Zakiya Hooker

Zakiya Hooker - Flavors of The Blues - 1996 - Pointblank Records

Zakiya Hooker is the talented daughter of the great John Lee Hooker. This album is not the guitar dominated boogie style of her father but more a jazzy style of blues. It is good music, and well done. Zakiya has performed with some of the blues greats, including Etta James, Charles Brown, John Hammond, and Taj Mahal. Here's an excerpt from an article by Eric Arnold in The Sun Reporter from 30/10/03, "There's a whole lotta people talking about the blues these days, but very few of them really know what they are on a first-hand basis. That's not the case with Zakiya Hooker. As the daughter of legendary singer-guitarist John Lee Hooker -- an American icon who penned seminal songs like "Money (That's What I Want)," "Dimples," "Boom Boom" and "Boogie Chillun" -- Zakiya literally grew up with the blues, and they've been with her all her life. Blues is the root. So it'll always come back. Blues will never die." Buy her "Another Generation Of The Blues" album. And for similar blues music, check out Denise LaSalle's "Pay Before You Pump" album.

TRACKS / COMPOSERS

Stones in My Passway - Robert Johnson
New Orleans Rain - Doug Duffey
Baby You Busted - Robert Young, Zakiya Hooker, Ollan Christopher, Anthony Cook
Look Me Up - Randie McBride
Protect Me from the Blues - Zakiya Hooker, Ollan Christopher, Anthony Cook
Art of Divorce - Zakiya Hooker, Ollan Chirstopher, Anthony Cook
Receipt to Sing the Blues - Angel South, John Stevenson
Let's Do Something - Zakiya Hooker, Ollan Christopher
Drowning in Your Love - Angel South

MUSICIANS

Zakiya Hooker (Vocals)
Lloyd Gregory (Guitar)
Vernon "Ice" Black (Guitar)
Bob Young (Guitar)
Alvon Johnson (Guitar)
Anthony Cook (Guitar)
Billy Johnson (Guitar)
Ollan Christopher (Bass)
Joseph Thomas (Bass)
Simon Russell (Keyboards)
John Turk (Keyboards)
Michael Robinson (Keyboards)
Larry Bradford (Keyboards)
Vince Littleton (Drums)
Richard Agon (Drums)
Stevie Blacke (Mandolin)
Tom Poole (Trumpet)
Anthony Zamora (Harmonica)
Charlie Musselwhite (Harmonica)
Ed Early (Trombone)
Kristina Kopriva (Violin)
David Stone (Saxophone)
Ollan Christopher (Vocals)
Ollan Christopher (Vocals (Background))
Xavier Gardner (Vocals (Background))
Sue McAlpine (Vocals (Background))
Randie McBride (Vocals (Background))
Maureen Smith (Vocals (Background))

REVIEWS

At first glance it would seem that Zakiya Hooker was born into the blues. After all, her father is blues legend John Lee Hooker. But rather than relying on her father, Zakiya has pursued life -- and music -- on her own terms. Her Pointblank Records debut, Flavors Of the Blues, opens with a cover of the Robert Johnson classic “Stones in My Passway,” illustrating Zakiya’s supple blues and smooth, jazz-inflected style. Elsewhere, the results range from tempestuous (“Art Of Divorce” and “Let’s Do Something”) to delicate and moody (“Protect Me From The Blues,” “New Orleans Rain, “ and the torch song gem “Drowning In Your Love”). Joining his daughter and Charlie Musselwhite in the studio, John Lee Hooker lends his inimitable presence on the track “Bit By Love (Hard Times).”In shaping her music, Zakiya has received incalculable support from Ollan Christopher, her husband, producer, musical partner, and co-owner of their own recording studio, where the entire Flavors project was recorded. Possessing a distinguished resume’ in his own right, including five years with Curtis Mayfield, Christopher engineered and produced Flavors, played bass throughout the album, and co-wrote five of the songs with Zakiya. Beneath its warm, burnished appeal, Flavors Of The Blues documents the resilience of the human spirit. In her own unique voice, Zakiya Hooker now shares the strength gained from a lifetime of experience. © www .ozaproductions.com

