Name me an album by Captain Beefheart.
I bet your answer is “Trout Mask Replica”.
But, if you fancy getting into the Captain don’t start there. You’ll find it incompressible, difficult and a bloody racket. It does have it’s moments but there is a lot of unlistenable stuff on there. Don’t get me wrong, it is an album I enjoy but it is a perverse thing.
No, start with the first Magic Band album Safe As Milk. It’s a freaky delta blues album and there’s plenty of good stuff on it like this.
Categories: 1968 · blues · delta blues · freak
Tagged: blues, captain beefheart, delta, freak, magic band, safe as milk, sure 'nuff i do, trout mask replica
One of the workshops I attended at the BMG Rally was a Blues workshop with a great teacher, Mark Willetts. The class was full of mandolins which is not usually a blues instrument. I decided to leave mine in it’s case and got the guitar out instead. The class then took the standard 12 bar blues form building up various parts in a Chicago Blues style. After explaining the minor pentatonic scale we were then encouraged to improvise over the top. The workshop leader then asked who’d had a go and from a class of about 30, I was one of 3 who hesitantly put their hand up. He then told us that in the next run through everybody was to play quietly whilst the three of us took a solo in turn. I’ve never improvised or played a guitar solo before so it was a bit daunting, but when my moment came, I managed something that didn’t sound too bad and was actually a lot of fun. I got quite a buzz out of it and had another go on the next run through. Got me wanting to play my semi-acoustic again.
So today’s selection is from the suggested listening, The London Howlin’ Wolf Sessions, which featured Howlin’ Wolf playing alongside people he inspired such as Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman.
Categories: 1971 · blues
Tagged: BMG rally, Howlin' Wolf, Rockin' Daddy, London Sessions, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Charlie Watts, Bill Wyman, blues
A talkin blues from Bob here. You’ll have to go over to his site to hear it providing you can get the player or real audio to work over there. Hit play top left. You’ll find the words there too. As this is a talking blues, it’s very much about the words with Dylan being in a dark and witty mood on this tale of a picnic gone wrong with lives lost on a sinking boat. Be warned though if you’re expecting bears you will be disappointed.
Categories: 1961 · Folk · blues
Tagged: Bob Dylan, Talkin' Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues, talking blues
At the moment I’m reading a brilliant book I got for Christmas called I Shot A Man In Reno: A History of Death by Murder, Suicide, Fire, Flood, Drugs, Diseaseand General Misadventure As Related in Popular Song by Graeme Johnson. It’s a great title. It’s a book (well duh!) that provides great reading opened at any page at random but is best enjoyed all the way through.
It’s prompting a lot of delving through the record collection. For starters I turned up Stack O’Lee Blues, also known as Stagger Lee. I’ve chosen the Mississippi John Hurt version, although I could have gone for one of countless other options including Woody Guthrie’s Stackolee, Nick Cave and Bad Seeds’ Stagger Lee from the Murder Ballads album and Stackalee by Frank Hutchinson from Harry Smith’s wonderful Anthology of American Folk Music boxset on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.
The sleevenotes in the Smithsonian boxset gives background to the tale,
“Theft of stetson hat causes deadly dispute, victim identifies self as family man.
The murder mentioned here probably took place in Memphis in about 1900. Stack Lee seems to have been connected by birth or employment with the Lee family of that city who owned a large line of steamers on the Mississippi”
I’ve also just discovered two more versions in my collection. Wrong Em Boyo by The Clash, a cover of a Ska song on London Calling is based on the tale as is Stack Shot Billy by the Black Keys. I’ve spent a bit of time listening to the various versions of this song that I have.
Categories: 1928 · blues
Tagged: Mississippi John Hurt, Stack O'Lee Blues
Today I am mostly listening to…. (last.fm stream)
