Chess Records

Chess Records is the sound of South Side Chicago turned all the way up — a label run by two immigrant brothers from Maxwell Street who taught the rest of the world how to play the blues. Founded in 1950 at 2120 S. Michigan Avenue, this is the room where Muddy Waters plugged in, Howlin' Wolf roared through the control booth, and Chuck Berry walked in a truck driver in '55 and walked out with "Maybellene" — the record that taught rock and roll how to move. Willie Dixon wrote the songbook. Etta James broke your heart. Bo Diddley invented a beat that refuses to die. Little Walter bent a harmonica into something nobody had ever heard. In 1964 the Rolling Stones made the pilgrimage to 2120 and recorded on the same floorboards — an address so sacred they named an instrumental after it. From 1950 until the doors closed in 1975, a small Chicago label exported the blueprint for modern popular music. A piece of the South Side for the wall — understated enough for any room, specific enough to mean something to anyone who knows.