It took a while, but Zakiya Hooker has finally decided to follow in her daddy's footsteps--sort of. Like 1994's Another Generation of the Blues, Hooker's new release, Flavor of the Blues (Pointblank/Virgin), won't satisfy blues purists expecting John Lee Hooker's daughter to pretend she's just arrived from the Mississippi Delta. The fact of the matter is that Hooker has inherited her father's blues sensibility and applied it to contemporary uptown R&B. In other words, she's no Bessie Smith or Big Mama Thornton, just Zakiya. Wah-wah guitar, swatches of keyboards and funky, sharp horns ensure that the longtime Oakland resident's music has an identity distinct from that of her legendary father. On Robert Johnson's classic "Stones in My Passway," the Little Big Horns punctuate Hooker's bravado-filled braying. "Look Me Up" is lip-smackingly sexy; here and elsewhere, Hooker reminds one of Denise LaSalle, one of the prototypal blues and R&B singers. Like most R&B, the songs on Flavor of the Blues are about sex and love: looking for it ("Look Me Up"), finding it ("Drowning in Your Love"), losing it ("Art of Divorce") and trying to regroup after the bottom falls out of it ("Receipt to Sing the Blues"). However, there's more here than meets the hips. "New Orleans Rain," for instance, finds Hooker displaying a knack for subtler fare. "Protect Me From the Blues," co-written by Hooker, Ollan Christopher (who engineered and produced the album) and guitarist Anthony Cook, is even more impressive, with its ethereally twinkling guitar intro, jazzy-blue sax, inventive bass line and Zakiya's impeccable phrasing. Ditto "Drowning in Your Love," with its Count Basie­like instrumentation and smoky, evocative vocals. Another Hooker-Christopher-Cooke tune, "Art of Divorce," is probably the funkiest number Flavor has to offer, due largely to the brassy Little Big Horns. They more than earn their name as Ed Early (trombone), Tom Poole (trumpet) and Dave Stone (saxophone) come close to sounding like a full horn section. In terms of straight blues, "Receipt to Sing the Blues" and "Protect Me From the Blues" ought to satisfy the self-appointed standard-bearers of the genre. Perhaps Flavor of the Blues is not a completely accurate description of the music here; "flavors" is more like it. The point is, the songs all derive their power from the source of nearly every pop form this country has produced. Like Another Generation of the Blues, Flavor of the Blues includes a cameo from John Lee Hooker himself. On top of his instantly recognizable country-blues pulse, father and daughter exchange half-completed phrases on "Bit By Love (Hard Times)." But Zakiya really doesn't need her father's assistance; she shines brightly enough on her own. The only obstacle that could prevent the Oakland resident from leapfrogging to stardom is the sex-and-skin game. Let's hope she can take the proper evasive action--whatever it may be. © Nicky Baxter, [ From the February 13-19, 1997 issue of Metro ] © 1997 Metro Publishing, Inc.

BIO

Zakiya Hooker is quite familiar with the blues. You could even say she had a front-row seat to view the best the genre had to offer, right in her own living room. Her dad was the renowned blues giant John Lee Hooker. She started to follow in her father's career path in 1991, a year that turned out to be bittersweet for the younger Hooker. That was the year she took to the stage with her dad for the first time, and father and daughter delivered a duet. As happy as that occasion was, Zakiya Hooker soon was forced to face tragedy. The youngest of her three children, John, 20, was killed in a car crash. Three years earlier, son Maurice was jailed and faced a long confinement behind bars. Like her father and a generation of blues artists before her, Zakiya Hooker learned how to prevail in the face of adversity. Flavors of the Blues, her CD from Pointblank Records/Virgin issued in 1996, is a testament to the strength of the spirit. Silvertone/Zomba Records released Hooker's debut, Another Generation of the Blues, in 1993. The album lived up to its title with the inclusion of a duet sung by John Lee and Zakiya, one generation of artists joining together with another. Flavors of the Blues also featured a duet with her legendary father. The younger Hooker, whose name at birth was Vera Lee Hooker, didn't change her name until after she'd relocated to California following the breakup of her first marriage. As a single mother, she re-christened herself with a first name that translates from Hebrew as "pure," and from Swahili as "intelligence." In 1987, she became acquainted with her next husband, Ollan Christopher, who had worked previously with Curtis Mayfield. he couple owns a recording studio, and Christopher contributes to his wife's music as bass player, co-songwriter, and producer. He also sang background on her second album. © Linda Seida, All Music Guide

