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Sunday 27 February 2011

The Music That Made Me A Man

Ok, so here it is, my first official blog, and as you can probably tell it's an indulgence (aren't all blogs?!) into the music that has shaped me into the adult that I am today.

Firstly, let me start out by saying that I have never had a particular interest in blogs or for that matter, Twitter (I have signed up at an account - user: andyek81 to further publicise this blog). However, music has featured prominently throughout my life and in recent times I have begun learning more about the history rather than just the theory and playing of this medium. In particular, the blues. I love it. It's seeds were planted from an early age, but probably took some time to come to fruition.


Tomes can be wrote on any and all references I have to music from my childhood, but I'll start from my first active interest in music (which doesn't include the Jason Donavon 45s my sister bought me one birthday). I am proud to announce that my first music purchase was The Beach Boys: 20 Golden Greats. This was purely by fortune and not design, but looking back to those early days of NOW! albums and Jason Donavon, I am glad to see my hard earned pocket money went on a credible band with some integrity.

Fast Forward a few years, bringing me to the arse end of my teenage years and the beginning of the Britpop years. I was unfortunate to not be old enough to recognise and appreciate the music of The Stone Roses et al (although later I would) when it was current, but I was fortunate that my sister had bought Definitely Maybe after seeing Shakermaker on top of the pops. This later enabled me a seat at the table of the musical aristocracy in my school, where knowing of Oasis before they came so big was a sign of ones' authority on music and granted you an 'in' or at least not a chastising 'out' of the cool gangs.

The natural evolution, which would become a hallmark of my musical fascination and taste would be to delve into the influences of my favourite bands.

Although technically not an inspiration, the aforementioned Stone Roses carved the niche that Oasis later went to exploit. Were it not for a legal battle with Silvertone and the subsequent 5 year gap between album releases, one can only imagine how insignificant Oasis may have been and how much more massive Stone Roses would have been. Anyway, I digress. The Stone Roses kickstarted two things for me: my love for both the guitar and for blues.

Granted, I had learnt loosely how to play the guitar when I was at school aged 15, it took a girl (as is always the case) and The Stone Roses to get me spending my maintenance grant on a guitar and embark upon the neverending quest to become kinda good at it.

 Tightrope 

This, and (I suppose) Live Forever really got my ear into acoustic music. This has never changed, I can't explain my love for acoustic guitar, I just absolutely love it. I always used to think that with acoustic you don't need anything else, no amp, no effects, you could just pick up a guitar and perform your song. There's no hiding with it

Anyway, so I was getting into this sort of music, trying to impress the girls and so naturally bought a guitar and tried to play. Fortunately, my mum heard my efforts and booked me guitar tuition which I kept up for a year and a half or so.

I carried along on a similar path of Britpop/ Indie for sometime, loving the heavy guitar style of John Squire on Second Coming album. The more I read about him, the more names like Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix and Bob Dylan started being bandied about. I'd heard of these people of course, and knew of some of their music but had never really spent any time really listening to them. This was the moment when my musical choices started to become a whole lot more idiosyncratic, and my tastes truly my own.

I'd listened to Jimi years before on a tape I'd borrowed from Stockport library (Live at Woodstock) and have to admit, I liked it, but didn't really get it. Upon repeat listening however, the rather obvious

Voodoo Chile (Slight Return)

I changed. Gone was my liking for jangly bands like Supergrass, James and The Inspiral Carpets and I delved into a world where guitar was king. I became a snob. I stopped going to gigs with my friends/family because it wasn't the music I liked, and in my eyes the music I used to listen to was inferior and technically deficient to the music I was now into.

It wasn't just guitar mastery, however, that shaped my musical world at this point. Lyrical mastery in the form of Bob Dylan (note: acoustic guitar) had me transformed, and probably shaped my musical tastes more than the likes of Jimi Hendrix and Led Zep. As Bob brought about the love of a man and acoustic guitar, which is still may favourite form of musical expression. Among many of the many songs of Dylan I could select as an example for this blog, I'll go with the first that I found profound (and misunderstood til some time later):




It Ain't Me Babe

This is the only version containing Dylan I can find on youtube, you get the idea and know the song anyway.

