OTIS SPANN
Otis Spann is renowned as Muddy Waters‘ pianist throughout his Classic period of electric Chicago Blues, and a member of the Chess house-band that backed a roster of their big selling artists. He did rather more than that, as he showed off his great Blues voice on a series of fine albums in a solo career that was cut short by his untimely death.
Drag-out barrelhouse piano and lovely slurred vocals as Otis tells you ‘Ain’t Nobody’s Business’;
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Otis was the longest serving member of Muddy’s band and Chess Records‘ policy of using a house-band meant that he was often heard with Willie Dixon, Jimmy Rogers and Fred Below backing Howlin’ Wolf, Little Walter, Bo Diddley and a host of others. In 1954, Otis released a single, ‘It Must Have been the Devil’, where he took the vocal lead over BB King‘s guitar, but further tracks lay in the Chess vaults for many years. When Muddy’s band played the Newport Folk Festival in 1960, Otis sang ‘Goodbye Newport Blues’ which appeared on the subsequent live album. This sparked Otis’s debut solo album for Candid Records, ‘Otis Spann is the Blues!’ and the follow up, ‘Walking The Blues’. These sessions featured Robert Jr. Lockwood and Lightnin’ Hopkins on guitar, with some vocal help from ‘St. Louis Jimmy’ Oden. Touring and recording with Muddy, Otis was in London in 1964 where he cut an album as front-man for Mike Vernon‘s Blue Horizon label, with contributions from Muddy and the young Eric Clapton. [stextbox id=”custom” caption=”Otis Spann Discography” float=”true” align=”left” width=”300″]It’s a close call between this and Walkin’ the Blues, but both are superb.
OTIS SPANN IS THE BLUES
[/stextbox]Back in The States, Otis shared the album ‘The Blues Never Die!’ with harp player James Cotton. Sessions with Lonnie Johnson, T-Bone Walker, Buddy Guy and Junior Wells, as well as working in the Chess house-band and touring with Muddy meant that Otis was very busy. He decided to go solo in 1969, and his place in Muddy’s band was taken by Pinetop Perkins. This new freedom meant that Otis was able to record a huge repertoire of Chicago classics in his own style, and he contributed many of his own songs too. A highlight was ‘The Biggest Thing Since Colossus’, an album he recorded in 1969 with members of Fleetwood Mac after they had taken part in the live ‘Blues Jam at Chess’ sessions.
Otis with Peter Green;
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In April 1970, Otis recorded ‘Last Call’, a live album where his wife Lucille took most of the vocals, which proved to be his swan-song, as his liver cancer caught up with him three weeks later.