Listening Post

Various Alligator Records 45th Anniversary Collection (Southbound) ★★★★

Steeped in the recording history of the blues, Alligator Records 45th Anniversary Collection isa bittersweet reminder of some of the seminal third-generation artists who carried the torch for the old-style blues. The label’s first release was the debut album by Hound Dog Taylor and The Houserockers, who cut multiple takes of 25 songs over two evenings back in 1971. It set the template for a raft of artists signed to the label, who were perhaps a bit too rough and ready for the commercial leanings of major labels and who were more enamoured at the time with the copycat stylings of artists like The Allman Brothers, George Thorogood, Rory Gallagher, Edgar Winter’s White Trash and even Stevie Ray Vaughan. No disrespect to the above musicians but Alligator liked their music down and dirty.

Among the highlights are Hound Dog Taylor and The Houserockers’ blistering boogie Take Five, while Son Seals smokes up the joint on Cotton Picking Blues. Elvin Bishop, who got his grounding in the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, flaunts his off-kilter style and humour with Can’t Even Do Right. Koko Taylor’s Voodoo Woman is the rough edge of sassy lady, while one of the first ladies of soul, Mavis Staples’ rerecording of Will The Circle Be Broken after the events of 9/11 is as emotionally pertinent as any of her songs she recorded that became anthems for the Civil Rights movement. With the blues, it pays sometimes to get down and dirty to find the real gold.