I've got the blues
 

No, this is not about last night's game. This is about the music.

I had never really had a lot of exposure to blues music (The Kirk Brown Band aside), so several months back I was browsing through cd box sets and came across one entitled Martin Scorsese Presents The Blues, based on a series he did for PBS (some of you are probably familiar with it, I wasn't). I decided to pick up and explore the genre. One of the best music investments I have ever made. I don't know how many different artists, and 80 years of music history. It was really neat to listen to the 5 discs back to back to hear the music evolve.

Since that time I have purchased three albums of different artists (Albert King, Jimi Hendrix, and B.B. King) and have delved some into the history of the music, as well as the subtleties of the different "classes" of the music (I don't have a preference, I enjoy all of them).

I know with as many people that are on this board, there has to be a few blues afficianados around. Any suggestions for someone who is realitevly new to the genre? I have a list of artists that I want to further check out, but I would like further suggestions.

Did you just eat some Craft Mac and Cheese?

If you take my advice and check out One Foot In The Blues you're going to understand why ZZ Top is my favorite band.


Link for One Foot In The Blues


If you'd like I'll be more than glad to burn you a cd of some of my favorite tracks(always happy to get a new convert)just smoke me your addy and I'll get one to you.

You can Google most of these.
Relatively new:
Tommy Castro Band
BB Chung King & Buddaheads
Johnny Lang
Robben Ford & the Blue Line

Contemporary Blues:
Jimmy Vaughan
Eric Clapton (of course)
Roy Rogers
Johnny Winter
Robert Cray
Nighthawks
Albert King
Otis Rush

Anybody on the Alligator Records Label

Classic Blues Statesmen:
Muddy Waters
John Lee Hooker
Robert Johnson
BB King
Houndog Taylor
Elmore James
Pinetop Perkins
Leadbelly
Howlin Wolf
Buddy Guy and Junior Wells

Check these guys out, and you're on your way.

What I would do is find the artists that you really like and find out who influenced them. That's how I started building my collection. Circuit City's website has a nice feature where you can look up an artist and then find related artists. Here's a sample link (I hope it works) Link

I would also encourage you to seek out live music whenever you can. In particular I would focus on small clubs and festivals as that is where you get the best bang for you buck. The best festival I've been to is the King Biscuit Blues Festival. It's the first Thursday-Saturday of October and the event is free. Essentially you can listen to 36 hours of blues very cheap, particularly if you like to camp.

One final thought...I would not start with the old,old stuff. To the unaccustomed ear it may be difficult to fully appreciate. I generally recommend that you start with someone contemporary and work your way back in time. The music may take on additinal meaning to you once you comprehend the influence that the old blues guys had on today's sound.

If you like Jimi Hendrix blues riffs, check out a guy named Roy Buchanan. He turned down a chance to join the Rolling Stones. Ron Wood was the second choice.

Buchanan kicks ass. Lonnie Mack would also be a good choice. I recently had the opportunity to see a young (19?) guitar slinger by the name of Wes Jeans. Very, very talented guy in the style of Hendrix/Vaughan/Albert King. If any of you get the chance to see him please do. My guess is he won't be in small clubs for long.

Here's his website just in case anyone is interested. Wes Jeans

No need to mail anything, I can pick it up from you in a couple of weeks. ;)

I like the little bit ZZ Top I've heard, and have noticed some blues tendencies in their music. I guess I just never thought of them as blues. Of course I didn't think that way about Hendrix either until I started listening to blues music and was able to hear where Hendrix's music was coming from.

Thanks for the link, I'll check it out.

A lot of those artists are on the box set I purchased, and most are on my list to further explore. But there are a few names I haven't come across yet, so I'll add them. Thanks.

I like the song Comin' Home when you go the site.

Thanks.

I have done that to some extent, between the booklet that came with the box set and researching on-line I have come to get an idea of who the masters are, and who their masters were. But i could always be missing something too, hence this thread.

Where does this festival take place?

Too late. ;) I have actually found plenty of the really old stuff I like. But then again, I'm not your typical 20-something year old who thinks music from ten years ago is out of date and sucks. I have style. :D

Duly noted.

Okay,I'll put you a compilation together but I hope one of us remembers that it's here,as I'm sure we'll both be drinking heavily that weekend.

If I may:

Mike Morgan and the Crawl