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.
Blues For Big Town
John Lee Hooker Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Had the blues for big town
Yeah, I woke up this mornin'
Had the blues for big town
You know I'm tired of the country
All that people in town
Yeah, I start packing my own suitcase
Yes, I hit that dusty trail
You know I'm going to big town
Going to make it my home, alright now
Oh, my polo wagon
She broke down and began to drown
My polo wagon
She broke down and began to drown
Don't stop runnin' around
Runnin' wild round in worry
Oh don't forget it
I did mother your own child
Oh, I'm the mother o' your child
Yeah, I got bags full o' nickel
Put it in my telephone
I'm gonna beg my baby
Tell her please let me come back home
The song 'Blues For Big Town' by John Lee Hooker is about the singer's struggle with a feeling of unease and dissatisfaction with his life in the country. He woke up in the morning feeling the "blues for big town", expressing his yearning for the bustling city life. He was tired of the quiet life in the countryside and all its people. The singer declares that he is packing his own suitcase and hitting the dusty trail because he wants to make the big town his home. He wants to explore new opportunities and live it up in the city.
The second stanza talks about how the singer's Polo wagon broke down and began to drown, leading him to worry about what he would do next. The singer pleads with his lover, reminding her that he is the mother of her child, to let him come back home. The song ends with the declaration that he has bags full of nickels, which he is going to put into the telephone to beg his lover to take him back.
Line by Line Meaning
Yeah, I woke up this mornin'
The artist began his day in the morning
Had the blues for big town
He was feeling sad about life in the countryside and wanted to live in the city
You know I'm tired of the country
The artist is exhausted with living in the countryside
All that people in town
He enjoys being around large populations
Yeah, I start packing my own suitcase
He begins packing his own suitcase
Yes, I hit that dusty trail
He sets out on his journey
You know I'm going to big town
He is going to the city in search of a new home
Going to make it my home, alright now
He believes that he will thrive and settle in the city
Oh, my polo wagon
Artist's automobile
She broke down and began to drown
His car broke down and is causing him to worry
Don't stop runnin' around
He is too anxious to stay still and must keep moving
Runnin' wild round in worry
He is in a state of nervousness and anxiety
Oh don't forget it
He is reminding someone of a favour he did for them
I did mother your own child
He took care of the person's child as if he was their mother
Oh, I'm the mother o' your child
He wants the person to acknowledge his hard work
Yeah, I got bags full o' nickel
He has a substantial amount of money
Put it in my telephone
He is putting the money in a safe place
I'm gonna beg my baby
He plans on pleading to his loved one
Tell her please let me come back home
He is asking to return home to the person he loves
Contributed by Kylie L. Suggest a correction in the comments below.