When Hooker hit the stage at Greenwich Village's legendary Café Au-Go-Go in 1966, backed by Muddy Waters and band, he made blues history. Hooker's emotional power is intensified by Muddy and co.'s visceral Chicago blues assault on the violent, doomy "I'm Bad Like Jesse James," while the despair of "When My First Wife Left Me" comes off even more bleakly downhearted. And when Hooker lays into a signature boogie on "She's Long, She's Tall (She Weeps Like a Willow Tree)," the results are absolutely electrifying.