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What brought me to Blues music? How did I discover it? What was my route? Well, it might actually have been Route 66. That's the song, not the road. As a teenager in the 1960s, I liked the music (and the controversial image) of the Rolling Stones. Maybe I liked them because my elder sister liked the Beatles. So often musical heroes are the subject of sibling debate and to the record companies, this is grist to their ching. Beatles or Stones? Oasis or Blur? JLS or One Direction? We've all grown up championing the causes of our icons. Who was better? - Muddy Waters or Howlin' Wolf? There was an intense rivalry between these two Chess Records artists. It's said that if Howlin' was luke-warm about performing one of Willie Dixon's new compositions, Willie would say 'Muddy's keen to do it' and that would lead to an enthusiasm on Wolf's part to record the song to have an advantage on his stable-mate. The same was, apparently, true of Muddy who would delight in recording something he was told that Howlin' Wolf was keen to perform. When I first heard Route 66 on an early Stones album, I thought it sounded fantastic. I had no idea that it had been recorded earlier by several artists and my ignorance continued as I admired the songs which they played with what I now know as the 'Bo Diddley beat.' I saw the Rolling Stones twice in Cardiff's Capitol Theatre touring alongside the likes of Ike & Tina Turner, The Yardbirds, the Spencer Davis Group and even Long John Baldry who I was privileged to interview forty years later. Each of these artists was at the time delving into the back catalogues of American Blues performers and putting their own stamp upon the music. I was oblivious to this. I liked what I heard and accepted the music as new and hot off the press. I didn't know that there was a British Blues Invasion taking place. I was a young teenager to whom music was very important if it sounded good and was performed by my chosen heroes.
Towards the tail end of the 1960's, my tastes evolved into liking Led Zeppelin - not realising that they were dipping into the same well-travelled musical pool - and I then had a 25 year love affair with the music of David Bowie who just pushed boundaries in every sense for such a long time. If you haven't heard it yet you can listen to my programme 'Me & David Bowie' on Mixcloud. Here's the link:- https://www.mixcloud.com/bob-williams4/me-david-bowie-a-personal-history/?play=fb&fb_action_ids=10153915264464283&fb_action_types=mixcloud%3Aupload Reaching my middle years, I became aware that Blues music, as performed by the old Delta guys and the Chicago guys, had been reinterpreted under my nose and (belatedly) followed the historic journey taken by so many performers in the 1960s and beyond. It was, and still is, a total revelation to realise how simple songs performed by solo artists on their backyard stoops could become stadium rockers. I'm still learning. How did your interest in Blues music form? What was your route?
3 Comments
Graham Stark
2/22/2016 02:11:26 am
What brought me to the blues - short version.
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Graham Stark
2/22/2016 02:27:41 am
Following on from how I got into the blues, other similar stories are "I know that I should like jazz but I just don't get it", "Classical music - the new Led Zeppelin" and "How I nearly had a heart attack at Sun".
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Bob Davidson
2/25/2016 08:20:56 am
I think I've followed pretty much the same road into the blues as Bob and Graham. Probably because we became musically "aware" in the same period. I was pleased to see Graham's mention of Mike Raven - I remember listening to him on Sunday afternoons too. He also came to give a talk/lecture at my school around 1968 - a great guy. I would add John Mayall as an influence as far as British blues are concerned - as an introduction to the music of JB Lenoir, and as a catalyst in terms of launching the careers of more than a few British musicians in the late 60s/early 70s.
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