Whiskey & Wimmen: John Lee Hooker’s Finest

2017 marks what would have been John Lee Hooker’s 100th birthday. As part of a larger, year-long centennial celebration for the legendary bluesman, this collection features some of Hooker’s most celebrated recordings, from the prime of his career. Spanning his time on Vee-Jay, Stax, Riverside and Specialty Records, the collection includes such favorites as “Boom Boom,” “Boogie Chillun'” and “Big Legs, Tight Skirt.” New liner notes by music journalist Bill Dahl round out the package. The son of a sharecropper, Hooker rose to prominence performing an electric guitar-style adaptation of Delta blues. Hooker often incorporated other elements, including talking blues and early North Mississippi Hill country blues. He developed his own driving-rhythm boogie style, distinct from the 1930s-1940s piano-derived boogie-woogie.