Still recording and performing at the age of 86, Buddy Guy has lived the archetypal blues story. His first job was picking cotton in Louisiana before he moved to Chicago at 21. He didn’t expect to become a star; he just wanted to live somewhere he could see the greats play. After starving for several months, he lucked into jamming with Otis Rush at the 708 club, where Guy caused such a stir that the owner phoned Muddy Waters to come and watch. With Waters’ patronage, Guy quickly landed a record deal, but his early recordings were watered down, without the distortion and feedback he used live. “I told [label boss] Leonard Chess we should get that sound on record,” he recalled later. “He just told me, ‘Ain’t nobody gonna buy that noise, man!’”
Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton did buy that noise, however, and a young Jimi Hendrix once cancelled a show to watch Buddy Guy instead. A spectacular showman, Buddy used his 150 foot cable to begin gigs outside the venue and leap into the crowd. His new albumshows Buddy as the last and greatest of the electric blues pioneers. “I promised them all,” he remembers, “BB
