The 500 - #468 - Paul Butterfield Blues Band - Debut

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

My plan (amended). 

• 1 or 2 records per week & at least 2 complete listens.
• A quick blog post for each, highlighting the important details and a quick background story.
• No rating scale - just an effort to expand my appreciation.

Album # 468

Album Title: Debut
Artist: Paul Butterfield Blues Band
Released: October 1965
My age at release: 3 months
How familiar am I with it: Somewhat
Song I am putting on my Spotify Mix: Mellow Down Easy selected by my friend Claudio
Great Lyric:
"Come down to the station
To meet my baby at the gate
Asked the station master
If my train's a-running late
He said "If you're a-waiting
on the 444
I hate to tell you son
That train don't stop here any more" (Mystery Train)

In the summer of 1988, I drove from London, Ontario to Calgary, Alberta in about 35 hours. My only rest was a one hour nap beside a corn field near Rugby, North Dakota (the geographical centre of North America).

I was fuelled on this trip by cigarettes, coffee & Jolt cola (all the sugar, twice the caffeine) and the burning desire to reunite with my girlfriend (now my wife). I would also be meeting her father for the first time.

The soundtrack for my journey was housed in my beloved cassette briefcase. You see, there was a time...long before Spotify, Apple Music, Itunes and even Compact Discs...when music was only made portable on cassette. My briefcase contained a curated collection of albums and mixed-tapes meticulously selected for this journey. I remember August of 1988 being monopolized by two things: The Who (the album Tommy in particular) and classic blues. 

As I have mentioned in previous posts, there was a store in London called "The Software Library" and they rented compact discs. A few weeks earlier, while listening to Eric Clapton from his time with John Mayall & The Blues Breakers, I decided that I wanted to increase my knowledge of the blues. So, I tracked down as many early blues albums I could and put together a mixed-tape full of tracks from Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Robert Johnson, Elmore James, Willie Dixon, John Lee Hooker & Buddy Guy. On that drive to Calgary - I played that cassette at least five times. Consequently, many of those songs create an emotional recall that transports me to that time - young, free and jacked up on nicotine, caffeine and love.

When I first fired up this debut offering from The Paul Butterfield Blues Band (PBBB to fans) I assumed I wouldn't know a single track. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised to realize that I was familiar with many. 

This is a great record, particularly if you love the Chicago Electric Blues sound. As I mentioned when I wrote about Albert King's Born Under a Bad Sign (#491 on this list), I became a lifelong fan of the Chicago sound because of my love of comedy, Saturday Night Live and The Blues Brothers.

Things I learned

• Elvin Bishop was in the PBBB. He is the writer of one of my favourite 70's songs Fooled Around and Fell in Love which has an incredibly underrated guitar solo in it... go listen.
• It was one of the first blues albums recorded in America featuring a white, lead singer. The British Blues movement predates it by over 5 years. 
• Butterfield suffered from peritonitis (inflammation of the intestines). Several surgical procedures were unsuccessful and he developed an addiction to heroin which he began using to relieve the pain. Sadly, in 1987, he died of an accidental overdose at the age of 44.