Muddy Waters & The Rolling Stones
Checkerboard Lounge – Live Chicago 1981

And finally came the day when I managed to recover my Amazon Prime password and activate the free trial period of Qello Concerts.

I had the review ready for a while, but I felt I needed to watch the entire concert first to understand if I had hit the mark or not; in my mind, the few images of the performance available on Youtube were more present than the music itself, and this, for someone who usually loves to listen with their eyes closed, is a clear signal of the dominance of frames over notes.

The fact is, the product under review is a package – released in 2012 - that includes 2 vinyls, 1 CD, and 1 DVD all for the "modest" sum of, at least, 100 €, which has kept me away from purchasing it, at least until today... Moreover, while the musical material is easily available on various streaming platforms, the concert film is only visible on the aforementioned Qello Concerts.

So, Saturday after lunch, weakened by the ignoble attempt to resume playing tennis (interrupted due to COVID), I'm ready: download & play of "Checkerboard Lounge – Live Chicago 1981" by Muddy Waters & The Rolling Stones".

In truth, from the start it's clear that the story is not just about "The Father Of Modern Chicago Blues" and the "Stones": the first two songs, in fact, are sung by Lovie Lee, a keyboardist from the support band he is part of. A classic intro with the usual booming presentation follows, and here comes Waters who, after the greetings and a brief speech, strikes with "You Don’t Have To Go"; the magic of the voice and the guitar of a man who is the Blues begins. Following that, a version of over 10 minutes of "Country Boy" with a screaming bottleneck work: Muddy calls, and the guitar responds. To spice things up, the self-satisfied smiles of the great elder.

Then again, calling it a stage is a stretch... The atmosphere is typical of the Chitlin' Circuit venues, even though the Checkerboard has only existed since 1972. The performance space, just a bit larger than a handkerchief, about 20 cm higher than the floor, is already crowded with the 6 members of the crew with, at the center, him, Muddy Waters, a living legend of Blues (he would die two years later), an iconic figure that transforms the chair he's sitting on into a throne and the guitar into a scepter.

The band is comprised of 5/6 black people, with the only exception being a tall blonde with cowboy mustache on guitar (Rick Kreher), who, for some reason, doesn't appear in the credits despite his nice solo in "Country Boy". On drums, the blackest man I've ever seen in my life (Ray Allison) tightens his jaws grinding his teeth, making it clear how they've "charged" before playing. Completing the harmonious ensemble are John Primer, also on guitar, Earnest Johnson on bass, and George "Mojo" Buford on harmonica or rather, harmonicas considering the bandolier he wears holds various instruments for different tunings, aside from the classic richter.

Indeed, black people and what whites have turned them into with their cliché: I want to be black/Have natural rhythm/Shoot twenty feet of jism, too (Lou Reed – "I Wanna Be Black"). Always the rhythm in the blood and the ejaculatory power of blacks fill the imagination of whites. But, nonetheless, it's certain that on October 17, 1961, on platform 2 of the Dartford railway station, a town about 50 kilometers southeast of London, Muddy Waters' "sprays," having crossed the Atlantic, transformed into some vinyls under Mick Jagger's arm when he met, after years, Keith Richards who had his inseparable guitar with him. Soon, the Rolling Stones would be born.

In 1981 they are the most famous Rock band in the world and, during the promotional tour of "Tattoo You," on November 22 they find themselves in Chicago for a free evening. Since 1971, every new work of theirs has reached the first place in the charts. They fill stadiums all over the world. They are millionaires. They frequent the jet set and the best places frequented by them. Yet, on the first notes of "Baby Please Don’t Go," when the scene shifts outside the club, you see Mick and Keith (with Ronnie Wood, Ian Stewart, various acolytes, and groupies) step out of a limousine and work their way through the crowd to enter the Checkerboard Lounge Blues Club, Chicago - Southside Chicago, 423 E. 43rd St, conceptually light years away from New York's "Studio 54" where they are among the "owners" of the private.

The gang of "pale faces", having taken off their coats and jackets, settle into the front seats of the long tables arranged under the stage which host the lucky audience. It's already evident from the clothing the distance between the bluesmen and the rockers: the former with impeccable tailor-made suits, while for the latter, Mick's acetated Ellesse tracksuit stands out (but the overcoat, ahahah the overcoat!). Clothes aside, the show really begins now: a couple of magnums of whiskey travel above the heads of the audience and the first, rightfully, reaches Keith's hands, who, fumbling like a Brixton thug with a blade drawn from his own pockets, opens it and attaches it to his neck, gulping down a few swigs as if it were fresh water.

Muddy calls Mick on stage and then Keith, followed by Ronnie, and, BOOM!! Magic: Waters seems to bring Jagger back at least 15 years, before audiences around the world asked him to amplify his already oversized ego. Having shed the clothes of the "vain" who made his Lear jet fly to Nova Scotia to see the total solar eclipse (Carly Simon - You’re So Vain), he returns to being the boy from Dartford station, just another fan of Blues and Waters, but who has the unique and unrepeatable opportunity to share the stage with his idol. Even if his eyes are shining and he is restless, Mick waits every single time for the host to give him the cue to sing his lines, and certainly, he will not be remembered for this in this circumstance.

