There can be no debate on the subject: B.B. King is the most innovative and influential lead guitarist to grace the postwar blues arena. This absolutely crucial period in the Mississippi-born blues icon’s amazing career hasn’t been treated particularly well on the CD reissue front over the years, especially domestically. His seminal 1950-62 output for the Bihari brothers’ RPM, Kent and Crown logos has generally been reduced to a few concise greatest hits collections that barely scrape the surface of King’s voluminous catalog. That’s why this beautifully presented four-disc boxed set comes as such a delightful development. At long last we have an in-depth examination of King’s most important waxings — 106, to be exact — that digs deep into his exciting Memphis beginnings (rough edges and all), glides through his mid-50s heyday, when saxist/house arranger Maxwell Davis honed his studio arrangements to a diamond-sharp edge, and slides into the early ’60s, by which time King’s immaculate and instantly recognizable lead guitar technique had fully matured.

The Vintage Years box leads off with a first disc subtitled The Great B.B. that contains a goodly number of his greatest hits — only this time, unlike more than a few King collections previously out on the market, all the takes are the right ones with no overdubbed horns and electric bass added after the fact (sound quality is superlative throughout). The dirge-like “3 O’Clock Blues” made King a star in 1952 and logically starts the set, followed by the imaginative Latin-tempo–to-jump-and-back-again ’53 smash “Woke Up This Morning,” the broom-dusting piledriver “Please Love Me” and the impeccably burnished mid-50s swingers “You Upset Me Baby” and “Every Day I Have The Blues.” The full-length 1960 smash “Sweet Sixteen” still packs a considerable emotional wallop, dramatic extended ending and all, and King’s definitive “Rock Me Baby,” a solid hit in 1964 (long after King left Kent), probably makes its CD stereo debut here.

The second CD, Memphis Blues ’N’ Boogie, is devoted to King’s earliest days of recording for RPM, which commenced when he was holding down a daily radio airshift on Memphis’ pioneering WDIA. Sam Phillips’ fledgling Memphis Recording Service hosted King’s first sessions, the torrid “B.B. Boogie” and “A New Way Of Driving” contrasting with the resolutely downbeat “The Other Night Blues” and “B.B. Blues.” King was still in the process of developing his own singular sound, but the search was seldom less than fascinating, his Roy Brown–influenced vocal roar perfectly complementing his fiery fretwork. Perhaps due in part to his record-spinning duties at WDIA, King had a firm grasp of blues tradition, updating the raucous “Shake It Up And Go” and Tampa Red’s “She’s Dynamite” with storming arrangements that jump like crazy.

Take A Swing With Me, the third disc, takes in a lot of stylistic ground while surveying 1954-60. King takes his best shot at crooning Duke Ellington’s “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore” in front of a lush Big Band, his faithful companion Lucille nowhere to be found, and delivers the hearty spiritual “Precious Lord” with legit Sunday-morning reverence. Plenty of hits are aboard this CD too: The ominous “When My Heart Beats Like A Hammer,” a jumping “Whole Lotta’ Love” and the lovely doo-wop–ish ballad “Sneakin’ Around” were stone smashes. “Be Careful With A Fool” and “Days Of Old” rock as hard as anything King ever cut for the label, and “Boogie Rock” (also known as “House Rocker”) is an astonishing instrumental, King peeling off chorus after chorus of dazzling jazz-laced licks over tight, punchy horns.

The early ’60s have too often been overlooked and undervalued by serious King historians, but King Of The Blues, the comp’s last installment, underscores that King was making quality recordings for as long as he was pacted to Kent, even if his Crown LPs were designated as budget fodder from the day they were pressed. “You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now,” “Fishin’ After Me” and “Hold That Train” hail from a brilliant trio-backed 1960 album, Lloyd Glenn’s rumbling 88s acting as the perfect foil for the guitarist’s leonine cries and stinging axe. “Bad Case Of Love” teeters on the precipice of rock ’n’ roll and could almost be Twisted to, but overall King wisely sticks to what he does best: brass-powered blues, performed with infinite class. The accompanying 76-page booklet is a triumph unto itself. Colin Escott and compiler/producer John Broven split the annotational duties, Broven adding an interview with Phillips and an informative history of the Biharis’ prolific Los Angeles labels. There’s also an incredibly detailed discography, vintage photos aplenty and all the bells and whistles that an exalted figure such as King merits. The only question is why wasn’t this project tackled domestically a long time ago? The undisputed King Of The Blues certainly demands such lavish treatment in his own backyard. Thankfully, the good folks at Ace have done the job — and they’ve done it absolutely magnificently. (42-50 Steele Road, London NW10 7AS, England)
— Bill Dahl