In the 1980s and 90s, the eldest son of Muddy Waters was not in a recording studio or backstage at a sold-out theater. He was driving an 18-wheeler. Larry Morganfield, known as Mud Morganfield, was born in Chicago on September 27, 1954, to Mildred Williams and McKinley Morganfield, and was raised primarily by his mother and seven uncles while his father toured the world. This episode examines a late-blooming career that defies every assumption about musical royalty.

The conversation covers his tough Chicago upbringing, his years as a commercial truck driver, and the recurring dreams of his father performing on stage that followed Muddy Waters’ death in 1983 and eventually pushed him toward music. It then follows his start in South Side clubs, the double-edged sword of a voice that sounds uncannily like his father’s, and a discography that includes Fall Waters Fall (2008), Son of the Seventh Son (2012), They Call Me Mud (2018), Portrait (2022), and a planned 2025 release called Deep Mud.

• Why Mud credits the harsh streets of Chicago, not his famous last name, for forging his character
• How a legendary parent’s shadow functions as a ceiling while they are alive and becomes a foundation after they are gone
• The tightrope between being dismissed as a tribute act and being rejected for ignoring his father’s songs, and how he balanced originals with classics
• His 2015 Blues Music Award for traditional blues album with For Pops, a Muddy Waters tribute recorded with Kim Wilson
• His half-brother Big Bill Morganfield’s separate path, and what Mud’s story says about finding a calling later in life