Modern electric blues guitar can be traced directly back to this Texas-born pioneer, who began amplifying his sumptuous lead lines for public consumption circa 1940 and thus initiated a revolution so total that its tremors are still being felt today. Few major postwar blues guitarists come to mind that don't owe T-Bone Walker an unpayable debt of gratitude. B.B. King has long cited him as a primary influence, marveling at Walker's penchant for holding the body of his guitar outward while he played it. Gatemouth Brown, Pee Wee Crayton, Goree Carter, Pete Mayes, and a wealth of other prominent Texas-bred axemen came stylistically right out of Walker during the late '40s and early '50s.

King's last Shelter album was his most elaborately produced, with occasional string arrangements and female backups vocals, although these didn't really detract from the net result. Boasting perhaps heavier rock elements than his other Shelter efforts, it was characteristically divided between blues standards (by the likes of Willie Dixon and Elmore James), Leon Russell tunes, and more R&B/soul-inclined material by the likes of Ray Charles and Percy Mayfield.

Compiling a number of performances recorded shortly before Albert Collins' death, Live '92/'93 offers definitive proof that the guitarist remained vital until his last days.

Epic's The Essential Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble gathers two discs' worth of the late blues guitarist's work, including many live performances and a few tracks with the Vaughan Brothers. The collection presents Vaughan's material in roughly chronological order, from the 1980 live recording "Shake for Me" to 1989's "Life by the Drop." It also touches on most of Vaughan's definitive songs and performances, including "Tightrope," "Wall of Denial," "Couldn't Stand the Weather," and "Cold Shot," and live versions of "The Sky Is Crying," "Superstition," and "Rude Mood/Hide Away." Though this album doesn't offer anything that hasn't already been released in some form or another, it does go into slightly more depth than several of the other Stevie Ray Vaughan retrospectives by presenting both his greatest studio hits and some of his best live work.

One of the most satisfying contemporary Brown discs of all for the discerning blues fan. Nothing but swinging, horn-abetted blues adorn this album, as Gate pays tribute to an influence and a protege by covering T-Bone Walker's "Strollin' with Bones" and Albert Collins's "Frosty." Brown's jauntily revives Junior Parker's "I Feel Alright Again" and Percy Mayfield's "Give Me Time to Explain," while his own numbers – a funky "Dollar Got the Blues," the luxurious blues "Sometimes I Slip" – are truly brilliant.

A sort of a sequel to Gatemouth's 1974 Cajun country & western cowboy album Down South in the Bayou Country, the originally issued Bogalusa Boogie Man consists of 12 tracks performed in more or less that same vein. "Bogalusa Boogie Man" was recorded in Bogalusa, LA, during March of 1975, almost exactly one year after Bayou Country. Material for this project was composed by Danny Morrison, Red Lane, Hoyt Garrick, David Craig, Jerry Hubbard, Pat Rush, Fred Martin, and Little Feat founder Lowell George, whose "Dixie Chicken" features "vocals by everyone around in the studio, including friends and neighbors and the one and only Woody Lee Lewis." George is said to have singled out this version as his all-time favorite.

Tuff Enuff is a 1986 studio album by Texas-based blues rock and rockabilly band The Fabulous Thunderbirds which pointed the band in a more mainstream direction. The single, "Tuff Enuff" was featured in the films Gung Ho, Tough Guys, as was the follow-up single "Wrap It Up". It has also been played a number of times on the sitcom Married… with Children. "Tuff Enuff" remains the band's only Top 40 hit, peaking at No. 10 on the Billboard Hot 100.

If you're talking about packaging, the flaws of this disc are considerable. Comprised of 14 songs from 1960-1990 (most from 1960-71), the unifying theme is that all of them are taking from Houston recording sessions. But while recording dates and some personnel are noted, the original labels and dates of release are not. Furthermore, although the liner notes give a reasonable overview of Copeland's career, the tracks on this specific compilation are not discussed. And, putting the boot in, the cuts are not sequenced chronologically, but arranged almost as if someone had pressed the random button on a CD remote. Now, having aired all those complaints, the music is very good. These are fiery, committed performances in which the songs and arrangements often veer as much toward soul as toward blues. That's something that works to Copeland's advantage, both because he was versatile enough to combine styles well, and because it made him stand out from legions of other journeymen bluesmen.

