitar players know the man's riffs, if not his name. - Jessy Terry

Johnny Winter
Submitted: 01/30/2010 04:24 PM

Texas guitar legend Johnny Winter became a seeming overnight star in 1968 with the release of his first album on Columbia records. Winter was and remains an incendiary guitar player and a gruff, authoritative vocalist. An exceptionally fluid and dynamic soloist on both standard and slide guitar, his records in the 70's tended towards rock excess, but by the end of that decade he had returned to a much more pure blues approach which continues today. Along the way Winter was instrumental in helping the career resurgence of Muddy Waters, producing and playing on a number of acclaimed records. Winter was an important influence on a whole generation of musicians, including Chris Whitley and Stevie Ray Vaughn - Tom Heyman

Robert Cray
Submitted: 02/07/2010 02:38 PM

Finding a modern audience has earned Cray some criticism he wouldn't get if he was a struggling club performer. He has a clean, singing guitar, strong songwriting abilities, and a soul voice more Sam Cooke than Muddy Waters. His unique mix of blues, rock, and soul has taken another turn of late: Cray's latest album celebrates that glorious Stax Records sound of the '60s. While their styles are different, Cray could arguably be compared to Ray Charles, another performer who ably crossed blues, soul and pop barriers. - Eric Shea

Blues Brothers
Submitted: 01/30/2010 04:24 PM

Anyone who has ever craved plain white toast and four fried chickens understands that the Blues Brothers were on a mission from god. Joliet Jake and his brother Elwood were created by the late, great John Belushi and his partner Dan Aykroyd. The duo began as a way to warm up the audience before Saturday Night Live broadcasts, but soon became a semi-regular act on the show, and later graduated to a legitimate touring band with hit albums and a feature film. Their trademark look was inspired by the modernists of English subcultural yore, blues enthusiasts who donned three-button black suits, skinny black ties, porkpie hats and Wayfarer sunglasses. Backed by the likes of guitarist Steve Cropper and bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn (legends from the Stax studio's house band), as well as other well-known session players, the Blues Brothers covered standards from the Stax-Volt vaults with genuine affection. Although they began as a sketch, the two turned a new generation onto classic blues and soul. - Eric Shea

Louis Prima
Submitted: 02/04/2010 03:35 PM

Every generation seems to re-discover Louis Prima. Disney fittingly turned him into a jovial primate for The Jungle Book in 1967, David Lee Roth did a note-for-note cover of "Just a Gigolo/I Ain't Got Nobody" in 1985 and most recently, Brian Setzer and other Swing revivalists have used his sound as a template. Prima was a longtime veteran of the jazz scene who struck gold in the 1950s by mixing his Louis Armstrong influences with swinging jazz, throbbing Jump Blues, early R&B and Neapolitan zaniness. Just by itself, his music was unforgettable; but when combined with his hilariously brash sense of showmanship, Prima became unstoppable. Backed by saxophonist Sam Butera's band and a succession of straight-faced female foils (the finest being the angelic Keely Smith, who went on to achieve major success as a solo artist), Prima literally had "the wildest show in town" while also penning such standards as "Sing Sing Sing," and "A Sunday Kind of Love." His bawdy act excited the sex-starved masses of the Eisenhower era, earned respect from jazz hepcats, and was studied and appreciated by greasy-haired teenagers growing up on rock 'n' roll. While Prima's recorded output suffered when he left Capitol Records for supposedly greener pastures, he remained a very popular live act well into the '60s. - Nick Dedina

Leadbelly
Submitted: 01/30/2010 04:24 PM

Leadbelly, born Huddie William Ledbetter, is one of the most influential voices in American music. Though widely thought of as a blues musician (which, in part, he was), a direct line can be drawn from him to the folk protest music of the '60s, and from there to Bruce Springsteen and Billy Bragg. In the '40s, Leadbelly brought obscure American folk songs to white, urban audiences and helped spread the word about injustices in America. Like Woody Guthrie, he could do love or comedic songs, and he had a real knack for children's songs. He died a decade before his true impact was felt. It's never to late to pay your respects. - Nick Dedina

