George ''Wild Child'' Butler - Keep On Doing What You're Doing (1969)

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George ''Wild Child'' Butler - Keep On Doing What You're Doing (1969)

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George remained active throughout the 60's and from 1966 he performed mainly in Houston and New Orleans. He worked extensively with the late Cousin Joe Pleasant and Roosevelt Sykes in New Orleans and the great Sam "Lightnin'" Hopkins in Houston. George appears as a sideman on a number of sides with Lightnin' Hopkins, the best known of which being the album on the Jewel label entitled "TALKING SOME SENSE". He was next signed to a contract by the Mercury label; in fact George observes, "The record companies always wanted me to sign an exclusive contract, and their people always met me with a paper their hand." George did an album for the Mercury label entitled "KEEP ON DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING". This album contained brand new Wild Child material including "HIPPIES PLAYGROUND" and also the song that has become most associated with George, "GRAVY CHILD" . However, during this period Mercury Records experienced severe distribution problems and granted George's request of an outright release from his contract with them. "KEEP ON DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING" on the Mercury label should be a prime candidate for re-release as a blues classic. George next recorded on the TK label in 1977 doing an album entitled "FUNKY BUTT LOVER". TK Records soon went out of business and George had to go to considerable trouble to regain possession of his original master, which he later leased to Rooster Records. From 1977 until 1986 George was a part of an all-star blues package including Ted Harvy, Sam Lay, Jimmy Rogers and Wild Child Butler. His travels with this package took him from Atlanta, Georgia, to Whitehorse in the Yukon, and just about everywhere in between. During this period of his career George appeared in nearly every state in the union, but ironically rarely in Chicago itself. When he did appear in Chicago, he would be asked to close shows by the legendary Howlin' Wolf, an honor granted to few performers. George's powerful singing style is often compared to that of Howlin' Wolf and one syndicated blues DJ even referred to him as a Howlin' Wolf imitator, which established the fact that the DJ knew little about either man.

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George ''Wild Child'' Butler - Keep On Doing What You're Doing (1969)

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George ''Wild Child'' Butler - Keep On Doing What You're Doing (1969)

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Biography by Bill Dahl
From all accounts, George Butler was indeed a "wild child." But he found time between the youthful shenanigans that inspired his mom to bestow his descriptive nickname to learn some harp basics at age 12. He was gigging professionally as a bandleader by the late '50s, but Butler's recording career didn't blossom until he moved to Chicago in 1966 and signed with Shreveport, LA-based Jewel Records (his sidemen on these sessions included bassist Willie Dixon and guitarist Jimmy Dawkins).The harpist didn't have much luck in the recording wars: his 1969 Mercury album sank with little trace, while a 1976 LP for T.K., Funky Butt Lover, did equally little for his fortunes (it was later reissued in slightly altered form on Rooster Blues as Lickin' Gravy). Around 1981, Butler moved up north to Ontario, Canada, and continued his career. A decade later, he cut the first of two albums for British producer Mike Vernon; These Mean Old Blues was an engaging set of original material cut in London. Stranger, the fruits of another English session, emerged in 1994.