Elmore James, the king of the raw and loud slide guitar of '50s Chicago blues, left something down in his old stomping grounds in Mississippi before moving north -- little Earnest Johnson. Johnson took the stage name Elmore James Jr and now bills himself as "the undisputed son of Elmore James, king of the slide guitar". Junior proves time and time again that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. But while James Jr. plays guitar and sings like his famous father, neither of those aspects share the heart on sleeve emotionalism of the older man, but rather the deep, hearty music of the Chicago tradition.
He plays traditional electric blues, that is rooted in the past without being an exercise in sheer nostalgia. Elmore James, Jr., has been playing off and on around Chicago since the late 1960s. While Junior may have impossibly large shoes to fill, he certainly has cut his own niche in the contemporary blues scene. He played last summer at the Chicago Blues Festival, in 2001 at the San Francisco Blues Festival and toured Sweden with the Bobby Rush band. He also headlined the Kalamazoo Budweiser Blues Series with Larry McCray.
Sample Tracks From Daddy Gave Me The Blues (2008) 1. Don't Get Mad 2. Going Back Home   3. Nora Mae 4. Tore Down 5. Oh Baby 6. Daddy Gave Me The Blues 7. The Misfit (Got To Keep Movin') 8. I'll Get You 9. Cummins Prison Farm 10. Electric Man 11. Steppin With Elmo 12. See See Rider 13. Mean Little Linda 14. Going Back Home (Acoustic)
Sample Tracks From Sista Monica (1997) 1. Stepping with Elmore 2. Crazy About Ida Mae   3. That's All Right 4. Forrestville Arkanses Blues 5. I Should Have Quit You (I Can't Take It) 6. Bad Feeling 7. Dust My Broom 8. Bitter With the Sweet (Lonely Child) 9. Oh Babe 10. Cummins Prison Blues
Elmore James, Jr. in Chicago 6/7/08 with Cadillac Zack