This contains straight-up reissues of two of T-Bone's Imperial albums, themselves merely collections of the original 78s. Everything on these 24 sides was recorded between 1950 and 1954 – not as trailblazing a period as the one from 1946 to 1947 on Black and White, but still prime T-Bone by any yardstick. The majority of these sides were cut in Los Angeles, with the exception of the New Orleans-recorded "I'm Still in Love With You" and the Windy City cut of "Bye Bye Baby." Loads of great T-Bone guitar and a cool West Coast sound to most everything on here make this an important addition to anyone's blues collection.

Omar & The Howlers' misadventures at the majors began when they trimmed the blues and padded the rock. Since returning to Rounder/Bullseye, they have smartly managed to keep the balance, and that's the case on their latest. The 13 tracks alternate between boogie shuffles, swaggering wailers, and heartache testimonies, with Omar's flailing guitar and spiraling harmonica nicely backed by his trio and such assistants as organist Reese Wynans, vocalist Kris McKay and saxophonist John Mills. Plenty of blues and more than enough rock fervor.

Wrap It Up is an enjoyable budget-priced collection of hits and album tracks from the Fabulous Thunderbirds' Epic era, including the title track, which is a cover of Sam & Dave's hit. It's a fine sampler, but not a definitive collection by any stretch of the imagination. With their fusion of blues, rock & roll, and R&B, the Fabulous Thunderbirds helped popularize roadhouse Texas blues with a mass audience in the '80s and, in the process, they helped kick-start a blues revival during the mid-'80s. During their heyday in the early '80s, they were the most popular attraction on the blues bar circuit, which eventually led to a breakthrough to the pop audience in 1986 with their fifth album, Tuff Enuff. The mass success didn't last too long, and founding member Jimmie Vaughan left in 1990, but the Fabulous Thunderbirds remained one of the most popular blues concert acts in America during the '90s.

Second Winter, Johnny Winter's second album for Columbia, originally had the distinction of being the only album in rock history that was a three-sided double LP. Musically, 35 years after its original release, Second Winter is still an oddity. Issued by Sony's Legacy division, the set has been painstakingly remastered, and expanded by bonus cuts and an entire disc of live material. It's too bluesed-out to be a pure rock record, and too psychedelically dimensioned to be a pure blues album. Tommy Shannon calls it "power blues." And as for whatever else passed for blues-rock at the time – Cream, Hendrix, Canned Heat, etc. – forget it. This set is a whole different animal. Cut in Nashville with all tracks begin done within one or two takes, the energy of Second Winter is undeniable. The sheer range of styles Winter assaulted in his restless quest is astonishing too.

Like everything on Memphis Slim's album Goin' Back to Tennessee or Alvin Youngblood Hart's "Tallacatcha" (a Western swing performance worthy of Bob Wills), Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown's 1975 Barclay album Down South in the Bayou Country completely transcends any and all attempts to confine this diverse artist within the artificial parameters of blues or any other preordained category. Consisting mostly of songs written by Hoyt Garrick, Jr., Charles Gressett, and David Craig with additional tunes by J. Loyd and Joe Stampley, this pretty parfait of country & western, Southern rock, cowboy hoedown, and electric Cajun soul music was recorded during February and March 1974 in Bogalusa, LA. Gatemouth, fresh from his tenure as Deputy Sheriff of San Juan County, NM, sounds particularly pleased to be active at the center of a project so completely infused with authentic Southern sensibilities. Perhaps the most satisfying track off of the original album is "Loup Garou." This hoodoo funk ritual with background vocals by Geraldine "Sister Gerry" Richard sounds as if it might have been influenced by Dr. John's "Loop Garoo," which had appeared on that artist's Atco album Remedies in 1970.