His third UK top ten album in a year proved just how successfully Mayall had taken blues to the British masses.
Along with his beloved guitar 'Lucille', B.B. King brought the blues out of the margins and into the mainstream of America.
Chess Records laid the foundation for rock’n’roll, and its influence can still be felt today, as this guide to the 10 best Chess blues records shows.
The notion of DIY music stretches back to 19th-century flutes made from bird bone, through punk anarchy and the digital revolution.
Chess Records had its first hit record on 29 July 1950, Gene Ammons' ‘My Foolish Heart’, then went on to provide the soundtrack to Black America in the 1950s.
From B.B. King to Muddy Waters, these are the 100 greatest blues albums of all-time.
Many people mistake pop music as disposable. But from the blues to The Beatles, some of the most important artistic statements have been wrapped up in the world’s most popular songs.
A cynical act of mimicry by Sonny Boy Williamson II sparked a blues legend, the latest chapter of which has been tackled in song by Randy Newman.
'Live At Leeds' was a definitive in-concert album and "a very valid bit of plastic," as Roger Daltrey said.
Sonny Boy Williamson II was a blues harmonica player from Helena, Arkansas whose catalogue of songs are still covered as blues standards today
Start your journey into one of the most influential labels in music with our list of the best Chess albums to own on vinyl.
From blues and jazz to rock'n'roll and soul, here are the 50 best Chess Records singles to discuss and debate, but mainly to hear and consider.
The guitar virtuoso from Fargo, North Dakota started kicking up a storm on disc at the age of 14.
From John Lee Cooker to Kansas Joe McCoy going by Hamfoot Ham, learn why some of the greats did so much recording under blues nicknames.
Eric Clapton joins John Mayall's Bluesbreakers and then quits to form Cream, but first he records the Beano album, a classic.
