Lightnin’ Hopkins – Lightnin’ Strikes

Texas blues with a Los Angeles band

Lightnin’ Hopkins recorded this music in Los Angeles on 4 and 5 October 1965. His electric guitar and voice meet Don Crawford’s harmonica, Jimmy Bond’s bass and Earl Palmer’s drums. Producer Dave Hubert brought a musician whose storytelling was closely connected to Texas together with experienced members of the Californian studio community. The resulting album appeared on Verve Folkways.

The title can initially send collectors in the wrong direction: Vee-Jay had already released a different Hopkins album called Lightnin’ Strikes in 1962. This is the later recording with a band. The historical sleeve contains another confusion, showing Reverend Gary Davis rather than Hopkins. Label, catalogue number and programme are therefore more reliable guides to this edition than the face on its cover.

A familiar song in another setting

“Mojo Hand” opens the nine-track programme. Hopkins first recorded it for Fire in 1960; this is another version from the 1965 session. Returning to songs was part of the working life of a musician with an extensive repertoire. A familiar title does not necessarily identify the same recording, nor does it imply the same musical circumstances.

Listen for how Hopkins’ guitar connects with bass and drums in this performance. Where do the others pick up an entrance, and where do they leave him space? “Little Wail”, “Cotton” and “Take Me Back” move through further parts of his repertoire on the first side. Each selection can be followed as an encounter between an individual way of phrasing and an accompaniment sustained by several musicians.

A storm becomes a contemporary subject

“Hurricane Betsy” opens the second side. The hurricane struck Louisiana in September 1965, a little over three weeks before these sessions. Alongside established material stands a title responding directly to a recent event. Hopkins’ music preserves older forms and stories, but it also engages with the world in which he was living at that moment.

Palmer brought experience from New Orleans and a vast range of Los Angeles sessions. Bond was another sought-after local studio musician. Here, their task involved responding to Hopkins’ particular approach. Try “Guitar Lightnin’” or “Woke Up This Morning” and follow one accompanying part throughout. Which small changes keep the performance moving? Attention to the band expands the image of a blues musician so often pictured alone with a guitar, revealing the exchanges that make this recording distinct.

The Verve Acoustic Sounds reissue

AVER 40053 contains the nine album selections on one stereo LP, pressed on 180-gram vinyl at 33⅓ RPM. The publisher explicitly specifies all-analogue mastering by Matthew Lutthans at The Mastering Lab. The documented runouts support the TML lacquer-cutting credit, and Quality Record Pressings manufactures the vinyl. A tip-on gatefold jacket is included; Stoughton is identified in the recorded details of the physical release.

The publisher does not establish the precise tape generation. Its general reference to analogue tapes is therefore not expanded here into an additional original-master guarantee. This release belongs to the Acoustic Sounds Series, distinct from reissues of the earlier Vee-Jay album with the same title. It presents Hopkins in the electric band setting of 1965, where the personnel and recording circumstances give that familiar title a specific identity.

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More by Lightnin’ Hopkins: Goin’ Away · Lightnin’

Musicians

Documented selection of participating musicians. Personnel may vary by track; this list does not claim to be complete.