Every Monday night there was a jam session in the Bruxelles club in Dublin, where I’m from. My brother and sister went down there. I went with them and musicians would jam until the wee small hours and I fell in love with the blues right there and then. I was just 16, so I was underage and I had to sneak in.
That’s where I discovered you can play 12-bar blues all night because it’s about the emotion and the feeling you put in. You’ve got to put your heart and soul into it – it’s about the playing and the solos and the chemistry of the group in front of you. I learned how to sing there, how to give it loads then pull it back a bit, I loved that aspect of singing.
As I got older I saw the link between those blues sessions with the traditional Irish sessions I was going to with my family. Seeing my family sing a cappella, singing their heartbreaking songs, they’d put their whole selves into the performance and raise the roof. They’d be singing ballads and people would be crying. It was the same with the blues and I quickly worked out which record labels I could trust, Ace, Chess… and I’d buy anything on them from Dublin HMV, even if I didn’t know the artist, I knew they’d be good.
That’s how I discovered Louis Jordan, Little Willie Littlefield, Howlin’ Wolf, Billie Holiday – by taking a chance.
Howlin’ Wolf – Smokestack Lightning (1956)
I was 16, chanced my arm when I saw he was on Chess and gave him a go – and it’s one of the greatest songs ever written and recorded. You put it on and just melt listening to it. The groove is amazing. I love Hubert Sumlin’s guitar playing. I met him just before he died. I had a night off from touring in New York and he was playing at the Iridium. I couldn’t believe it and I almost got to sing with him, but he’d been playing for hours and they cut the gig.
At the point he nodded at me and I got up to go to him, his nurse came out, he had an oxygen mask on, and she stopped him playing any more. But I got to hang out with him backstage. I love Willie Dixon’s playing on this record too, and the way Howlin’ Wolf went from those low to high notes. He was such a wonderful vocalist. I learned everything from him.
John Lee Hooker – Boom Boom (1962)
It’s obvious, but sometimes you find with the songs you know so well you look for more obscure ones to play. But then you’ll put the obvious one on one day and it will just blow you away. It’s one of the hottest sounds ever. It’s just rude, but not in a nasty way – it’s just the way he yells it.
I’m a big fan in general of his work, but I love the overall feel of this one; the lyrics, the guitar, his voice. You can imagine him giving it all that – it’s almost like a conversation; it’s a bloke coming on to you with a twinkle in his eyes. How does it make me feel when I hear it? Hot and bothered [laughs]. My [2009] single Johnny Got A Boom Boom was a nod to John Lee Hooker and this song.
Wynona Carr – How Many Times? (1959)
She did a lot of great songs, like Til The Well Runs Dry, What Do You Know About Love? and How Many Times?, which is a great ballad. I used to sing a lot of Wynona Carr songs with Mike Sanchez, and what I realised was that not only was she a great singer, but she was such a great writer too. She wrote all her own stuff, and she didn’t get the credit she deserved when she was alive.
Because she had a great voice, was a great arranger and songwriter, a great businesswoman, a very clever woman, she was a huge influence on me as a person, too, in terms of what she achieved as a woman in the music business. I really cannot see why she wasn’t a household name.
Sister Rosetta Tharpe And Marie Knight With The Sam Price Trio – Up Above My Head (I Hear Music In The Air) (1949)
I got a live record of hers with Little Richard. I hadn’t heard her before and it was just mental, so I looked into her, started hearing more and more of her songs and I loved them all. Then I was speaking to Jools Holland about her and he asked me to jump in and sing along to Up Above My Head. I did the song with Jeff Beck as well. I thought she sounded like Chuck Berry, that she must be influenced by him. But he came after her and it turned out he was influenced by her. It wasn’t often you heard a woman rocking out like that, she blurred the lines between gospel, blues, rock’n’roll and R&B, and her guitar playing is absolutely brilliant.
Willie Dixon – Nervous (1959)
He really wrote the blues and I had trouble picking just one by him. I could have picked so many: My Babe, Spoonful – his lyrics are great, the feel he gets, the groove. But I picked this one because not many people know it and it is just fantastic.
I found it on YouTube. It’s him singing and playing on it, and his bass playing is so simple. He creates a really simple sound. It’s him just joking around and it captures his humour on the record. He comes across as a great guy who doesn’t take himself too seriously.
Ruth Brown – (Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean (1953)
Ruth Brown recorded for Atlantic. In fact they called the label The House That Ruth Built because of her early success there. She was a fantastic singer, her voice is just stunning, she could get any song across. The groove, the mood; and she has an attitude that I just love and you wouldn’t want to mess with her either.
But then she will also have her vulnerable moments, when she’s waiting for her man to come home. She could also swing the blues as well, like with Teardrops From My Eyes.
Elmore James And His Broomdusters – Rollin’ And Tumblin’ (1960)
I lost a fella because of Elmore James when I was a teenager. We gave each other mixtapes. He gave me all the popular stuff and I gave him an Elmore James one, and I never heard from him again [laughs]. I sang this song for many years, and he’s got a great voice – that’s what I first focused on – his vocal and how it went so well with the guitar.
The song was made famous by Muddy Waters, but this is the arrangement I like best. I love Shake Your Money Maker and Dust My Broom too, all songs where the lines are blurred, where I don’t quite know what they are. Are they blues? Are they R&B? Are they rock’n’roll?
Lavern Baker – Voodoo Voodoo (1961)
This is a great song, one that I’ve sung in my set for many years, and one that not many people do or know. I love the vocals. You hear the intro of the sax and then she just goes straight into it, ‘I thought I was a snake/I started crawlin’ on the ground.’ She’s got a really great voice. She could growl and beat you up with her voice. You really wouldn’t mess with her on this one and her delivery taught me a lot.
Eddie Cochran – Eddie’s Blues (1959)
I love it because the solos are on fire and it sounds like he has 20 fingers. I still can’t believe he was only 20 when he recorded this. It saunters along nicely then these two solos just kill it! It knocks me out every time.
Imelda May’s new EP Imbas is released on November 27. It’s available to pre-order now. The original version of this feature appeared in The Blues #14, published in July 2014. Imelda May was speaking with Jon Harrington.
(LouderSound)
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