Original Album Classics [Box set]

I have no idea how the 'Original Album Classics' series isn't more popular, or at least more well known. Its ridiculously cheap, less than £3 an album!!!

The Johnny Winter collection contains the following albums:
Johnny Winter
Second Winter
Saints And Sinners
Still Alive And Well
Live

They amount to a brilliant collection of Winter's songs and talents.
A great introduction to his music that I aim to take further with more of his albums.
It's a shame he isn't as well known as he should be. What a guitar player!

The only downside is the packaging, the CDs come in individual cardboard sleeves which are all in a cardboard Johnny Winter box and the albums keep sliding out which is abit annoying. Other than that, a great collection.

Johnny Winter truly is one of both rock and blues greats.Surely one of the finest guitarists of his generation, produced some classic albums over the years.Whether he plays electric or acoustic, an excellent slide guitarist as well. The man who took Muddy Waters back to the blues pinnacle in his later recordings, for that we will always be grateful. JW also appeared at the Eric Clapton Crossroads Guitar Festivals, has a stunning new album out 'Roots', and still continues to tour with his band. So here we have a box set of five of his very best albums,still sounding as great as the day they were first released.If you have no JW releases then this set is the best place to start.A range of both great blues tracks,some equally great rock material, covers of both Rolling Stones and Dylan material, dare I suggest better than the originals including a storming Jumpin' Jack Flash and Highway 61 Revisited, Chuck Berry's Johnny B. Goode, four studio and one live album made between 1969 and 1974, but don't be put off because they sound as fresh as they ever were. Nearly fifty tracks of awesome rockin' blues, plus the odd acoustic track where his slide playing shows the mark of a true master of his craft. This truly is a bargain box set, not to be missed, by an artist who throughout the years has given us some of the best American music there is.Very recommended indeed.

Johnny Winter's lone entry in the hugely successful "Original Album Classics" Series is a genuine nugget. A 5CD Mini Box Set concentrating on his rightly celebrated Late Sixties/Early Seventies Blues-Rock output - it's also mid-price into the bargain.

Released 24 January 2011 in the UK (1 Feb 2011 in the USA) - each CD is housed in a singular card sleeve which repro's in miniature the back and front artwork of the original vinyl LP (with recording info, production credits etc downloadable via the Net from Sony's website). Columbia/Sony Legacy 886976561727 breaks down as follows:

Disc 1 is "Johnny Winter" released May 1969 on Columbia CS 9826 in the USA and June 1969 on CBS S 63619 in the UK (34:14 minutes)

Disc 2 is "Second Winter" released as a 3-sided 2LP set in November 1969 on Columbia K2S 9947 in the USA and May 1970 in the UK on CBS S 66321 (46:57 minutes)

Disc 3 is "Live/Johnny Winter And" released March 1971 in the USA on Columbia CS PC 30475 and in the UK on CBS S 64289 (40:12 minutes)

Disc 4 is "Still Alive And Well" released April 1973 on Columbia KC 32188 in the USA and in the UK on CBS S 65484 (44:32 minutes)
[Note: Tracks 11 and 12 "Lucille" and "From A Buick Six" are bonus tracks]

Disc 5 is "Saints & Sinners" released February 1974 in the USA on Columbia KC 32715 in the USA and in the UK on CBS S 65842 (41:48 minutes)
[Note: Track 11 "Dirty" is a bonus track]

Winter's debut LP "The Progressive Blues Experiment" was released on Imperial Records in the States in April 1969 - so the first disc on here "Johnny Winter" is actually his 2nd album and his debut for Columbia Records. Along with its impossibly cool follow-up "Second Winter" (a 3-sided 2LP set where Side 4 was blank) - they are vinyl treasures I've had on my turntables for over 40 years.

Highlights from both include the twin guitar boogie of "I'm Yours And I'm Hers" along with the stunning National Steel slide of "Dallas". And as if to stamp his credentials on the genre, the cover of the Muddy Waters staple "Mean Mistreater" features two huge Blues Legends - Willie Dixon on Bass and Walter "Shakey" Horton on Blues Harp. Speaking of mean harmonica warblers - Winter's own Harp playing on "Back Door Friend" makes him sound like some 70-year old veteran. The immediately impressive "I Love Everybody" track from "Second Winter" turned up on those CBS sampler LPs in 1970 and 1971 while his cover of Percy Mayfield's "Memory Pain" sounded so hard rock - a great opening salvo and a clever reading of the changing sounds of the time.

But like Rory Gallagher on "Live In Europe" (another genuine guitar hero), it wasn't until 1971 that you heard the full power of Winter and his band on the now legendary "Live" album. There are versions of the Stones' "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode" that are arguably definitive - blistering stuff. I'm afraid I threw many a guitar shape to these tracks in my living room as a teenager...oh dear...

The final two albums featured here - "Still Alive And Well" and "Saints And Sinners" - saw RICK DERRINGER both join the ranks and produce. The Canned Heat/ZZ Top boogie of "Rock & Roll" (lyrics above) and the Slide Blues of "Too Much Seconal" showed that the magic was still there (even if the drugs seemed to be getting the better of him). His version of the Stones "Silver Train" from 1973's "Goat's Head Soup" sounds so much like them that it might very well have been an outtake from that Stones session with Winter singing lead vocal instead of Mick Jagger. His funky spoken intro of "I'm hungry...Let's do this f****er..." to "Still Alive And Well" raises a laugh to this day and his raucous version of Chuck Berry's "Thirty Days" is great fun too. And on it goes...

To sum up - nearly 6 albums worth of great Blues-Rock for roughly two quid a record is a bit of a no-brainer really.

No Winter of discontent here folks. Recommended.

PS: and if you want more check out his late Seventies collaborations with MUDDY WATERS on Blue Sky Records which feature Winter producing and playing on all (see the 3CD "Original Album Classics" box set). There is also a Legacy Double of "Second Winter" and a "Woodstock" version of "Johnny Winter" - both have bonus discs with

PPS: in the 'comment' section attached to this review is a list of all titles in the "Original Album Classics" Series to January 2012 (over 145 titles - 5CD and 3CD sets)