Not sure if they have been mentioned- not enough time for me to read whole thread- but check out Gov’t Mule. Their live albums contain many blues standards and classics. Great band with a long blues tradition. With some edge.
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The blues, and where to begin?
- Thread starter Bright Midnight
- Start date
A. It's not about songs or specific recordings, it's about specific performers. One recording of "Smokestack Lightning" by Howling Wolf won't get you understand why Sam Phillips of Sun Records said of Wolf that "this is where the very soul of man begins" and that bringing Wolf's music to the world was his most important contribution. That's coming from the man who brought the music of Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, et.al. to the world.
B. My journey to the blues came from Cream. Hearing "Crossroads" made me want to play that guitar sound. That lead me to the Allman Bros. (Duane et. al.) Clapton, Allman, and the Stones, etc. were always open about the sources. That lead me to BB King, Freddie King, Robert Lockwood, Jr., and I got the first Robert Johnson album. That was something I did not understand. Going through Wolf's catalog and hearing how that (and Muddy and others) linked forward to Butterfield, and Mayall, etc. and on to Hendrix et. al. led me to also chase that trail back from Wolf to Johnson. For me, Wolf was the key that tied it all together.
C. None of this is specifically about bass. It's music. Playing appropriately for THIS gig is a common task no matter the genre. And again it is NOT about any specific recording. It is this singer, this drummer, this (or these) guitar players, etc. It shouldn't be a regurgitation of a performance as a stagnant museum artifact. It's music from the heart and soul, as well as the mind.
B. My journey to the blues came from Cream. Hearing "Crossroads" made me want to play that guitar sound. That lead me to the Allman Bros. (Duane et. al.) Clapton, Allman, and the Stones, etc. were always open about the sources. That lead me to BB King, Freddie King, Robert Lockwood, Jr., and I got the first Robert Johnson album. That was something I did not understand. Going through Wolf's catalog and hearing how that (and Muddy and others) linked forward to Butterfield, and Mayall, etc. and on to Hendrix et. al. led me to also chase that trail back from Wolf to Johnson. For me, Wolf was the key that tied it all together.
C. None of this is specifically about bass. It's music. Playing appropriately for THIS gig is a common task no matter the genre. And again it is NOT about any specific recording. It is this singer, this drummer, this (or these) guitar players, etc. It shouldn't be a regurgitation of a performance as a stagnant museum artifact. It's music from the heart and soul, as well as the mind.
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not sure if he's been mentioned...tread is TL;DR all...
Add Roy Buchanan to the list
Add Roy Buchanan to the list
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There's a ton of suggestions in this thread of where you should start with exhaustive lists. As you've found, if you go straight to Robert Johnson, listening can feel more like homework than enjoyment. So I take a different approach.
Go listen to the Yardbirds, early Beatles and Rolling Stones, John Mayall, and the records where Dylan goes electric. This will peel back a layer of rock and give you a better idea of why the original blues masters came into the white mainstream in the late 60s and 70s. The recordings are better and you'll find you know the main players. Once you find your favorites there, the original recordings can be more palatable.
"The Blues Brothers", as we've seen even in this thread, are a bit divisive in blues circles - hugely popular white guys, neither of whom has a lot of talent for singing (and don't really play, either) aping music of black originators who were generally given short shrift by their native country. I enjoyed the movie when it came out, for what it was - a funny comedy which featured some good performances by some blues icons. Akroyd and Belushi are/were very talented comedians, and they knew how to stage a show, putting together a band of talented players. Made boatloads of money from recordings and tours spinning off from the movie. Its popularity did bring greater exposure for the genre, which is a positive aspect.
But imo it's not the best blueprint for really learning about blues music, as I've described. "Sweet Home Chicago" is just great in Magic Sam's iconic version, no need to go to a watered down version.
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This is the problem with the blues today, in a nutshell. Nobody really knows what it is.
Depending on what you've been exposed to, when and where you grew up, the word "blues" conjures up a lot of different things. The approach taken can be wildly different, too.
I play in one blues band and one "blues" band. Ironically, the band that is closer in spirit to what I feel the blues is also includes a lot of weird covers that aren't particularly bluesy, but we give them a bluesier feel. The band that is "blues" with the quotes does mainly traditional blues tunes, but the bandleader would rather hear the players just parroting back learned licks and arrangements from records rather than playing by feel.
