Play (Moby album)

Play is the fifth studio album by American electronica musician Moby, released on May 17, 1999, by V2 Records. It was recorded at his Little Italy apartment in New York City.

While some of Moby's earlier work garnered critical and commercial success within the electronic dance music scene, Play was both a critical success and a commercial phenomenon. The album introduced Moby to a worldwide mainstream audience, not only through a large number of hit singles (that helped the album to dominate worldwide charts for two years), but also through unprecedented licensing of his music in films, television, and commercial advertisements. It eventually became the biggest-selling album of its genre, with over 12 million copies sold worldwide.

In 2003, the album was ranked number 341 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It was nominated for both a Grammy Award and Brit Award, was the UK's biggest selling independent album of 2000, and certified platinum status in more than 20 countries.

Muddy Waters

McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 – April 30, 1983), known by his stage name Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician who is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago blues".

Muddy Waters grew up on Stovall Plantation near Clarksdale, Mississippi and by age seventeen was playing the guitar at parties, emulating local blues artists Son House and Robert Johnson. He was recorded by Alan Lomax there for the Library of Congress in 1941. In 1943, he headed to Chicago with the hope of becoming a full-time professional musician, eventually recording, in 1946, for first Columbia and then Aristocrat Records, a newly formed label run by brothers Leonard and Phil Chess.

In the early 1950s, Muddy and his band, Little Walter Jacobs on harmonica, Jimmy Rogers on guitar, Elgin Evans on drums and Otis Spann on piano, recorded a series of blues classics, some with bassist/songwriter Willie Dixon, including "Hoochie Coochie Man", "I Just Want to Make Love to You" and "I'm Ready". In 1958, Muddy headed to England, helping to lay the foundations of the subsequent blues boom there, and in 1960 performed at the Newport Jazz Festival, recorded and released as his first live album, At Newport 1960.

Goin' Down Slow

"Goin' Down Slow" or "Going Down Slow" is a blues song composed by American blues singer St. Louis Jimmy Oden. It is considered a blues standard and "one of the most famous blues of all". "Goin' Down Slow" has been recorded by many blues and other artists, notably Howlin' Wolf and Bobby Bland, whose rendition was a hit in both the Billboard R&B and Pop singles charts.

Original song

"Goin' Down Slow" "is the lament of a high roller who is dying":

The song is a moderately slow-tempo twelve-bar blues, notated in 4
4 or common time in the key of B. Oden, as St. Louis Jimmy, recorded it in Chicago on November 11, 1941. It was released as a single by Bluebird Records and featured Oden's vocal with accompaniment by Roosevelt Sykes on piano and Alfred Elkins on "imitation" bass.

"Goin' Down Slow" was Oden's most famous song and he later recorded several versions, including in 1955 for Parrot Records and in 1960 for Bluesville Records. He and Sykes continued their musical partnership well into the 1960s.

Goin' Down

"Goin' Down" is the song by British singer-songwriter, Melanie C. Written by Chisholm, Julian Gallagher and Richard Stannard for her debut solo album Northern Star (1999). The song was produced by Marius De Vries and received a mixed reception from music critics. The song was released as the first single in the third quarter of 1999 and reached the top ten in the United Kingdom, where it became her second top five single. It reached the top twenty in Australia and the top fifty in Canada. In the UK the single sold 92,645 copies, becoming the 179th best selling single of 1999. Its music video was banned by some music television stations due to its violent content and offensive language.

Music video

The music video was shot in Los Angeles in July of 1999 the video sees Melanie with a short, blonde, spikey crop (it is shorter than on the CD-cover). She is seen dancing and jumping intensely with a microphone wearing a plaid skirt. There are scenes of people dancing in a big club-like warehouse with policeman driving outside, as they are seen trying to get in. Melanie is in the club throughout the whole video with wind and some water vapor being sprayed towards her in slow motion. Joc is shown driving an antique Pontiac that has a Cadillac label on the side.

Howlin' Wolf

Chester Arthur Burnett (June 10, 1910 – January 10, 1976), known as Howlin' Wolf, was an African-American Chicago blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player, originally from Mississippi. With a booming voice and looming physical presence, he is one of the best-known Chicago blues artists. Musician and critic Cub Koda noted, "no one could match Howlin' Wolf for the singular ability to rock the house down to the foundation while simultaneously scaring its patrons out of its wits." Producer Sam Phillips recalled, "When I heard Howlin' Wolf, I said, 'This is for me. This is where the soul of man never dies'". Several of his songs, such as "Smokestack Lightnin'", "Back Door Man", "Killing Floor" and "Spoonful" have become blues and blues rock standards. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 51 on its list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time".

Early life

Howlin' Wolf was born on June 10, 1910, in White Station, Mississippi, near West Point. He was named Chester Arthur Burnett, after Chester A. Arthur, the 21st president of the United States. His physique garnered him the nicknames Big Foot Chester and Bull Cow as a young man: he was 6 feet 3 inches (191 cm) tall and often weighed close to 275 pounds (125 kg). He explained the origin of the name Howlin' Wolf: "I got that from my grandfather", who would often tell him stories about the wolves in that part of the country and warn him that if he misbehaved then the "howling wolves would get him". Paul Oliver wrote that Burnett once claimed to have been given his nickname by his idol Jimmie Rodgers.