Butterfield Blues Band – Born Under A Bad Sign
Butterfield Blues Band – I Want To Be With You
Butterfield Blues Band – The Boxer
Butterfield Blues Band – So Far, So Good
Growing up I was a major fan of Paul Butterfield and the many bands he led from the mid-1960s to the early-1970s under the title of “The Butterfield Blues Band.” Besides featuring Paul’s legendary Harmonica playing, the band featuring exceptional players at all stages, including Michael Bloomfield, Elvin Bishop, Gene Dinwiddle, Philip Wilson and even a young David Sanborn. One of the many things I love about the Butterfield Blues Band records was the progression of sound, from raw and gritty Southside Chicago Electric Blues to a more horn driven deeply soulful and funky sound towards the end of the band’s tenure and perhaps best represented on this live album recorded in 1970 out of some sets performed at Los Angeles’ Troubadour.
At this point in the game, it’s almost entirely about laying a deep groove down. This much is clear in the band’s version of the Albert King classic (and what unfortunately still rings oh too true as a personal theme song) “Born Under A Bad Sign.” The funk just bubbles up slowly and slowly until those horns (A horn section incidentially so monstrously tight that they ended up being employed by Stevie Wonder on his classic album “Talking Book”…yep that’s right those horns on “Superstitious” belong to THIS horn section), blast on out. Similarly funky good times are had on “The Boxer,” a track that’s sung by bassist Rod Hicks and with some monster drum licks provided by George Davidson, as well as on “So Far, So Good,” a blisteringly upbeat number that only takes a breather for a lovely soprano sax solo from Dinwiddle before slowing bringing the groove right back to close out the LP.
In listening to this album earlier this week while prepping for my classes I realized how appropriate a post this would be since so many of the great songs on this set are “love” songs, and because it features not only one of my favorite tracks from Butterfield, but one of my favorite love songs of all time in “I Want To Be With You,” a thoroughly realistic love song about how sometimes you realize that you want to be with one person in particular only when you almost lose that person. I know that a lot of blues purists don’t dig on the later records from the Butterfield Blues Band precisely because of the soul and funk elements, but for me these records (basically all the albums after Michael Bloomfield left) remain my favorites because of how the band was able to integrate all the various elements of the members tastes together into one sweet funky batch.
Cheers,
Michael