Street smart

Junior Wells recalls his Chicago days

by Don Flunkinger

Harmonica blues legend Junior Wells knows what it takes to make the transition from the streets to the big time. After all, he went from playing on the streets of Chicago to playing clubs, then international blues festivals, and even the Grammy awards. In the '50s, Wells, Earl Hooker, and "Little" Walter Jacobs played with Muddy Waters but supplemented their income by riding Chicago's trains performing for passengers. Wells wasn't too proud to take the money then, and he's not too proud to admit it now.

"Muddy Waters, he wouldn't play over there because he had too much pride," he says. "Union scale at that time was twelve dollars and fifty cents. Walter and I would walk in with $250 apiece, and then Muddy would want us to give him some of the money. And we'd say, `No, you can't spend [it].'

"Some people have a lot of pride; I figure if you're a musician, whatever it takes for you to do what you want to do, do it. Hey, I don't have no shame about playing my music. Music is my whole life, and I don't care where I'm playing it."

Wells, who plays the Iron Horse this Friday, recently picked up on Tracy Chapman, another acclaimed singer who first made a name for herself singing on the streets -- in Cambridge, while she attended Tufts. When he heard her sing "Give Me One Reason" on a television show; he just knew he liked the song so much he wanted to do it himself.

"When I heard it, I said, `That tune there was made for me to sing,'" Wells says. "I liked the lyrics to it, and I liked the way she was doing it."

The cover is not just likable; it's brilliant. The song appears on Wells's Come On In This House, which features slide guitarists Sonny Landreth, Derek Trucks, Corey Harris, and Alvin "Youngblood" Hart. Wells turns "Give Me One Reason" into a perfect blues shuffle, complementing Landreth's National steel slide-guitar riff. The album netted Wells a nomination in the Best Traditional Blues Album Grammy category and an opportunity to perform with Chapman at the Grammys.

Now that he thinks about it, he remembers seeing Chapman playing in Harvard Square. "I used to come there and play years ago. I used to see a young black chick around with a guitar there back when you're going across the bridge into Boston . . . when I first saw her [on television], I looked at her and said, `I saw that lady somewhere before.' That's where I saw her."

Wells first came into the spotlight when he replaced Jacobs in Waters' band in 1952. Wells went on to record classic sides in the '50s for himself, with sidemen such as Earl Hooker, Lafayette Leake, and Willie Dixon. In the '60s, he began a long partnership with another Chicago legend, Buddy Guy, with whom he recorded his debut, Hoodoo Man Blues. Together they rode the blues revival all the way into Montreaux, where in 1974 they cut one of the all-time classic live albums, Drinkin' TNT 'n' Smokin' Dynamite, with an all-star band that included Rolling Stone Bill Wyman.

The '90s Chicago blues revival came when major label Silvertone signed Guy, and in 1993 Wells signed with Telarc Records. The large independent label has so far released four Wells albums. In addition to the slide guitarists, Carlos Santana and Bonnie Raitt have showed up to record with Wells.

"Every time I go into record and Santana knows anything about it, he wants to be on it," Wells says. "Landreth also. It's a great feeling to be in the studio and know that these guys want to do these things with you. It makes me real proud."

At 63, Wells still sings with an amazing dynamic range, from a whispering mutter to full whoops and shouts -- and the occasional grunts and percussive tongue clicking. His harmonica playing is spunky as always.

For a preview of the Fourth of July show, fans can pick up a copy of Live at Buddy Guy's Legends, his latest Telarc album. His eight-piece band cook up a smoking background not only for Wells's own tunes like "What My Momma Done Told Me" and "Messin' with the Kid," but also for other classics like Ray Charles's "The Train" and Preston Foster's "Got My Mojo Working."

Live at Buddy Guy's Legends also features Wells in several of his trademark suit-and-hat ensembles, which he'll be sporting at the Horse. "I choose to dress the way I do because it's different," says Wells, who earned the nickname "Godfather of the Blues" in the 1970s for wearing a mafioso hat.

"Everything changes. Clothes change, and I change with the clothes." But thank God Junior Wells plays the blues same as he always has -- energetic, jumpy, and with the enthusiasm of a musician who immensely enjoys what he's doing.

Junior Wells appears at the Iron Horse, in Northampton, at 7 and 10 p.m. on July 4. Tickets are $14. Call (413) 584-0610.