Earl Hooker 'Two Bugs In A Rug'

Earl Hooker 'Two Bugs In A Rug'

Earl Hooker was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi as first cousin to John Lee, but moved to Chicago at the age of one. He spent the lion's share of his productive life playing blitzing, shit-hot guitar as a session man in the studio and on the road. There are scarce few recordings of Earl, but this album (called 'There's A Fungus Amung Us' due to advancing Tuberculosis in the bluesman in the early '70s) represents some of his best sides. The entirely instrumental album features a ragged patchwork of steel slide guitar, rugged rhythm section, stabbing organs, and sax, which serve to knock the edges off an underlying blues framework to create an altogether more funky and amiable monster. The slightly incongruous sleeve artwork by cult cartoonist Robert Crumb adds to the ramshackle charm.