Chicago Soul (2LP)

In the 1960s Chicago's Chess Records was an incredibly successful record label releasing Electric Blues, Soul, Funk, Jazz, Gospel and even Psychedelia. Chess Records alongside Atlantic Records in New York, Motown in Detroit and Stax in Memphis, dominated the American R'n'B charts.

In the 1950s Chess records, founded by two Polish immigrant brothers Leonard and Phil Chess, made it's reputation with Urban Blues. Since the 1920s Black Americans had been migrating to Chicago from the Delta states of the South, leaving behind sharecropping and Jim Crow. The Chess brothers began recording many of the Black artists who made their way to Chicago such as Muddy Waters and Howlin Wolf who revolutionized Blues music by giving it a new urban sound. In the mid-1950s Chess also signed Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry, who along with Elvis Presley and Fats Domino created a new style of music - rock and roll.

By the 1960s, Chess was at the height of its success. Spurned on by the huge success it had had with Blues music, the label branched out into other areas. As Soul music exploded into the mainstream with Motown and Atlantic Records, Chess itself moved into Soul releasing classic material by artists such as Etta James, Fontella Bass, Gene Chandler, Laura Lee and more.

Since the 1950s Jazz had always been a part of Chess Records and Ramsey Lewis became the most successful Jazz artist at the label. As well as Lewis' classic "Party Time" ,this album also includes classic tracks by lesser-known Jazz artists such as Lorez Alexandria and Sonny Cox.

Two groups, Soulful Strings and Rotary Connection, redefined the sound of Chess in the second-half of the 1960s. These two groups, led by arranger/producers Richard Evans and Charles Stepney brought a previously unheard experimentalism to the sound of Chess. Mixing the traditional elements of Soul and Funk with Psychedelic Rock and Avant-Garde Jazz gave the work of these two men a unique sound. As well as Soulful Strings and Rotary Connection (which featured the vocal talents of Minnie Riperton), other artists such as Phil Upchurch and harpist Dorothy Ashby benefited from the sonic adventures of Evans and Stepney adding Moogs and Theramins over full orchestras and even choirs.

By the late 1960s, Blues music was a thing of the past. Groups such as the Rolling Stones had earlier paid their respect to the blues sound of Chess (The Rolling Stones second album had been recorded at Chess studios). By the late 1960s artists such as Howlin Wolf, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters and Little Milton were looking for a new sound. Enter Marshall Chess (son of Leonard). His new Chess subsiduary label Cadet Concept had already made waves with Rotary Connection. He began new recordings by the famous blues artists only this time mixing in elements of Electric Funk and Soul, which was already so much a part of other Chess artists. With these recordings such as Howlin Wolf's "Evil" and Bo Diddley's "Another Sugar Daddy", he brought a whole new audience to these first generation Chess blues artists.

At the height of its success, Chess Records was sold in 1968 and Leonard Chess died the following year. Although Chess kept going for the next five years under it's new owners, GRT, the spark had gone and Chess was gradually downsized and artists left. This album shows Chess at it's height in the 1960s.