It was a hit in 1966, making it first to No. 1 in Canada in January 1966 on the RPM Top Singles chart, then to No. 1 in the U.S. on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in February and No. 11 on the UK Record Retailer chart.
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The song was also covered years later by the New York underground artist Klaus Nomi, appearing on his 1981 debut album Klaus Nomi, and was the A-side of a 1982 single accompanied by a video.
The Empire Strikes Back | Lightnin' Hopkins | The Pink Panther Strikes Again | Sam "Lightnin'" Hopkins | Three-strikes law | White Lightnin' | The Green Hornet Strikes Again! | Strikes and Spares | Streetcar strikes in the United States | Saturday the 14th Strikes Back | Reg Strikes Back | Lightnin' Slim's | Lightnin' Slim | Lightning Strikes Again | Jungle Sound: The Bassline Strikes Back! | I Love the '80s Strikes Back | Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back | Barbarian Queen II: The Empress Strikes Back |
According to Zappa, the beginning background music was inspired by Lightnin' Slim's "Have Your Way".
He has also sung and played guitar and harmonica as "Blast Furnace" with the band Blast Furnace and the Heatwaves and currently performs with London blues band Crosstown Lightnin'.
Within a few years, he was representing House, Hurt, White, Skip James, Sam "Lightnin'" Hopkins, Arthur Crudup, Junior Wells, J. B. Hutto and many others.
He was nominated for Most Promising Newcomer at the British Independent Film Awards 2009 for his role in White Lightnin, and won Best Actor awards at the Monterrey and Mumbai Film Festivals for the same role.
The studio was important in launching the careers of such artists as Lightnin' Hopkins, Harry Choates, George Jones, Eddie Noack, The Sir Douglas Quintet, Roy Head, and Freddy Fender.
He is also the guitarist and front man of the musical group The Bottle Rockets which have been best described as loud, interpretive Americana (the Stooges meet Lightnin' Hopkins).
This became part of a LP called "Avant Slant," which was a collage of new and already recorded sounds and songs from Milt Gabler, the poet Robert Graves, LeRoi Jones, Lightnin' Hopkins, and others.
In 1959, Hopkins was contacted by folklorist Mack McCormick who hoped to bring him to the attention of the broader musical audience which was caught up in the folk revival.
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Musicologist Robert "Mack" McCormick opined that Hopkins "is the embodiment of the jazz-and-poetry spirit, representing its ancient form in the single creator whose words and music are one act".
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Filmmaker Les Blank captured the Texas troubadour's informal lifestyle in his 1967 documentary The Blues Accordin' to Lightnin' Hopkins.
Slim has been cited as a major influence by several contemporary blues artists, including Captain Beefheart, who in a 1987 radio interview with Kristine McKenna, stated that Lightnin' Slim was the only artist he could recommend somebody listening to.
The label has released albums by influential artists such as Townes Van Zandt, Lightnin' Hopkins, Lead Belly, Chris Smither, Dave Brubeck, Nina Simone, Harry Partch, John Cage and Albert King.
The reissue includes a booklet with liner notes by Ron Forbes-Roberts and notes by musicians Ferguson, Emmons, and Kenny Malone.