MORE ABOUT ZAKIYA HOOKER

Vera Lee Hooker was born in Detroit on April 1, 1948. Vera Lee Hooker is a daughter of blues legend John Lee Hooker. She was John Lee Hooker only General Partner as well as his creative partner in his last years on Earth. Of his eight children, John Lee chose Zakiya to transfer his immense legacy to as he appointed her to be the executor of his estate and the sole trustee of his trust. He gave Zakiya the keys. In 1987, after taking the name Zakiya (Swahili for "intelligence", and Hebrew for "pure, exonerated"), she met and married Ollan Christopher Bell who also became her musical and songwriting partner. In 1991 Zakiya Hooker made her first public singing appearance in a duet with her father, and by 1993 released her first album, Another Generation Of The Blues, on Silvertone Records in Europe. In 1998 her second album, Flavors Of The Blues, was released worldwide on Pointblank/Virgin Records. In June 2001 Zakiya Hooker and John Lee Hooker were starting to work together on his new album, when he left for Delta Blues Heaven at his home in Los Altos, California. Zakiya Hooker continued the work they had started, and, with music/songwriting partner and producer Ollan Christopher Bell helming the production, they together completed John Lee Hooker’s new album and titled it Face To Face. Nine of the tracks on this album include past and current members of Bluz 4 U, the band that now backs Zakiya Hooker in her live performances. She is now working on her third album and tours with Bluz 4 U. Zakiya Hooker performed at film director Martin Scorsese’s Radio City Music Hall blues concert (2/7/03 in NYC), a concert that was filmed by director Antoine Fuqua and released as a feature film in 2005, and she was a panelist, as well as performer, at San Francisco’s KQED-TV launch program for Scorsese’s fall 2003 PBS-TV series The Blues. © 2006-2008 BluesSearchEngine.com

AND MORE ARTIST INFO

Zakiya Hooker is quite familiar with the blues. You could even say she had a front-row seat to view the best the genre had to offer, right in her own living room. Her dad was the renowned blues giant John Lee Hooker. She started to follow in her father’s career path in 1991, a year that turned out to be bittersweet for the younger Hooker. That was the year she took to the stage with her dad for the first time, and father and daughter delivered a duet. As happy as that occasion was, Zakiya Hooker soon was forced to face tragedy. The youngest of her three children, John, 20, was killed in a car crash. Three years earlier, son Maurice was jailed and faced a long confinement behind bars. Like her father and a generation of blues artists before her, Zakiya Hooker learned how to prevail in the face of adversity. Flavors of the Blues, her CD from Pointblank Records/Virgin issued in 1996, is a testament to the strength of the spirit. Silvertone/Zomba Records released Hooker’s debut, Another Generation of the Blues, in 1993. The album lived up to its title with the inclusion of a duet sung by John Lee and Zakiya, one generation of artists joining together with another. Flavors of the Blues also featured a duet with her legendary father. The younger Hooker, whose name at birth was Vera Lee Hooker, didn’t change her name until after she’d relocated to California following the breakup of her first marriage. As a single mother, she re-christened herself with a first name that translates from Hebrew as “pure,” and from Swahili as “intelligence.” In 1987, she became acquainted with her next husband, Ollan Christopher, who had worked previously with Curtis Mayfield. The couple owns a recording studio, and Christopher contributes to his wife’s music as bass player, co-songwriter, and producer. He also sang background on her second album. © 2008 WhyFame.com