Burning Hell


Burning Hell is an album by blues musician John Lee Hooker that was recorded in Detroit in 1959 at the same sessions that produced The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker, but not released by the Riverside label until 1964 in Europe.

Reception

reviewer Richie Unterberger stated: "Burning Hell ranks among John Lee Hooker's most edgy and focused performances. A companion piece to The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker, it finds Hooker singing country-blues, accompanied only by his own acoustic guitarsomething he rarely did after traveling north from the Mississippi Delta... Hooker shows himself to be an excellent interpreter who could have held his own with Delta bluesmen of any era. Although his guitar playing is pretty raw even by blues standards, Hooker more than compensates with his powerful, resonant voice".

Track listing

All compositions credited to John Lee Hooker except where noted
  1. "Burning Hell" – 3:17
  2. "Graveyard Blues" – 3:38
  3. "Baby, Please Don't Go" – 4:49
  4. "Jackson, Tennessee" – 3:20
  5. "You Live Your Life & I'll Live Mine" – 3:21
  6. "Smokestack Lightnin'" – 3:22
  7. "How Can You Do It" – 2:57
  8. "I Don't Want No Woman If Her Hair Ain't No Longer Than Mine " – 3:15
  9. "I Rolled and Turned and Cried the Whole Night Long" – 3:47
  10. "Blues for My Baby" – 3:37
  11. "Key to the Highway" – 3:15
  12. "Natchez Fire " – 3:02

    Personnel