Album: John Lee Hooker <!-- none onestar twostar threestar fourstar fivestar -->

Hooker, SHOUT FACTORY

What comes across on this four-CD set is the sheer consistency and dedication of John Lee Hooker's career: it's the work of an artist who knew he had tapped into something sublime, and kept plugging away at that one thing until the world shifted to hear things his way. Hooker's blues, compared with the sophisticated style of friends and mentors such as T-Bone Walker and BB King, was tarry black, sticky and adhesive, his foot tapping out its mesmeric tattoo behind those rhythmic guitar slashes, refusing to release the listener from its grasp, while his predatory voice stalked like a crawlin' king snake sizing up its prey. The power of his blues, he knew, resided in its hypnotic grip, which crystallised rock'n'roll years before the style was recognised, and which reflected, more keenly than any of his colleagues' work, its African roots. This set covers Hooker's output from his 1948 breakthrough single "Boogie Chillen" through hits such as "Dimples" and "Boom Boom", to his guest-laden Nineties comeback albums, none of which was nearly as potent as his work with Canned Heat's Al Wilson on the 1970 Hooker'n'Heat album.

DOWNLOAD THIS: 'Boogie Chillen', 'Dimples', 'Boom Boom', 'Let's Go Out Tonight'