"Spoonful" is a blues standard

Blues standard

A blues standard is a blues song that is widely known, performed, and recorded by blues artists. The following list identifies blues standards and some of the blues artists that have recorded them...

 written by Willie Dixon

Willie Dixon

William James "Willie" Dixon was an American blues musician, vocalist, songwriter, arranger and record producer. A Grammy Award winner who was proficient on both the Upright bass and the guitar, as well as his own singing voice, Dixon is arguably best known as one of the most prolific songwriters...

 and first recorded in 1960 by Howlin' Wolf

Howlin' Wolf

Chester Arthur Burnett , known as Howlin' Wolf, was an influential American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player....

. It is loosely based on "A Spoonful Blues", a song recorded in 1929 by Charley Patton (Paramount

Paramount Records

Paramount Records was an American record label, best known for its recordings of African-American jazz and blues in the 1920s and early 1930s, including such artists as Ma Rainey and Blind Lemon Jefferson.-Early years:...

 12869), itself related to "All I Want Is A Spoonful" by Papa Charlie Jackson

Papa Charlie Jackson

Papa Charlie Jackson was an early American bluesman and songster. He played a hybrid banjo guitar and ukulele, his recording career beginning in 1924...

 (1925) and "Cocaine Blues" by Luke Jordan

Luke Jordan

Luke Jordan was an American blues guitarist and vocalist of some renown in his local area of Lynchburg, Virginia....

 (1927). "Spoonful" has been interpreted and recorded by a variety of artists.

Howlin' Wolf versions

"Spoonful" has a one-chord, modal blues structure found in other songs Willie Dixon wrote for Howlin' Wolf, such as "Wang Dang Doodle

Wang Dang Doodle

"Wang Dang Doodle" is a blues song written by Willie Dixon for Howlin' Wolf at Chess Records in Chicago. It has been covered by many artists, including Love Sculpture, Koko Taylor, Z. Z. Hill, Ted Nugent, the Pointer Sisters, PJ Harvey, Grateful Dead, Ratdog, Savoy Brown, Charlie Watts, Booker T....

" and "Back Door Man

Back Door Man

"Back Door Man" is a blues song written by Willie Dixon and recorded by Howlin' Wolf in 1961. It was released by Chess Records as the B-side to Wolf's "Wang Dang Doodle"...

" as well as in Wolf's own "Smokestack Lightning

Smokestack Lightning

"Smokestack Lightning" is a classic of the blues. In 1956, Howlin' Wolf recorded the song and it became one of his most popular and influential songs...

". Backing Wolf (vocals) are: longtime accompanist Hubert Sumlin

Hubert Sumlin

Hubert Sumlin is an American Chicago blues and electric blues guitarist and singer, best known for his celebrated work, from 1955, as guitarist in Howlin' Wolf's band. His singular playing is characterized by "wrenched, shattering bursts of notes, sudden cliff-hanger silences and daring rhythmic...

 (guitar); relative newcomer Freddie Robinson

Abu Talib (musician)

Abu Talib was an African American blues and jazz guitarist, singer, and harmonica player.-Career:...

 (second guitar); and Chess recording veterans Otis Spann

Otis Spann

Otis Spann was an American blues musician, who many consider the leading postwar Chicago blues pianist.-Career:Born in Jackson, Mississippi, United States, Spann became known for his distinct piano style....

 (piano), Fred Below

Fred Below

Fred Below was a leading blues drummer, best known for his innovative work with Little Walter and Chess Records in the 1950s. Nobody laid more of the Chicago blues rhythmic foundations, particularly its archetypal backbeat, than Fred Below.-Career:He was born in Chicago, and started playing drums...

 (drums), and Dixon (double-bass). It has been suggested that Freddie King

Freddie King

Freddie King , thought to have been born as Frederick Christian, originally recording as Freddy King, and nicknamed "the Texas Cannonball", was an influential African-American blues guitarist and singer. He is often mentioned as one of "the Three Kings" of electric blues guitar, along with Albert...

 contributed the second guitar on "Spoonful", but both Sumlin and Robinson insist it was Robinson. In 1962, the song was included on Wolf's second compilation album for Chess titled Howlin' Wolf

Howlin' Wolf (album)

Howlin' Wolf is the second album from Chicago blues singer/guitarist/harmonicist Howlin' Wolf. It is a collection of six singles previously released by the Chess label from 1960 through 1962...

.

In 1968, Wolf reluctantly re-recorded "Spoonful", along with several of his blues classics in Marshall Chess

Marshall Chess

Marshall Chess is the son and nephew of the founders of Chess Records, the Chicago-based independent record label that first recorded an unprecedented list of African-American, blues and early rock and roll artists such as: Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Bo Diddley, Sonny Boy...