As I said, this opened a world of options. After I had worn out listening to all of his early acoustic years (I'm not a snob about his electric playing, I just didn't like much of what he did after Highway 61, I have openly expressed my love for acoustic!) and asked a dear friend of mine (who had some years on me and knew a whole lot more about music than I did) to recommend some acoustic singer/songwriters similar to Bob Dylan I may like, and to my memory he mentioned three: Nick Drake, John Martyn and Bert Jansch. I consulted my "Great Rock Discography" for their respective best albums and quickly rushed up to Vinyl Exchange in town and bought an album of each.

Now, Nick Drake usually runs away with all the critics and plaudits, however, as much as I could appreciate his ability, there was just something missing for me. I couldn't connect with him. I think I've since learned it's the folkiness - the same thing which prevents me from really connecting with Bert Jansch. John Martyn however, he had something different, something that pulled at me and started a love affair for the mans music (again, acoustic years only)

I Don't Want To Know

This is the song, that of all I've mentioned thus far, and probably subsequently, gets me. It has exactly what I'm looking for. I don't know what it is. The musky jazz flavour? The tinge of blues? The heartfelt sentimentality without being soppy? I don't know. All of them, but not one (nor all) descriptions do it justice. It sounds pompous to say, but its transcendental music, the whole is so much more than the sum of its parts.

This of course brought me more into the world of jazz and blues. Upon reading more of John Martyn and seeing that a major influence was Davy Graham, I considered buying an album of his off Amazon. This was still the days before spotify, youtube and even broadband so it was a risk I didn't take. I wish I had because years later I've found that Davy Graham is awesome, and would have definitely influenced my playing a lot earlier than it since has done.

I was still hungry for music and at this time again trotted off to Vinyl Exchange and bought a compilation of Led Zep. Wow. The obvious one had me hooked first off (mainly due to the acoustic guitar)

Stairway To Heaven

Again, the obvious choice, but when you first start listening to a band, they're the ones that get you. This started a love affair, and a regret that like Davy Graham, I hadn't listened to them from an earlier age (after learning of their influence on John Squire). I tried to remedy this at this point and look into their influences. The Blues.

This of course, I found was shared by all of my then favourite artists. I looked into it and one name stood out above all else Robert Johnson. Now I have to be honest. I went to Our Price in town and bought an album (the third or fourth record shop I'd been to). I got it home and it cackled and I was frankly finding it hard work to listen to.

The authentic original blues was put on the back shelf for a while.

A chance encounter was to revitalise my love for the blues. I was aware of a rerun of some old Old Grey Whistle tests for their 30th anniversary and John Martyn was on. Again, this was prior to youtube and the like and you never got to see artists I liked from their prime and so the video was set and I eagerly watched and saw John Martyn perform I'd Rather Be The Devil. With my thumb on the stop button, Bob Marley came on and I thought, I'll keep this on record (with a girl whom it may impress in mind) and so left it running. For some reason on the saturday morning I put it on and watched all the other acts on that programme. It wasn't something I generally did, but I just tried it. I then saw a performance which had my hair stand on end, got me out of bed, found the album that song was on and jumped on a bus to town to buy it

Vigilante Man

Ry Cooder. This performance I still hold up as the "If I could be anywhere near that good". I really wish I was, this blew my mind and still does. It's perfect. Again, the blues was rearing it's head and calling to me. This time however, I eased myself in with some compilation CDs from my library. The first one I remember truly being taken aback with was



The Love Blues

Unfortunately I couldn't find the Keb Mo' version I was after, but the guitaring is present in this version, if not the voice. But again, I was hearing what was capable with just a guitar and voice and loving it.

Whilst working through Ry Cooder's back catalogue, I obviously came to the early band he was in and another mainstay of my collection. Taj Mahal.

