The blues, and where to begin?

[DaveParker39]

The album "Born Under a Bad Sign" by Albert King is as good a place to start as any.
Albert Collins' live recordings of the late 80's are electrifying.
If you want to go back a little further into transitional (between acoustic/electric) blues, Jimmy Reed and Lightnin' Hopkins are also compelling.
Just about any BB King will be an enjoyable listen, I am partial to his 70's live albums.

 

[Paul New]

Another BB live.

 

[Skip Chucker]

Aside from the fact that so much talent(who, at that time, where overlooked or forgotten about)got some exposure, that film is a demeaning, patronizing fraud. Plus, there’s precious little actual straight ahead blues in it.

 

[Paul New]

Magic Slim played the quintessential stripped-down west side blues. His mentor was Magic Sam. He recorded and gigged for 40 years!

 

[Paul New]

 

[Paul New]

 

[Jason Sypher]

I moved to New Orleans in 91 to learn how to play “real bass”. I wanted to learn the fundamentals and trace back the bass to its roots and start from the ground up. It was the only place I could think of where that was still possible. One of the first things I learned was that I didn’t know poopie about the blues. My first recording session was with Little Freddie King for an album that ended up being called Swamp Blues. Freddie just started playing and I had to follow. He played whatever he wanted and phrased in ways that did not conform to patterns or set changes. Track after track I got my ass handed to me. I was sweating bullets. I had to immediately abandon the patterns I had learned and follow the STORY. It was life changing. I was fairly consumed with the blues for my first couple of years there. The one recording that taught me the most was Big Joe Williams Talkin Blues. That was the closest thing to what I was encountering on a day to day basis. A conversation, not patterns. Those early Muddy records, Can’t Be Satisfied etc also taught me a lot about navigating through changes that can float, beats that can get flipped, stories that need to be told. The blues is one of the most deceptive musics I’ve ever come across, that and Hungarian/Romanian music. They are so vast and variable. You have to learn how to swim in them, possess them, inhabit them. Many will attempt it and many will fail.

 

[Fat Fret]

Don’t forget the ladies; Bessie Smith was one of the first to record what was considered blues, but it won’t sound like Chicago style, it had more to do with the post-Dixieland jazz of the time, and Memphis Minnie was so much more than the person who got plundered for “When The Levee Breaks”. Sister Rosetta Tharp was a force of nature, on vocals and guitar, and came from gospel roots. Never let anyone tell you the blues is boring, they usually din’t know what they’re talking about.

Never ever forget the ladies!

 

[BazzaBass]

Hey guys,

I've been swallowing music in much any type or form since I was a toddler, now I'm almost 44....yet for some unknown reason I never got around to the world of blues. Strange. I know Zeppelin, The Doors etc were heavily influenced by blues, and I've had a Robert Johnson album, John Lee Hooker, etc....but I never gave them much time.

What would be a good starting point to really get to know blues a genre? Any artists, bands you could recommend?

Open up Chordify and go to this YouTube video


You will have a wonderful time

 

[Laurent]

If you want to learn how to play the blue on bass, there is one seminal book and that's Ed Friedland's:

 

[juancaminos]

The Blues players have been posted. Once you get into it you will run into guitar players who say they are playing blues but in reality it's just fuzzed out rock. I am in a situation like that now. I sing Help Me, Rack Em Up, and a few Fabulous Thunderbirds and SRV songs. But the guys I'm with now, although strong rock and country players, just can't do the blues stuff. So be aware learning proper blues will ruin ya!

 

[JimmyM]

Blues bass is easy, but it’s hard, too. There have been times I think I’m crushing it only to have the true blues players (I’m a fan but never played in a straight up blues band till 3 years ago) tell me I’m dragging the faster tunes by playing on the beat when they want me ahead of it. They don’t want it to rush, but they want you to push the beat a little. And playing the same riff over and over can lull you into a false sense of security, and then BAM!

 

[MichelD]

Open up Chordify and go to this YouTube video


You will have a wonderful time

That is amazing!

 

[jamro217]

The obvious answer is to trip over your dead dog on the way out of your burning house and then bumping into your boss (the sheriff) on the porch who is having an affair with your wife to tell you that your house and drummer aren't the only things fired. And that's all before lunchtime.

Or you could do it the easy way and get to know the differences between Chicago Blues and Delta Blues and Memphis Blues and Kansas City Blues and The St. Louis Blues (not the hockey team). Figure out which style you like and listen to the bass patterns on the recordings. I DO NOT suggest listening to British Invasion bands who played the blues (and popularized that style to young kids in the USA) because they have their own British accent, musically speaking, that colors the original slightly. Go to old 78 rpm records on YouTube and listen to the original versions. Hope this helps.

 

[antfarm]

I really enjoy playing along to this session. The bass playing (Gus Thornton) is rock solid, simple classic lines. A great tool to learn the form with fills, turnarounds and endings. The two guitar players aren’t too bad either.



EDIT: I wrote this when I was still reading page 2 of the thread. Just saw @BazzaBass post.

 

[Kipp Harrington]

You'll probably get a variation of responses as to what is the blues - it really is a very broad subject.

@brianrost 's list is a great start for the blues roots.

For me, the traditional style of blues gets old pretty quick to play or listen to. I personally enjoy what I call "power blues". I can get pretty fired up with that style. Yes, much of this material is covers of the names listed above - they just present the music in a style that is more energetic. Here's a list of some of the artists I consider power blues:
Cream
Hendrix
Robyn Trower
Pat Traverse
Frank Marino
Gary More
SRV
Joe Bonamassa

There are many more - many 70s R&R bands were essentially power blues. But this is also a pretty deep rabbit hole of material.

Great post and I'm with ya with all those artists!

 

[Bright Midnight]

It might, but for blues? Falstaff, Busch, Schlitz, or if you're in Texas, Pearl.

Well, seeing that I'm from Belgium, I'm gonna stick to the blonde triples we have here, though they tend to get heavy after two or three

 

[Durham52]

So you've had most of the jokes about how simple the blues is and how it's all about some guy loosing his woman etc. but that's all BS and anyone who tells you any of that stuff with a strait face isn't worth listening to. They generaly say the same sort of things about country, rock, pop, reggae and anything else they regard as low brow.

Like any other form of music when played badly, or without understanding and feeling, it can be anemic, boring and unimaginative. But played well, by people who know it and feel it, it's as powerful and as challenging as anything else.

I got into the blues (and really heard a bass guitar for the first time) after hearing The Animals recording of House of the Rising Sun, that led me to discover Alexis Corner, then the blues players he studied. The 3 Kings, the early acoustic stuff, Blind Lemon, Robert Johnson and the rest, through Lightning Hopkins, Albert Collins, Hound Dog Taylor, Buddy Guy (still alive and playing, check him out) and all the other electric blues players. Don't disregard the people who came after them, carried the torch and added to the cannon, Bloomfield, Green, Winter, Cray, Hendrix and so on up to the modern day.

Blues doesn't have to be some frozen in amber endless tribute to the early days, it's grown into something as broad and varied as any of musical genera.

And just because he's a damn legend, here's a bit of Buddy Guy, feeling it. (And not one mention of his woman done doing him wrong in it...)

 

[swink]

What would be a good starting point

Getting up in the morning or waiting for your baby to leave you already helps you 80% on your way to the Blues.

 

[swink]

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