BAKER, MICKEY - BLAM! NYC R&B SESSIONS 1952-1961

Mickey Baker's contribution to the history and development of rock and roll as we know it places him alongside titans like Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry. It's that simple. The difference between these two and Baker is that his career has been unfairly undervalued, if not completely unknown. The work of Mickey Baker—a highly sought-after studio musician, the quintessential session guitarist during the golden age of R&B—laid the foundations for a genre we will never tire of championing. This tireless worker—who spent half his life in the studio and the other half on tour—left his mark on hundreds, thousands of recordings, including countless hits by artists of the caliber of Big Joe Turner, Ruth Brown, and the Coasters. His incendiary riffs and solos, his consistently aggressive yet elegant sound, a creativity ahead of its time, and impeccable taste completely transformed the concept and role of the electric guitar in rock and roll forever.

But don't panic: what we present here, far from being an album for serious guitarists or rock 'n' roll academics, is simply a selection of singles recorded in New York for various labels between 1953 and 1961. A magnificent compilation with much previously unreleased material, where you'll have the pleasure of discovering—or rediscovering—the immeasurable Mickey Baker.