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ORIGINAL 1956 VERSION OF MUDDY WATERS STANDARD BY ANN COLE
Here's a beat up but playable copy of the original recording
of the Muddy Waters blues standard, Got My Mo Jo Working
, by the obscure but great Ann Cole, circa 1956. See
below for more details, courtesy of songfacts.com.
We heard this gem on the March 31-08 Fingerfulla 45s
edition of RRR.
From songfacts.com:
This was written by a little-known Blues musician named Preston
Foster, and was first released by the Gospel singer Ann Cole
in 1956. Muddy Waters toured with Cole and picked up the song
from her, adding some lyrics to his version. Waters popularized
the song and it became a Blues standard.
A "Mojo" is a kind of magic charm, and the term shows up
in a lot of Blues songs. In this song, the singer is heartbroken
because his trusty Mojo doesn't work on the girl he loves.
Some of the artists who recorded this include Chuck Berry,
Canned Heat, Buddy Guy, B.B. King, Manfred Mann, Carl Perkins
and Jimmy Rogers.
The Paul Butterfield Blues Band recorded it on their first
album in 1966 as "I Got My Mojo Working." Elvin Bishop, who
was a guitarist in the band and later had the solo hit "Fooled
Around And Fell In Love," said: "If you were in Chicago in
1960, as I was, every blues band in Chicago played that tune.
And here it is in the 2000s, and half the blues bands you
go and see now play 'Got My Mojo Working.' If you've ever
seen the first Paul Butterfield album, the album cover, the
picture was taken in front of a store that sold that kind
of stuff. It's magic charms and lucky oil, and different things,
different kinds of powder you can sprinkle around the bed.
It's voodoo magic stuff."
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