The Essentials
Our pick of the 20 heavy-blues albums you need to own.
THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE
Are You Experienced (1967) Jimi’s debut album screamed his appreciation of the blues heavyweights, while announcing that he wasn’t afraid to torch their set texts. Thrilling if you were a listener, terrifying if you were a guitarist. THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE
Axis: Bold As Love (1967) The gonzoid intergalactic revue sketches might be your abiding memory of Axis, but Jimi’s rush-recorded second album was home to some stingers. “There’s such a fierceness to his playing,” says Philip Sayce. “But he was completely connected to the source.” THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE
Electric Ladyland (1968) It had more colours than a detonated Dulux factory, but Jimi’s third album still referenced his chitlin’-circuit roots, from the kazoo-powered R&B bounce of Crosstown Traffic to the power-blues jam Voodoo Chile. Electric Ladyland remains his sky-kissing peak. CREAM
Fresh Cream (1966) If Eric Clapton’s move to quit John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers smacked of callow career suicide, it was vindicated by his power trio’s 1966 debut. Clapton’s solos ensured that Fresh Cream kept one foot in the blues. FREE
Tons Of Sobs (1968) Four oiks with an £800 recording budget didn’t seem much to conjure with, but Free’s debut was an absolute belter. It might not have charted, but the cultural ripples it sent out were undeniable. LED ZEPPELIN
Led Zeppelin (1969) Granted, Zeppelin were light-fingered operators on their debut, plundering the back pages of Willie Dixon, JB Lenoir et al, but their genius lay in hitting the throttle and minting that sound. LED ZEPPELIN
Led Zeppelin II (1969) The official line is that this album marks the gearshift from blues to rock, but Jimmy Page’s first love is undeniably still present in the scuttling mania of The Lemon Song and the route-one Heartbreaker. TEN YEARS AFTER While Alvin Lee had yet to find his voice as a songwriter, the band’s white-knuckle way with a cover saw them prise apart the fingers of Willie Dixon et al to claim standards like Spoonful as their own.
Ten Years After (1967) FLEETWOOD MAC
Then Play On (1969) The Mac were shortly to morph beyond recognition, but Peter Green’s final album at the helm was a blues treasure trove, taking in Rattlesnake Shake’s slithering funk, the out-there improv of Searching For Madge and, for American punters, the deathless clatter of Oh Well. JEFF BECK GROUP
Truth (1968) Beck’s high-water mark was so ferocious that it often nudged beyond heavy blues into proto-metal. The tough covers of You Shook Me and I Ain’t Superstitious took Truth to No.15 in the US. “We didn’t know at the time how important this album would become,” noted JBG singer Rod Stewart.