The band I consider closer to real blues I define that way because we're always flying by the seat of our pants, playing whatever we want and listening to each other to create a musical experience that we enjoy creating and that others enjoy listening to. The level of musicianship is very high and the shows are pretty unscripted. We are playing music in every sense.
There is a lot of second-hand blues out there. Some of the people mentioned in this thread are blues-borrowers, rockers that borrowed blues motifs and used them to create their own music. Some are the real deal. You can go online and find study guides and academic courses that will give you some of the actual history of the blues if you want to have a better idea of how those pieces fit together. In fact, I got intrigued by this whole discussion and I just signed on for one of them. Since I play this music and I'm late to the game, maybe it'd be helpful to know more about it.
I think you can dive in anywhere but it helps to know where you are in the pool as you're diving, because ultimately you're going to want to know more. What you don't want to become is the bandleader for the band that plays "blues" using a detailed script; that flies against the spirit of this music. You want to recognize that blues is an open-ended form and approaching it as a player that way will be very helpful.
The blues is raw emotion put to music. I was once asked by a musician “How can I learn to play the blues?” I was a bit dumbfounded by the question. The music isn’t hard. Exposing your pain for all to see and hear is the hard part. Flattened thirds and sevenths, the simple 8, 12 or 16 bar forms are characteristics but the heart of the music is all in the depth and sincerity of the feelings expressed. You have to understand that the music came out of deep pain and misery. If you aren’t prepared to moan and really mean it, it’s not the blues.
I heard a story about Eddie Van Halen who visited Eric Clapton for a jam. Eric asked what did he want to play. Eddie said let’s do a blues in A. Eric’s response was, “Which blues?”
Eddie was about to learn that the blues is not as generic as he thought. The songs stand alone as stories of life experiences and expression of emotions engendered by them. It’s not about going through the motions.
At the same time, "Blues in A" would give me a road map for what was coming up. Specifics can vary from song to song in terms of tempo, rhythm, stops, turnarounds, feel, whatever, but "blues" describes a basic form which musicians may be expected to understand, in addition to describing a genre or historical body of work. So, I understand Clapton's query there ... but I also understand Eddie's basic meaning (not that he's a blues player, not his forte).
I'm also not taking any blues lessons from Eric Clapton.
At the same time, "Blues in A" would give me a road map for what was coming up. Specifics can vary from song to song in terms of tempo, rhythm, stops, turnarounds, feel, whatever, but "blues" describes a basic form which musicians may be expected to understand, in addition to describing a genre or historical body of work. So, I understand Clapton's query there ... but I also understand Eddie's basic meaning (not that he's a blues player, not his forte).
I get what you mean. Though I have always liked his version of Freddie King's "Hideaway" since hearing it when It came out. And I like lots of his rock/pop music. He's got lots of skill, but I'd look more to Freddie King and the rest for blues inspiration or education.
I feel like adding, I haven't seen a lot mentioned on T Bone Walker, though I may have missed a few posts. Anyway, he's at the very foundation of electric blues (and electric guitar, really). A contemporary of Charlie Christian, with whom he actually played a duo act, with T Bone dancing and singing in addition to playing - that was a mighty fertile town I guess! He was a major influence on BB King, and pretty much everyone, really. His "T Bone Shuffle" is a blues classic:
Clapton is a blues-appropriation expert and he rose to fame doing that. I'm sure he and many others of the British Invasion era felt like they were bringing an unappreciated art form into the public eye, and perhaps they were, but he wasn't an originator in the form and I'd rather look to the people he drew inspiration from instead of the second-generation that watered it down for the masses. Hearing about Clapton teaching SRV* is a bit like hearing someone at Burger King teaching someone at McDonald's how to cook a hamburger.
I get what you mean. Though I have always liked his version of Freddie King's "Hideaway" since hearing it when It came out. And I like lots of his rock/pop music. He's got lots of skill, but I'd look more to Freddie King and the rest for blues inspiration or education.
*I actually have a lot more respect for SRV than this would suggest, but I was struggling to find a better analogy.
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Texas has its own authentic blues traditions and I wouldn't take anything away from people like SRV or Johnny Winter, for that matter. It was a crappy analogy but I guess you got the pointI'm glad you added the postscript for SRV.
Check out the dedication on the Blues Brothers record.
The story is Curtis Salgado planted the seeds while Belushi was filming Animal House in Eugene and Portland.
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Check out Curtis. He’s a real deal blues man.