After all, Muddy, with all the love he bears him, knows he hasn't suffered enough to sing delta Blues with the same soul he puts into it. But watching him move in the square meter available with his typical small steps is a spectacle. It wasn't in the Chitlin' where he learned but in the small clubs in London with equally confined spaces. In his autobiography, Richards recalls: "The spaces were small, which was fine for everyone, but they suited Mick better. His frontman qualities were already evident in these small venues, where there was barely room to swing a cat by the tail... Give Jagger a stage as big as a table, and he'll move better than anyone else, except maybe James Brown."

Anyway, the band keeps playing, and you can imagine the level! After "Baby Please Don’t Go," it continues with "Hoochie Coochie Man." Then, after using it masterfully on his rusty red Telecaster weathered by the elements for "Country Boy," Muddy pulls his personal bottleneck out of his vest pocket and calls Keith. He gets shy and points to Ronnie, saying he's better with the tool: the first uncertain notes of "Long Distance Call" begin, but Ron quickly recovers and what follows is not bad at all for a white guy. To conclude Muddy's first moment, another endless jam for "Mannish Boy", and here Mick showcases his showmanship as well as his Blues singing abilities (from Keith's letter to his aunt after the fateful 1961 meeting: "He has all Chuck Berry's records, and his friends have them too, they're all rhythm and blues fans, I mean real R&B... Apart from this, Mick is the greatest rhythm and blues singer on this side of the Atlantic, and I don't mean maybe, it really is true)."

Meanwhile, loudly called by Waters, like in a village saga, Blues legends such as Buddy Guy (homeowner since he's the club manager), Junior Wells, Lefty Dizz have taken their place on that microscopic stage... Keith's eyes, both spirited and spellbound, rest on the figure of his idol Buddy with a tender expression as he performs one of his solos during another endless jam on "Next Time You See Me". Ronnie seems like a boy at his high school exams, in the grip of an eye twitch, totally focused on playing blues scales without overdoing it; then he drinks a big glass of bourbon and starts to loosen up. At a certain point, there are more Telecaster and Stratocaster on stage than at Ray’s Music shop! The songs follow one another, and while old Muddy rests among the audience, first Buddy and Wells, then Lefty, take the scene. When Waters returns for the show's closure, there's less space in an egg than on the stage, so much so that the host has to push away Lefty to make room for Keith, called for a solo.

In short, what I see is a pagan feast where the old father sincerely thanks part of that progeny composed of white brats who, in the mid '60s - during the gestation of another creature shaped with the three-note-three, the AAB scheme, and the call-voice/response-solo (they will call it Rock) - gave visibility to the Blues, until then enjoyed only by black people. Thanks to the countless cover of standard songs and some "innocent" theft of riffs, bridges, and solos, the brats secured visibility and fame not only for him but for all the founding fathers of Blues. And besides a considerable pension for all the blacks who support their families with that music. And, as a sincere man, Muddy gives Mick and Keith looks of paternal love. And since it's a celebration, Ian Stewart (and about time!!!) also finds redemption with a series of well-deserved close-ups for the excellent work he does on the keys lent by Lee.

Those 4 planks barely supporting the musicians' weight are like a magic circle, reminiscent of the crossroads where it all began: they do not respond to the laws of music business but to those of Blues, and don't be fooled by the cameras' presence, called more to capture in time a unique event than for commercial intent. Because at the end of the day, it's Blues that saved the Rolling Stones. When their first manager wanted them to become pop, the Stones said no. In the name of Chicago's Blues tradition, they said no. And the decision owes much to those little dirty secrets about sex and death that the Mississippi delta and the south side of Chicago had whispered to each other for decades. After all, Blues is indeed the existential anger generated by the white master's exploitation and the subsequent desire for love aimed at realizing one's feelings in a burst of self-determination, but it's also eros, aggressiveness, travel, alcohol and drugs, male supremacy, crime, and police... and in these matters, Jagger is a professor. And Keith the Principal!!!

Just one last detail to close. During the closing "Champagne And Reefer," there's a strange whispering between Lefty Dizz and Mick: they're preparing a surprise for daddy, not wishing to find him laid out like a dried cod with powdered nostrils. Because age advances and the wolf has indeed lost a bit of fur, as evident from the tonsure insulting the classic afro hairdo, but not the vice, and the white powder, at 'a certain age, is quite dangerous. Mick throws something on the ground, and Muddy picks up what seems to be an inflorescence, sniffs it, and... uuuuhhh! Then Mick intones: "You should have to smoke some dope" inviting him to enjoy only and exclusively joints!!! The show concludes with Muddy hugging Mick and shouting: NO COCAINE!

I don’t want to know what happened in the inevitable after hour...