Track Listing

1. She's Gone
2. Walking the Ceiling
3. Held My Baby Last Night
4. Taylor's Rock
5. It's Alright
6. Phillips' Theme
7. Wild About You Baby
8. I Just Can't Make It
9. It Hurts Me Too
10. 44 Blues
11. Give Me Back My Wig
12. 55th Street Boogie

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #32242 in Music
• Brand: TAYLOR,HOUND DOG
• Released on: 1990-10-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Album Description
Limited Edition Japanese pressing of this album comes housed in a miniature LP sleeve. 2007.

Amazon.com
If you think the slide guitar blues of Elmore James is as loud and ragged as music can be, then you've never heard Hound Dog Taylor. Born Theodore Roosevelt Taylor in Natchez, Mississippi, in 1915, he didn't pick up the guitar until he was 20, and was instantly smitten by the rawboned sound players like James got by slipping a slide across the strings of an electric guitar. The raw, boogie style of his trio (with Brewer Phillips on second guitar and Ted Harvey on drums) was nurtured over endless nights in Chicago blues clubs. Sometimes, Phillips plays a single-note lead guitar that suggests Buddy Guy on a bender. More often, the trio slams out a boogie beat that is topped by Taylor's slide guitar, an electrified whine that's about as subtle as a broken bottle on a tavern floor. This 1971 album was the first release by Alligator Records, which went on to become a major independent label specializing in contemporary blues. --John Milward

Customer Reviews

Rough but fun
"When I die", Hound Dog Taylor is reported to have said, "people are gonna say 'he couldn't play s**t, but he sure made it sound good'!"
Well, truth be told, Theodore Roosevelt Taylor wasn't the most subtle or technically varied slide guitarist, but he and his Houserockers did indeed make it sound good.

The production on this their first record leaves a lot to be desired (the drums are mixed way too far into the background, and there are times when you can barely hear Brewer Phillips' second guitar), but having Hound Dog Taylor's crunchy, fuzzy lead guitar right up front isn't too bad, and he rocks on the funky "It's Alright", the fiery instrumental "Walking The Ceiling", and a raw, sloppy take on Tampa Red's "It Hurts Me Too".

Other highlights include the slow blues "Held My Baby Last Night", and Hound Dog Taylor's best song, the superbly groovy, up-tempo boogie of "Give Me Back My Wig" (later covered by Stevie Ray Vaughan among others).
Incredibly unsubtle and often unvaried, and too many mediocre instrumental pieces, too, but it's good fun all the same.
3 1/2 stars.

A Classic
Hound Dog Taylor and the House Rockers prove that you do not need to be great musicans to be a great blues players. Blues is as much an emotion as it is a music style and the great play the blues with soul. You will not be confusing Hound Dog with Robert Cray or Eric Clapton who are both better technically, but lack the raw soul needed to be great at the blues. The Dog brings it as raw as anyone and that is what makes this is a great blues album. The rawness of this album it may not be as accessible for everyone. Would only suggest for folks already deep in the blues. If you are looking for some great slide guitar that is a little more refined abd accessibile check out Lil' Ed and the Imperials.

This album is important historically for the blues being the first release for Alligator Records, which has since become a major blues label and help revived the blues in the early 80's. If you like raw honky tonk slide blues guitar this is the album for you.

An essential work for anyone that rocks
This is the pivotal work for all rock and blues fans. It cannot get any more raw. For all you Black Keys, White Stripes, etc fans, this is what the bands aspire to be.

This is the real deal, music played by true bluesmen that were not in it for the money.

The guitar is so raw,
production so raw,
singing so raw

...they just must have turned on the tape recorder and said okay...now play!

What Miles Davis's "Kind of Blue" is to jazz, this is essential for modern rock. This is absolutely ferocious guitar playing!