' attempt at updating Wolf's sound for the burgeoning rock market. Unlike his 1971 The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions

The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions

The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions is an album by blues musician Howlin' Wolf, released in the summer of 1971 on Chess Records, catalogue CH 60008...

(Chess LP-60008) where he was backed by several rock stars, including Eric Clapton

Eric Clapton

Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...

, Steve Winwood

Steve Winwood

Stephen Lawrence "Steve" Winwood is an English international recording artist whose career spans nearly 50 years. He is a songwriter and a musician whose genres include soul music , R&B, rock, blues-rock, pop-rock, and jazz...

, Bill Wyman

Bill Wyman

Bill Wyman is an English musician best known as the bass guitarist for the English rock and roll band the Rolling Stones from 1962 until 1992. Since 1997, he has recorded and toured with his own band, Bill Wyman's Rhythm Kings...

, Charlie Watts

Charlie Watts

Charles Robert "Charlie" Watts is an English drummer, best known as a member of The Rolling Stones. He is also the leader of a jazz band, a record producer, commercial artist, and horse breeder.-Early life:...

, et al., here he was backed by relatively unknown studio session players. The resulting album, The Howlin' Wolf Album

The Howlin' Wolf Album

-Personnel:*Howlin' Wolf – guitar, harmonica, vocals*Gene Barge – horn, electric sax*Pete Cosey – guitar, bowed guitar*Hubert Sumlin – guitar*Roland Faulkner – guitar*Morris Jennings – drums*Don Myrick – flute*Louis Satterfield – bass...

(Cadet Concept

Cadet Records

Cadet Records was started as Argo Records in 1955 as the jazz subsidiary of Chess Records. Argo changed its name in 1965 to Cadet to avoid confusion with the similarly named label in the UK...

 LPS-319), with its "comically bombastic" arrangements and instrumentation, was a musical and commercial failure. Wolf offered his assessment in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine "Man ... that stuff's dogshit".

Cream versions

The British blues-rock

Blues-rock

Blues rock is a hybrid musical genre combining bluesy improvisations over the 12-bar blues and extended boogie jams with rock and roll styles. The core of the blues rock sound is created by the electric guitar, piano, bass guitar and drum kit, with the electric guitar usually amplified through a...

 band Cream

Cream (band)

Cream were a 1960s British rock supergroup consisting of bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce, guitarist/vocalist Eric Clapton, and drummer Ginger Baker...

 recorded "Spoonful" for their 1966 UK debut album, Fresh Cream

Fresh Cream

Fresh Cream is the debut studio album by British supergroup Cream. It was the first LP release of producer Robert Stigwood's new "Independent" Reaction Records label, released in the United Kingdom as both a mono and stereo version on 9 December 1966, the same time as the single release of "I Feel...

. For the American release of Fresh Cream, "I Feel Free

I Feel Free

"I Feel Free" is a song first recorded by British rock group Cream. The song's lyrics were written by Pete Brown, its music by Jack Bruce. It was the first track on the US issue of their debut album, Fresh Cream , and the band's second hit single...

" was substituted for "Spoonful". The song was released in the U.S. later in 1967 as a two-sided single (Atco 45-6522), but edited as Part 1 fades out as the instrumental break starts and Part 2 begins just before the third verse. Cream frequently played it in concert and the song evolved beyond the blues-rock form of the 1966 recording into a vehicle for extended improvised soloing influenced by the sixties San Francisco music scene. One such rendition, recorded at a Winterland

Winterland Ballroom

The Winterland Ballroom, often referred to as Winterland Arena or simply Winterland, was an old ice skating rink and 5,400-seat music venue in San Francisco, California...

 concert and included on their 1968 album Wheels of Fire

Wheels of Fire

Wheels of Fire is the name of a double album recorded by Cream. The release was largely successful, scoring the band a #3 peak in the United Kingdom and a #1 in the United States, and became the world's first platinum-selling double album....

, clocks in at nearly seventeen minutes.

Other versions

"Spoonful" has also been recorded by artists such as Etta James

Etta James

Etta James is an American blues, soul, rhythm and blues , rock and roll, gospel and jazz singer. In the 1950s and 1960s, she had her biggest success as a blues and R&B singer...

 on her album At Last! (1961), The Blues Project on their album Live at The Cafe Au Go Go

Live at The Cafe Au Go Go

Live at The Cafe Au Go Go is the debut album by the American band The Blues Project, recorded live during the Blues Bag four-day concert on the evenings of November 24-27, 1965 at the Cafe Au Go Go in New York City...