Gary Moore
Submitted: 01/23/2010 02:20 PM

Moore has always enjoyed a devout following among guitarists, from his early swashbuckling days as Thin Lizzy's lead guitarist to his many rock, Fusion, and blues solo projects. Moore's balance of technically savvy licks and raw, emotional soul keeps the fans rabid. It was Still Got the Blues (1990) that finally solidified Gary Moore's reputation as a top-flight guitarist, achieving critical and commercial success with a back to the basics approach that put Moore's fiery Blues Rock guitar front and center. Later albums continue with that approach, including After Hours (1992), which featured heavy-hitting guests including B.B. King and Albert Collins. - Jessy Terry

Elvin Bishop
Submitted: 12/04/2009 04:20 PM

Elvin Bishop dropped out of his second year at the University of Chicago to dive head first in the local blues scene. Fascinated by what he was hearing around him, he met up with Paul Butterfield and joined the Butterfield Blues band. He split from the outfit in 1968 to experience the crazy musical melting pot that once was San Francisco, where the sonic diversity crept into his sound in the form of a gospel, country, and blues hybrid. On the famous Fillmore stage, Bishop often sat in with the likes of B.B. King, Eric Clapton, and even the late, great Jimi Hendrix. He soon formed the Elvin Bishop Group and recorded the notorious "Fooled Around and Fell in Love." Bishop currently resides in San Francisco where he enjoys gardening and the occasional gig. - Eric Shea

Otis Taylor
Submitted: 11/26/2009 02:27 PM

JJ Grey & Mofro
Submitted: 12/05/2009 01:34 PM

Robert Randolph
Submitted: 01/07/2010 03:21 PM

Only a few years new to the scene, Robert Randolph (most often joined by "the Family Band) is the single most funkadelic rock-gospel player in the industry. The urgency in his musical passion is born of a life balanced between the torment of the streets and the haven of the soulful sounds surrounding his childhood home. Randolph started playing the pedal steel in his Orange, N.J., House of God Church, an African Pentecostal denomination where the pedal steel has become known as "sacred steel" based on a musical history dating back to the 1930s. He praised the Lord, stomped his feet, and shook the rafters all the way to venues like New York City's Beacon Theater and the long-revered Wetlands. When the Wetlands closed their famous doors for the last time, Randolph and the Family Band were asked by the owners to rock the walls one final time on that propitious night, oddly enough to the beat of a wailing gospel groove. Fire extinguishers are definitely required when Randolph plays his number one most requested, "I Don't Know What You Came to Do." - Amy Bartlett

Rory Gallagher
Submitted: 01/03/2010 12:48 PM

Irish born singer-songwriter and guitarist Gallagher was a Boogie Rock road warrior. He recorded prolifically and was much admired by his peers during his short life. Gallagher began his professional recording career with a power trio called Taste. The band enjoyed some chart success in England in the early 1970s, and it established Gallagher as a singer and guitarist of note in the crowded post-Cream landscape. He followed Taste with numerous recordings under his own name, all marked by his soulful vocals and slashing, white-knuckle guitar work. Gallagher was equally adept at Electric Blues and Country Blues; he often mixed the two in a manner similar to that of his heroes Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker. Gallagher died in 1995 at the age of forty-six from complications due to cirrhosis. - Tom Heyman

The Jeff Healey Band
Submitted: 10/26/2009 04:50 PM

With the hit "Angel Eyes," this blind Blues Rock guitarist is known for playing his Fender flat on his lap. - Robert Leaver

