"I'm not working as much as I've been," said 78-year-old Lonnie Brooks in a recent phone interview. "I had in mind to try to retire, but my boys keep tellin' me, 'Let's go out there.'"
I asked him when he decided he wanted to retire. Without missing a beat or belying the joke, the Louisiana-bred Chicagoan deadpanned: "I was thinking about this about 16 years ago. But I needed money, so I kept on."
Brooks' "retirement" decision coincided with his last studio release of new recordings, 1996's Roadhouse Rules - which in retrospect seems to have ended a two-decade solo run on the Alligator label, including 1979's classic Bayou Lightning. The All Music Guide called him "a Chicago blues giant" with a "unique Louisiana/Chicago blues synthesis unlike anyone else's on the competitive Windy City scene."
