Ry Cooder – Chicken Skin Music

Ry Cooder – Chicken Skin Music

Widely regarded as one of Ry Cooder’s finest and most influential albums, Chicken Skin Music is a rich celebration of American roots traditions and cross-cultural folk music. Blending blues, Tex-Mex, Hawaiian music, gospel, country, and rhythm & blues, the album showcases Cooder’s extraordinary ability to connect diverse musical styles through warmth, authenticity, and masterful musicianship.

Rather than focusing solely on original material, the record acts as a musical journey through traditional songs and reinterpretations, brought together by Cooder’s distinctive slide guitar work and deep appreciation for regional musical history. Tracks such as The Bourgeois Blues and Goodnight Irene pay tribute to the legacy of Lead Belly, while Stand By Me and He’ll Have To Go are transformed into beautifully understated roots arrangements.

The album is especially notable for its collaborations with legendary Tex-Mex accordion player Flaco Jiménez and Hawaiian musicians including Gabby Pahinui, helping create a truly multicultural and deeply human musical atmosphere. Throughout the record, gospel harmonies, traditional instrumentation, and relaxed grooves give the album a timeless and lived-in quality.

Warm, eclectic, and profoundly influential, Chicken Skin Music stands as a landmark recording in American roots music and an essential album for fans of folk traditions and genre-crossing musicianship.

Tracklist:

1. The Bourgeois Blues
2. I Got Mine
3. Always Lift Him Up / Kanaka Wai Wai
4. He’ll Have To Go
5. Smack Dab In The Middle
6. Stand By Me
7. Yellow Roses
8. Chloe
9. Goodnight Irene