Robben Ford
Submitted: 12/20/2009 12:42 PM

In terms of style, Robben Ford doesn't like to be pinned down to any particular genre. His crisp guitar playing remains the one constant, lending a high level of quality to anything he does. His impressive résumé boasts collaborations with legends such as George Harrison, Joni Mitchell, and Miles Davis. He also formed the chart-topping group the Yellowjackets (which he subsequently left) and his current group, the Blue Line. Ford has mastered both jazz and blues but has proven to be more enduring with the latter genre, playing with a pristine touch and a soulful, expertly phrased guitar style. - Jessy Terry

Marvin Sease
Submitted: 01/09/2010 02:45 PM

Mike Bloomfield
Submitted: 12/25/2009 02:17 PM

One of the first instrumentalists of the 1960s and '70s rock era to became a bona fide star, Michael Bloomfield is the classic tragic music business figure. Growing up in Chicago in the late '50s, he haunted the city's Southside blues clubs as a teen, befriending and sitting in with giants such as Howlin' Wolf and Big Joe Williams. He became an expert guitarist and a virtual walking encyclopedia of all blues idioms, electric and acoustic, standard and slide. He found acclaim as a founder and guitarist in the Butterfield Blues Band, and was a featured player on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited. After leaving Butterfield, he helped form the influential, horn-laden Blues Rock band Electric Flag, as well as appearing on the chart-topping Super Session record with Al Kooper and Stephen Stills. Despite the fact that he influenced a generation of guitarists and was a revered player, his output from the latter part of his career is spotty at best. He spent most of his time at home shooting heroin and occasionally writing scores for porn films. He died of an overdose at 38. - Tom Heyman

Freddie King
Submitted: 01/04/2010 12:31 PM

One of the three Kings of electric guitar, Freddy (or Freddie) co-owned many of the most classic blues riffs with B.B. and Albert. He got a slightly rawer sound than his fellow Kings, playing bright, snappy licks plucked with thumb and fingers on his Fender Stratocaster. Although he was born in Texas, King had more of a Chicago Blues sound, drawing influence from artists such as Robert Lockwood Jr. and Jimmy Rogers. Defining his style early, King had initial success with instrumentals like "Hideaway." His rough, loud, powerful vocals came later, when he started belting out songs like "Big Legged Woman." Eric Clapton was one of the most notable performers influenced by King, basing his entire sound on a love for King's music. Live in concert was the best way to experience the original, who tore up the stage with his large and slashing guitar presence.

Albert Collins
Submitted: 01/04/2010 12:31 PM

The late Albert Collins was an important and influential blues artist with an unmistakable sound. Playing a Fender Telecaster with his fingers through a hundred-watt amplifier, Collins produced a lead guitar sound that was brittle, biting, and funkily syncopated. His cool tone, and a number of early instrumentals he cut with titles like "Frosty" and "Sno-Cone," earned him the title "The Iceman." In the early 1960s Collins led big horn bands, but played with smaller bands and bounced from label to label after that. He signed with Chicago's Alligator records in the '70s, became a star attraction on the international blues circuit, and was a bona fide blues superstar by the time of his death in 1993. He was an important influence on a whole generation of guitarists, from Billy Gibbons to Stevie Ray Vaughn and Robert Cray. - Tom Heyman

Peter Malick
Submitted: 01/12/2010 12:31 PM

Peter Malick is a blues guitarist who spent years playing with the biggest names in the business (Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker and James Montgomery are only the beginning), but drug addiction sidelined his career for years. Malick cleaned up and slowly rebuilt his reputation, with breakout fame finally coming when one of his collaborators, Norah Jones, ended up becoming a huge star. Malick's recordings with Jones were compiled on 2003's New York City and became one of the rare blues albums to crossover to the pop charts. A real pro, Malick plays all styles of roots music, and he fits in nicely on FM radio. - Nick Dedina

North Mississippi Allstars
Submitted: 08/27/2009 12:55 PM

Fiesta-ready trio meld hearty swaths of Delta Blues with rollicking alternative rock. Think of a more Boogie Rock Violent Femmes morphing with the old Beastie Boys while a pensioner nicknamed Blind-something-or-the-other plays lead guitar.

