LIVING BLUES - JULY/AUGUST 1998 JOHNNY WINTER - LIVE IN NYC '97 By PJ Klemp When Eric Clapton, another blues/rock icon whose career took off in the '60's, revisited his blues lineage on Journeyman, the emphasis was on his return to the genre. Johnny Winter never left. Thouigh he has been a blues loyalist for a third of a century, rarely has he treated listeners to such an indepth guided tour of his roots. With his credentials as a Texas blues guitar slinger firmly established, Winter heads off into territory populated by his heroes. Not many musicians can handle the combination of chunky funkiness and agile lyricism thet characterizes Freddy King's style, but Winter pulls it off. Winter marries King's stlye with the rhythms of Muddy Waters' Chicago sound. The effect is both jarring and thrilling.But this album, like dozens of others Winter has recorded, is most powerful when it testifies to his lifelong commitment to the blues.