In the late 1950s and early '60s, New Orleans blues guitarist Walter “Wolfman” Washington backed up some of the greatest Crescent City R&B artists of the era, including Johnny Adams, Irma Thomas, and Lee Dorsey. Washington began working with his own band in the mid-'60s, and by the '70s, he had become a major name on the blues circuit, even though he didn't start recording until the '80s, at which time he began to expand the audience for his distinctive blues/funk/R&B amalgam even further.