The album would ship an impressive 150,000 copies within the first six weeks of its release, peaking at #127 on the Billboard magazine album chart. Recorded with members of the Chicago soul band Rotary Connection, including talented guitarists Pete Cosey and Phil Upchurch and keyboardist Charles Stepney, Electric Mud featured wah-wah pedals and fuzzbox, which were completely alien to the middle-aged blues singer.
As Chess Records’ signature artist, the label tried different gimmicks to make Waters more relevant to young record buyers.Ĭhess tried to market the urbane Chicago bluesman as a “folk blues” artist with 1964’s Folk Singeralbum and would reinvent Waters once more as a “psychedelic blues” artist with 1968’s much-maligned Electric Mud album.
During the 1950s, Waters had enjoyed a string of Top 10 charting R&B hits in songs like “I Can’t Be Satisfied,” “I’m Your Hoochie Coochie Man,” “Mannish Boy,” and “I’m Ready.” Although Waters was still making great music, the hits had dried up during the ‘60s. King, Waters had yet to catch on with young white audiences. The problem was that African-American record buyers had moved beyond ‘antiquated’ blues music and onto soul and funk sounds. Waters also attracted some of the most talented musicians in the business for his band. Waters could sing those old songs like nobody else and his onstage charisma was second to none. Waters was an experienced, albeit weathered 56 years old still young by the standards of blues music, and he was still at the top of his game. Muddy Waters Fathers and Sons, Chess 1969īy the dawn of 16th, Chicago bluesman McKinley Morganfield – better known to fans as Muddy Waters – was standing at a fork in the road in his career.
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