B.B. King: Live at the Regal [MCA]

Why you'll love it

This MCA reissue is pressed on 180g vinyl in the EU, with a printed inner sleeve carrying the credits. In 2005 the Library of Congress added Live at the Regal to the National Recording Registry, and Rolling Stone has placed it on its 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Printed inner sleeve
• Pressed in the EU
• Stereo mix

About the album

King reckoned he'd played the Regal hundreds of times before, and on November 21, 1964, it shows. The South Side crowd knows every lick, and he works the room like an old friend, chatting, teasing, then letting the guitar cut clean through the noise.

DJ Pervis Spann brings him on for side one and E. Rodney Jones for side two, and the band is tight as a drum: Duke Jethro on piano, Leo Lauchie on bass, Sonny Freeman on drums, Johnny Board and Bobby Forte on tenor sax and Kenny Sands on trumpet. Memphis Slim's "Every Day I Have The Blues" kicks things off at a gallop, "How Blue Can You Get" gets the biggest roar of the night, and the six-minute "Worry, Worry" is a masterclass in the slow burn. Johnny Pate produced.

Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, John Mayer and Mark Knopfler have all used it as a primer before their own shows. Jethro was booked to play organ until it broke, and King told him to sit at the piano and pretend; we'd say the pretending holds up rather well.

Also at Kops: more B.B. King on vinyl · browse Blues

Tracklist

Listen

On MCA (cat# 1116461), a reissue of the 1965 live album.