John Lee Hooker could be said to embody his own unique genre of the blues, often incorporating the boogie-woogie piano style and a driving rhythm into his masterful and idiosyncratic blues guitar and singing. His best known songs include "Boogie Chillen" (1948) and "Boom Boom" (1962).
There is some debate as to the year of John Lee Hooker's birth, 1915, 1917, 1920, and 1923 have all been cited, 1917 (the date on his grave marker in Oakland, California) is the one most commonly cited although Hooker himself claimed, at times, 1920.
Hooker was the youngest of the eleven children of William Hooker (1871–1923), a sharecropper and a Baptist preacher, and Minnie Ramsey (1875–?).
Hooker and his siblings were home-schooled. They were permitted to listen only to religious songs, with his earliest musical exposure being the spirituals sung in church.
In 1921, his parents separated. The next year, his mother married William Moore, a blues singer who provided John's first introduction to the guitar (and whom John would later credit for his distinctive playing style). The year after that (1923), John's natural father died; and at age 15, John ran away from home, never to see his mother and stepfather again.
He was a cousin of Earl Hooker,
Throughout the 1930s, Hooker lived in Memphis where he worked on Beale Street and occasionally performed at house parties. He worked in factories in various cities during World War II, drifting until he found himself in Detroit in 1948 working at Ford Motor Company. He felt right at home near the blues venues and saloons on Hastings Street, the heart of black entertainment on Detroit's east side. In a city noted for its piano players, guitar players were scarce. Performing in Detroit clubs, his popularity grew quickly, and seeking a louder instrument than his crude acoustic guitar, he bought his first electric guitar.
Though he stuttered slightly in his normal speech, he performed in a half-spoken style that became his trademark. Rhythmically, his music was free, a property common with early acoustic Delta blues musicians. His vocal phrasing was less closely tied to specific bars than most blues singers'. This casual, rambling style had been gradually diminishing with the onset of electric blues bands from Chicago but, even when not playing solo, Hooker retained it in his sound.
Hooker's recording career began in 1948 with the hit single, "Boogie Chillen" cut in a studio near Wayne State University.
Despite being illiterate, he was a prolific lyricist. In addition to adapting the occasionally traditional blues lyric (such as "if I was chief of police, I would run her right out of town"), he freely invented many of his songs from scratch. Recording studios in the 50s rarely paid black musicians more than a pittance, so Hooker would spend the night wandering from studio to studio, coming up with new songs or variations on his songs for each studio. Due to his recording contract, he would record these songs under obvious pseudonyms such as "John Lee Booker," "Johnny Hooker", or "John Cooker".
His early solo songs were recorded under Bernie Besman.
John Lee Hooker rarely played on a standard beat, changing tempo to fit the needs of the song. This made it nearly impossible to add backing tracks. As a result, Besman would record Hooker, in addition to playing guitar and singing, stomping along with the music on a wooden palette.
John Lee Hooker's guitar playing is closely aligned with piano Boogie Woogie. He would play the walking bass pattern with his thumb, stopping to emphasize the end of a line with a series of trills, done by rapid hammer-ons and pull-offs. The songs that most epitomize his early sound are "Boogie Chillen," about being 17 and wanting to go out to dance at the Boogie clubs, "Baby Please Don't Go," a more typical blues song, summed up by its title, and "Tupelo," a stunningly sad song about the flooding of Tupelo, Mississippi.
He maintained a solo career, popular with blues and folk music fans of the early 1960s and crossed over to white audiences, giving an early opportunity to the young Bob Dylan. As he got older, he added more and more people to his band, changing his live show from simply Hooker with his guitar to a large band, with Hooker singing.
In 1989 he joined with a number of musicians, including Keith Richards and Carlos Santana to record The Healer, which won a Grammy award — one of many awards.
He fell ill just before a tour of Europe in 2001 and died soon afterwards at the age of 83.
Hooker recorded over 100 albums and lived the last years of his life in San Francisco, California, where he licensed a nightclub to use the name Boom Boom Room, after one of his hits.
Among his many awards, John Lee Hooker has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
In 1991 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Two of his songs, "Boogie Chillen" and "Boom Boom" were named to the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
John Lee recorded several songs with Van Morrison, including "Never Get Out of These Blues Alive", "The Healing Game" and "I Cover the Waterfront". He also appeared on stage with Van Morrison several times, some of which was released on the live album "A Night in San Francisco".
John Lee also recorded in the sixties with british blues band The Groundhogs. These recordings are still available as a CD "John Lee Hooker with The Groundhogs". More importantly, Hooker recorded with the Blues-rock outfit Canned Heat, delivering the album 'Hooker N' Heat' in 1971. Hooker was influential and topical even in his lifetime, as evidenced in the MC5 cover of "Motor City's Burning" on their first album, recorded almost immediately after the riots which are the song's topic.
Back Biters And Syndicators
John Lee Hooker Lyrics
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Standing all around the door
Back biters and syndicators
Standing all around the door
An' it wished 'bout ev'ryday
Hopin' I'd go way to stay
Ooo-ooo-wee, ooo
Ooo-wee-ooo
Almost ruin my happy home
I be glad when the day come
You leave these syndicators alone
I can't understand, little girl
That they don't mean you no good
I can't understand, little girl
That you don't know they don't mean you no good
You'll find these kind-a people
In any neighborhood
Back biters and syndicators
Can't you see 'em standin' 'round the do'?
Back biters and the syndicator
Can't you see 'em standin' 'round the do'?
I'm gonna move on down the line
I don't have to be bothered no mo'
The lyrics of John Lee Hooker's Back Biters And Syndicators reflect the theme of the song clearly. The phrase "back biters and syndicators" refers to people who gossip and spread rumors or false information behind one's back with their ulterior motives. In this song, these characters are portrayed as standing outside Hooker's door, pleading for him to go away as they intend to ruin his happiness at home, indicating that they are either jealous or trying to manipulate him for their own benefit. Hooker seems to feel sympathy for his significant other, who doesn't seem to understand the ill intentions of these people towards her. Hooker tells her that these kinds of people exist in every neighborhood, and the only way to get rid of them is to move on because they are not worth engaging in.
The overall message of the song is that we should be aware of the back biters and syndicators around us and not let them get the best of us. John Lee Hooker's unique bluesy voice and the slow tempo of the song create a moody atmosphere that emphasizes the seriousness of the topic. The lyrics convey a strong sense of caution, which comes across as a warning to the listeners.
Line by Line Meaning
Back biters and syndicators
People who talk behind others' backs and those who manipulate situations for their own gain
Standing all around the door
Always lurking and waiting for an opportunity to strike
An' it wished 'bout ev'ryday
Every day, I wished they would go away
Hopin' I'd go way to stay
Hoping that I would leave for good to escape their constant presence
Almost ruin my happy home
Their constant presence and negative influence almost destroyed my peaceful and contented life
I be glad when the day come
I will be happy when the day comes
You leave these syndicators alone
You avoid these manipulative and negative people
I can't understand, little girl
I can't comprehend why you don't see their true intentions
That they don't mean you no good
That they have bad intentions towards you
You'll find these kind-a people
You'll encounter these kinds of people
In any neighborhood
In any community or social group
Can't you see 'em standin' 'round the do'?
Don't you notice that they're always present and always ready to take advantage?
I'm gonna move on down the line
I'm going to leave and start anew somewhere else
I don't have to be bothered no mo'
I don't have to deal with these negative people anymore
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Written by: AL SMITH, JOHN LEE HOOKER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind