John Lee Hooker was a very interesting character, an iconoclastic musician with his own very personal and individual style, he was also a survivor - a Blues musician who knew early on how to sell himself to record companies.
And sell himself he did, maybe too well - over the years from 1948 to the mid 1950's, John Lee Hooker recorded for no less than 20 different record labels!!!
Of course, this was done under a number of different aliases to get around contractual problems, since he often recorded the same material for those various labels.
Hooker certainly wasn't the first musician to do such a thing - Thomas 'Fats' Waller was reputed to have periodically gone through the famous Brill building, from door to door, selling the same compositions under different names to different music publishers so that he could get a bit of cash in his pockets to go out and get drunk...
The aliases Hooker created for himself were just as varied as the labels who were eager to record his music.
(Modern, King, Regent, Savoy, Danceland, Staff, Sensation, Chess, Acorn, Gotham, Regal, Swingtime. Federal, Gone, Chance, DeLuxe, JVB, Chart, Specialty, and Vee-Jay)
Here is a list of known aliases John Lee Hooker recorded under:
"Texas Slim"
"Delta John"
"Birmingham Sam and His Magic Guitar"
"Little Pork Chop"
"Johnny Williams"
"John Lee Booker"
"The Boogie Man"
"Johnny Lee"
"Sir John Lee Hooker"
"John Lee Cooker"
"Johnny Lee Hooker"
"John L' Hooker"
"What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet..."
from Romeo and Juliet, by William ShakespeareReferences used:
Bill Dahl, "John Lee Hooker: Biography",
http://afgen.com/john_hooker.htmlClaus Röhnisch, "John Lee Hooker Complete Singles Discography"
http://web.telia.com/~u19104970/johnnielee1.html#singles
