Syl Johnson
Blues and Soul man BORN 1936
Born in Mississippi, Sylvester Thompson moved with his family to Chicago in his early teens. Fellow northward migrator Magic Sam was a neighbour, and the young Syl, whose brothers Mack and Jimmy also played the blues, sang with him and other local luminaries including Billy Boy Arnold, Howlin’ Wolf and Jimmy Reed. Adopting his stage name and going solo in 1959, success came with increasingly conscious late’60s US R&B hits Come Sock It To Me, Different Strokes and Is It Because I’m Black. In 1971 he signed to Hi Records, achieving US pop Top 50 success with his version of Al Green’s Take Me To The River in 1975. He withdrew from music in the ’80s, but returned the following decade after his earlier work found favour with hip-hoppers (Kanye West, Cypress Hill and Jay-Z were among those he pursued for unauthorised sampling, while he referred to his home as “the house that Wu-Tang built” due to clearance fees). Later activities included, in 2010, the Grammynominated Numero Group box set Complete Mythology, a 2015 feature-length documentary Any Way The Wind Blows and rekindling the old fire with justified live performances.