John Lee Hooker: Boom Boom

If you search Amazon.co.uk for "John Lee Hooker Boom Boom" you get 74 results: yes, 73 of them are by JLH, and all have Boom Boom in the title. I'm guessing that this CD is one of them, but as many of the Amazon entries have neither cover art of tracklisting I can't be sure. MusicBrainz has around 18 albums by JLH called Boom Boom, and this time I identified the one I have by searching on the label, implausibly titled Tring International plc.

Yes, 27 tracks, for £2.99 — that's the clue to how and why I ended up with this. Not noticing the (very) small print that says, "This album contains some tracks that are re-recorded. All single artist tracks are performed by the original artist. Tracks featuring groups were recorded using as many of the original group members as possible."

Is it heresy to ask if JLH was a bit of a one-trick pony?

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Comments

[Fred Stagg]

John Lee Hooker, one trick pony? No.
JLH, Hubert Sumlin, Howlin' Wolf and others like them, have a sound. They also create or have created music from a deep rooted passion and experience. And yes, much of what they produce sounds like their other stuff. Let's remember that the genre is but 12 bars, a nasty backbeat and lyrical subject matter that often hits most of us somewhere south of the waistline. That is the essence of the blues. In the case of "Boom, Boom", I suspect this is the sort of repackaging shuck that record companies are famous for when marketing legendary artists with limited repitoires. There seems to be no end to the number of greatest/best of/all time favorite hits albums availible. Remember the series of "20th Century Masters/Millenium Collection" releases that began appearing about 10 years back?

[David]

Fair points, Fred. I was tired and in a tetchy mood. So it is heresy.

And I haven't heard of Hubert Sumlin before, so there's someone to check out.

[Fred Stagg]

Hubert Sumlin has done some solo work in recent years. His original claim to fame was his guitar work with Howlin' Wolf's band. Here is a terrific version of Killing Floor he performed with Clapton and few other upstarts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mm3yJC6g-5M