Much of the credit for turning young white Americans onto the blues in the 1960s has been lavished on the "British invasion" bands - among them Cream, Fleetwood Mac, John Mayall's Bluesbreakers and pre-eminently the Rolling Stones.
This is justified to some extent. The Stones, in particular, used their popularity as a lever to get television slots for their blues heroes, and employed them as support acts on tour. However, the contribution made by some noteworthy white American blues musicians at around the same time - among them Paul Butterfield and Mike Bloomfield of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band - tends to be undervalued.
Earlier this year, a box set devoted to Bloomfield titled was released. It goes some way to putting the quality of his guitar playing - largely overlooked during the CD era - into proper perspective.
Now another archival release, , featuring Paul Butterfield's Better Days band offers a reminder of what a fine blues harmonica player the leader was. There are some interesting parallels between Butterfield and Mayall.
Both led bands in which they were often overshadowed by their lead guitarists, and both were multi-instrumentalists who particularly excelled at the blues harp.
A crucial difference though is that Mayall learned his Chicago blues licks from records. Butterfield, a native Chicagoan, learned his hanging around blues clubs on the city's South Side, where he sat in sometimes with Muddy Waters.
Among white blues harpists his only real peers are Richard "Magic Dick" Salwitz of the J. Geils Band and Charlie Musselwhite, who learned his craft in Memphis.