(1966), Canned Heat

Canned Heat

Canned Heat is a blues-rock/boogie rock band that formed in Los Angeles, California in 1965. The group has been noted for its own interpretations of blues material as well as for efforts to promote the interest in this type of music and its original artists...

 from Vintage

Vintage (Canned Heat album)

Vintage was the first album recorded by Canned Heat in 1966, although it did not see actual release until 1970 under Janus Records. Produced by rhythm & blues legend, Johnny Otis, the album featured Muddy Waters/Elmore James' song "Rollin' and Tumblin'" recorded with and without Alan Wilson's...

(1966, released 1970), Shadows of Knight

Shadows of Knight

The Shadows of Knight are an American rock band from the Chicago suburbs, formed in the 1960s, who play a form of British blues mixed with influences from their native city. At the time they first started recording, the band's self-description was as follows: "The Stones, Animals and Yardbirds...

 from Back Door Men

Back Door Men

Back Door Men is the second album by The Shadows of Knight. Both this album and its predecessor, Gloria, were released in 1966 and are considered to be seminal garage band albums. As noted by one reviewer, "The original LP version of this album, the second by the legendary white Chicago garage...

(1966), Ten Years After

Ten Years After

Ten Years After is an English blues-rock band, most popular in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Between 1968 and 1973, Ten Years After scored eight Top 40 albums on the UK Albums Chart...

 from Ten Years After

Ten Years After (Ten Years After album)

Ten Years After is the debut album by the English rock/blues band Ten Years After. It features Spoonful, a cover that the more famous British blues rock group Cream also covered...

(1967), songwriter Willie Dixon from I Am The Blues

I am the blues

I Am The Blues is a Chicago blues album released in 1970 by the well-known bluesman Willie Dixon. It is also the title of Dixon's autobiography, edited by Don Snowden....

(1970), Johnny Diesel

Johnny Diesel

Johnny Diesel is an Australian musician, who has released material as leader of Johnny Diesel & the Injectors, under his birth name, or by the epithet Diesel...

 from Short Cool Ones (1996), Chris Whitley

Chris Whitley

Christopher Becker Whitley was an American blues singer-songwriter and guitarist.Whitley changed his sound frequently, and achieved modest mainstream success while maintaining a small but devoted following...

 from Perfect Day

Perfect Day (Chris Whitley album)

Perfect Day is the sixth album by singer-songwriter and guitarist, Chris Whitley. It is his fifth studio album.It is a full length release of cover versions of "love songs". The album was recorded a trio and is subtitled "Featuring Billy Martin and Chris Wood". Martin and Wood are the rhythm...

(2000), Uli Jon Roth and Jack Bruce

Jack Bruce

John Symon Asher "Jack" Bruce is a Scottish musician and songwriter, respected as a founding member of the British psychedelic rock power trio, Cream, for a solo career that spans several decades, and for his participation in several well-known musical ensembles...

 on the DVD Legends of Rock at Castle Donington

Legends of Rock at Castle Donington

Legends Of Rock: Live At Castle Donington is a DVD released by Uli Jon Roth. It features Uli's headlining show at Castle Donington in 2001, along with his special guests Michael Schenker, Phil Mogg and Pete Way from UFO, and Jack Bruce from Cream...

(2002), and George Thorogood

George Thorogood

George Thorogood is an American blues rock vocalist/guitarist from Wilmington, Delaware, United States, known for his hit song "Bad to the Bone" as well as for covers of blues standards such as Hank Williams' "Move It On Over" and John Lee Hooker's "House Rent Boogie/One Bourbon, One Scotch, One...

 from 2120 South Michigan Ave.

2120 South Michigan Ave.

2120 South Michigan Ave. is a studio album by George Thorogood and the Destroyers. It was released on June 14, 2011 on the Capitol Records label. The album peaked at #2 on the Billboard Top Blues Albums chart. The title refers to the address of the offices and recording studios of Chess Records...

. The Grateful Dead included the song in their live repertoire from 1981 through 1994.

Accolades

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is a museum located on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is dedicated to archiving the history of some of the best-known and most influential artists, producers, engineers and others who have, in some major way,...

 listed Howlin' Wolf's "Spoonful" as one of the "500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll". It is also ranked #219 on Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time". In 2010, the song was inducted into the Blues Foundation

Blues Foundation

The Blues Foundation is an American nonprofit corporation, headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee, that is affiliated with more than 175 Blues organizations from various parts of the world....

Hall of Fame "Classics of Blues Recordings" category.