In September 1963, Chess Records sought a piece of the growing pie of acoustic recordings with this acoustic folk-blues album. McKinley Morganfield, better known as Muddy Waters had been playing the Chicago blues and jazz scene for decades by then and actually favored electric guitar and modern blues interpretations and had scored a few hits with them in the 1950s, but things had been looking pretty bleak since 1958. The 1964 release became a hit and still defines the genre of acoustic blues and is highly sought after among audiophiles.