Little Milton
Submitted: 12/11/2009 02:40 PM

Known as both a stinging blues guitarist and a powerful Soul singer, this Mississippi native has long made a name for himself by combining the best of those two worlds. Since the 1950s, he's recorded for top-notch labels like Sun, Chess, Stax, and Malaco, alternating between straight Electric Blues (most of his Sun catalog), horn-driven, Funk-tinged Soul Blues ("That's What Love Will Make You Do"), and pure Memphis soul ("Grits Ain't Groceries (All Around the World)"). Throughout his career, he's proven able to adapt his blues-rooted sensibilities to a variety of settings, without losing that all-important visceral quality. - Will York

Little Walter
Submitted: 01/28/2010 09:21 PM

Before Little Walter, the harmonica was just an instrument for accompaniment on the back porch. Little Walter changed the instrument's role by hooking it up to a microphone and plugging into an amplifier. His tone was thick and fierce, covered in rich distortion and with enough balls to send guitarists and sax players scurrying to the back of the stage. His many recordings with Muddy Waters are some of the best the blues has to offer, not to mention his excellent collaborations with Jimmy Rogers and Otis Rush. In the 1950s he topped the R&B charts numerous times with instrumentals such as "Juke" and scowling Chicago blues like "You Better Watch Yourself." Unfortunately, his personality was as fiery as his playing; shortly after a tour with the Rolling Stones in the late '60s, he died in a street brawl. - Jessy Terry

R.L. Burnside
Submitted: 01/23/2010 02:20 PM

Forget those dolled-up, pentagram-sportin', tattooed rock 'n' rollers that comprise his audience of late -- the bona fide bad-ass is up onstage. You wanna talk hard livin'-- nothing beats the real life rigmarole of old bluesmen like R.L. Burnside. Coming out of the deep South in the 1930s, Burnside was one of the artists featured in Richard Grant's article on the wild lives of elder bluesmen on Fat Possum Records in the March 27, 1999, edition of British daily The Daily Telegraph. It said that Burnside went to prison in the 1940s for murder. He allegedly shot a man in the back of the head, but only served three months thanks to a plantation owner who needed Burnside to work the next planting season. A grimly practical Burnside told his label, "I didn't mean to kill nobody. I just meant to shoot the sonofabitch in the head. Him dying was between him and the Lord." As rugged and rowdy as his reputation, Burnside's overdriven Delta Blues slide guitar playing is fierce and blistering. His singing is heartfelt, though often mumbled and slurred. Live shows chug along like a steam engine overheating. His massive cult following comes in all shapes and sizes. - Dennise Lite

Robert Johnson
Submitted: 01/19/2010 11:49 AM

The story of Robert Johnson meeting the devil at the crossroads has been told so many times that we are all in danger of becoming honorary Ralph Macchios. Luckily, this legend is backed up with incredible music. The truth is that Johnson became the undisputed master of Delta Blues so quickly after taking up the guitar that fellow musicians joked that ol' Scratch must have had something to do with it. Johnson was a deeply troubled man who poured his mental anguish into intoxicating music and vivid lyrics. His style, songs, tortured life and murder at the hands of a jealous woman have made him an American icon. Robert Johnson only recorded a handful of songs but has left a vast musical legacy. - Jon Pruett

Tommy Castro
Submitted: 10/03/2009 01:45 PM

Tommy Castro is a bad boy of the blues. His music incorporates sultry, slow ditties with dirty guitar tones as well as soul-saturated, up-tempo rock 'n' roll songs with wailing Stratocaster leads. Castro sings in a kicked-back, nonchalant style that seems to always be chasing (or trying to keep up with) the backbeat of his songs. - Eric Shea

Johnny Nash
Submitted: 01/10/2010 01:18 PM

Powered by Top Blues Artists on Rhapsody Online