 Chevrolet

A great song, unfortunately I was unable to find his version of Frankie and Albert which have perfectly led me to my next foray back into the 'traditional' blues man. I loved Taj Mahal's laid back style and unique voice, a name came up quite a bit whilst reading about Taj Mahal and his influences. Mississippi John Hurt.


You've Got To Walk That Lonesome Road

His playing was the biggest influence on my own for many a year. I bought books from the Stefan Grossman series and have been "Boom Chicking" away for many a year since. This reopened the door to the traditional blues I had subconsciously closed since listening to the crackly Robert Johnson recordings a few years previous.

I now sought out similar artists, and a lot of the blues revival artists were very accessible due to the rerecordings of their works during the 60s. The major one was perhaps a lot of peoples' favourite Lightnin Hopkins.


Baby Please Don't Go 

Again, another example of what can be achieved with the acoustic guitar whilst staying pretty much within major chords, yet played to sound like 3 or 4 parts.

The traditional blues doors swung open. I no longer minded the crackly Robert Johnson CD and instead listened intently to his playing and words. I have listened to all the major traditional players from Son House, Charlie Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson Sonny Boy Williamson (1 & 2), Brownie Mcghee (another whose playing I find a cut above most), Tommy Johnson and all the rest you'll find in any decent blues history book.

It was coming across a Ry Cooder influence which took me away from the Delta/Country blues divide and that was a piedmont guitarist Josh White


Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out

What I loved most about this, and the same applies to Ry Cooder, is where it takes the blues. It adds jazz and a more complex song structure and lyrics (the jazz influence no doubt). I wondered if the fact that Josh White pandered to white audiences by making his blues more 'folk' would dilute his blues. And then pondered upon this ponderence. Do I believe that authentic blues has to be black, or more accurately written by black people for black people? Son House certainly thinks so. I'm not so sure, I think it just does add authenticity whether we like it or not. In it's perception anyhow. And it's not just colour related, I believe the most authentic blues is from the original 1930 recorders and any from the time of plantations. That's not to say that other blues isn't as authentic, just that any blues from anybody of that time and place automatically gets perceived as such (and rightly so).


From delving so deep into the roots of the blues, and where I'm still working through back catalogues of the original blues guys (I've not nearly listened enough to the artists I listed above). But it's so hard, love it or not, there is more modern blues which is so much easier to listen to. I've just had some John Hammond Jr on and I do find that easier to listen to than say Charlie Patton. I find myself wondering why it matters, but I'm a completist, I want to understand it in its purest form and work my way up. I want to listen to John Hammond and hear the licks he's taken off a certain player, or if he's playing in a certain players style, or singing his signature song. Why? Because I love it and why, I suppose, does anybody study history? Maybe it's also so I can feel like I can look down on those who haven't found the beauty of the blues, and due to its recent popularity again, to feel like I once did about Oasis and know that I was there before it became popular again. This may seem very shallow, but it was and is my passion when nobody I knew was into it. Like any love, it's difficult to share.

That said, anybody who has come to love the blues and have a vested interest in it I love to discuss music with. I'm all too aware of its increasing popularity and the recent albums of Tom Jones and Cyndi Lauper attest to that.

Here's hoping for an increased popularity of blues so long as authentically good musicians get the opportunity to ply their trade. One such being (one man band) Ben Prestage

 Step It Up

Not in his usual one man band there, but it's plain to see how good he is.

Another bluesman who deserves special note is Chris Smither. The closest bluesman to Bob Dylan I've found. Lyrically brilliant, and here's his humourous


Origin Of The Species

And I'll leave it there on that note, there have been many omissions in this blog. Chief of which being Tom Waits. He's a blog in his own right and maybe the source of one in future.

I wouldn't feel right without also expressing a huge love also for Howlin' Wolf.

Good night, and I hope you've enjoyed reading (those who've made it this far).

Please feel free to contact me, follow or comment on this blog. Any feedback is much appreciated.