Search - Johnny Winter :: Beginnings 1960-1967

These are the earliest recordings of blues guitarist Johnny Winter recorded in the '60s before he was signed by Columbia in 1968. These sides were recorded between 1960 and 1967 for the Dart, KCRO, Frolic, Todd, Hall-Way, and Pacemaker labels -- in other words, virtually his entire recorded output prior to his Progressive Blues Experiment long-player in 1967. The music here is raw electric blues, R&B, and even a few early rock tunes thrown into the mix. The cover of Johnny "Guitar" Watson's "Broke and Lonely" is a highlight, as is the burning instrumental cover of Chuck Berry's "Reelin' and Rockin." "Ease My Pain" is a primitive but fantastic model for what was to come in the late '60s on Columbia. A few tunes, such as "Eternally" and "You'll Be the Death of Me," were originally issued by Frolic, but picked up by Atlantic for national distribution. "Gone for Bad" and "I Had to Cry" were issued on MGM. Neither single charted; Winter was dropped. These tunes are a fine document, a lost highway to the past. Given the role Winter played in the electric blues and its mass acceptance in America, these tunes serve not as some inferior or embarrassing document, but the thing itself, raw and undiluted. Most of the material is comprised of doo wop, R&B, and twist instrumentals, all gritty enough not to be relegated as generic after the first listen.