Boogie Friday

A treatise on a subgenre of African-American music.

Y’all ready to boogie? I don’t mean disco-boogie, I mean primal one-chord boogie like you’re crab-walking through ninety degree heat in a Mississippi cotton field with a full Mason jar full of corn liquor coursing through your veins and the devil in your soul.

Although the boogie is often performed by blues artists, it is not the blues.

I’m gonna skip over ZZ Top’s “LaGrange” and much of John Lee Hooker’s recorded output and jump off with some lesser-known lights.

All right, then, let’s go. Hey, it’s Friday, people.

Magic Sam’s death at 32 in 1969 was one of the worst tragedies to ever befall the blues. There never has been a guy who combined charisma, a soaring tenor voice and devastating guitar in one package. Here he does his boogie: