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Just Beyond The Blues


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As we all know, Rock 'n' Roll is based on The Blues, for instance, The Stones song Gimme Shelter, if you listen to that, it's just amped up, speeded up, derivative blues. Another example would be almost any early Allman Brothers. It has that gritty, primal sound to it, like Blues, but it goes.....just beyond that, a little louder, a little faster, a little more in your face....

 

and that's the place I want to be, THAT'S what makes it Rock 'n' Roll, and IMO, The Best Music ever made. THAT SOUND!!!!

 

Early Beatles, same thing, all their experiments in pop were great, but I love the early stuff, and then when you listen to their final tracks together on Abbey Road, they're trying to get back to The Blues, and that attempt was a stellar moment in Rock History.

 

IMO, all the best Rock, captures that gritty primal blues sound, but extends it just a bit, just a bit, it's hard to know where to stop, but you'll know..........or.... will you?

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I have a Chuck Berry CD that I think meets your description. Raw and just great. I also have the Beatles live at the BBC CD set. They're covering some old stuff and it's just to primal. It's a great sound for sure. :D

 

I've always wanted to cover some of that stuff but I couldn't get people enthused about it.

Double Posting since March 2002

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Yeah man, I just love that sound. You can hear it too on some of the early Kinks, or The Who, or Bo Diddley, or damn, a 1000 other artists and bands. That's THE best sound in the world to me. Just beyond the blues , that's what I'm talking about.
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Chess Studios - one of my favorite places for cool sounds...Chuck Berry, Muddy, Little Walter, Jimmie Rodgers, Buddy Guy, Willie Dixon, Luther Tucker, Koko Taylor all those cool 60's sounds where they live-mixed room mics and close mics, changed the room acoustics to suit the sound, etc.

 

When the blues guys took a show out on the road things generally got rockin at some point ! More recently James Cotton had a nice medium size blues band with horns, harps, and guitars and such that could generally shake the devil loose, hehe.

 

Sun Studios - another great originator of cool sounds although set up totally different from Chess - blues, rockabilly, and beyond the blues sounds that turned into rock'n'roll too...'Train Kept A Rollin' came out of there, Burnett bros - too cool, along with my favorite early Elvis, Perkins, Jerry Lee stuff...

 

Besides that there was some other cool early rock'n'roll happenin with some of the New York style Swingin Blues bands there in the late 40's and 50's that got things happenin - I guess Bill Haley emerged out of that sound...

 

It'd be cool to have a time machine...hehe I guess I got one - my CD player !

 

You sound like you're on the verge of written & playin some more blues stuff Wewus ?

:cool:

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I like blues that makes me feel really bad when I'm feeling bad anyway. But that's not very often. When I'm feeling low Zep's "Since I've Been Lovin' You" or some feel-bad Robert Johnson works. Maybe it's a catharsis.

 

But something weird happened with the blues. They tried to make it popular and so instead of that slow and painful, minor chord progression and lyrically wailing you get fun little stories and bouncy beats. Happy blues doesn't work for me. I think of B.B. King as a happy blues kinda guy. It confuses me.

 

But then there are guys like Professor Longhair and Ray Charles that have an authenticity to them that goes beyond the blues....or does it?

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I remember in my mid 20's i was listening to lotsa jazz. It started to get really boring to me.

There was some stuff that just made me nuts, awesome, but the rest of it.... blaaaH

I analyzed the stuff i liked most and looked back on all the music i had loved since i was a kid and the one element that was always common was a strong blues influence.

This was a good thing for me to understand. After that i went through a few years of nuthin but blues, then that got kinda boring too.

But i still need the blues in my music.

 

In fact music without blues should not exist, i mean, what's the point? ;)

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Originally posted by Guruman:

The blues is just so right when there is that feel to it. I can't wait for Crossroads this June.

 

This is, like, some sort of festival devoted to that senior statesman of blues, Ralph Macchio, and his '80s movie, right?
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Primal and gritty? Yeah! But, I only hear traces of the real deal in most rock and modern blues. I prefer the old, deep Delta stuff; THAT's primal and gritty. I can dig the electric stuff too, and rock, but to my ears most of the feeling is traded off for other values. Stuff like sloooww Hendrix are exceptions, still conveying the "voodoo."

 

On the other side of the planet, in the center of Asia, they have equivalent music, sometimes even surprassing the Delta masters for sheer primal grit. Check out The Orphan\'s Lament or Kombu for examples.

 

"Blues isn't about making people feel good. Blues is about making people feel bad, while making a few bucks doing it." - Bleeding Gums Murphy

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And now, to tie in the Macchio movie to all this...

 

A line from Joe Seneca, who played Willie Brown in that flick; "The blues is a good man feellin' bad."

 

Funny that someone would mention Chuck Berry. A lot of guys I know wouldn't put Chuck and blues in the same room. But some of you might have his box set. In that set is a song that was the "B" side of "Maybelline" that was pure blues, "Wee Wee Hours". I got ahold of that 45 when I was 12, and played the shit out of BOTH sides!

 

And never looked back...

 

Whitefang

I started out with NOTHING...and I still have most of it left!
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Originally posted by Guruman:

The blues is just so right when there is that feel to it. I can't wait for Crossroads this June.

 

Some thing will never die. :)

ANyone click that link and scroll down to the news about the guitar auction? My GAWD - he's selling Blackie! Anyone got a spare 100K lying around? I'm having the mother of all GAS attacks. :freak:

 

By the way, raise your hand if you've recently purchased EC's Me And Mr. Johnson and haven't been able to pry it out of the CD player. I know I'm not the only one.

"I had to have something, and it wasn't there. I couldn't go down the street and buy it, so I built it."

 

Les Paul

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I *heart* Me & Mr. Johnson.

 

Our band is the poster child for 'just beyond the blues'. We take old tunes from the 30's and elecritfy them, and the stuff we write is electric blues.

 

The plus of this format is that we appeal to 40+ market of blues lovers and also appeal to the young adults who are just discovering that some of their favorite rock tunes are really covers of old blues tunes.

 

The disadvantage is that 'blues purists' get a little snotty about what we're doing to 'their' music. We haven't run across that attitude often.

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When I was about 10 I really got into the blues, and Stevie Ray Vaughan, and started exploring from there. I haven't listened to blues in a long time, but I still love it. CIUT in Toronto used to have a really good blues show back then... Danny Marks had a good one on CJRT (JAZZ FM) in Toronto too. Anyone know if that's still on?

 

I'm a big fan of rock has that "just beyond the blues" feel too. I loved Clapton's From The Cradle and Unplugged albums, as well as that whole Crossroads: Live In The 70s box. Piano Blues from the PBS Blues documentary was really well done -- I love Professor Longhair and the whole New Orleans piano blues thing. Archival footage of Oscar Peterson and Art Tatum ain't bad either! I enjoyed Jonny Lang's first album, Lie To Me, as well. And of course the Blues Brothers 2000 soundtrack -- horrible movie, great CD.

 

David

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I'm interested in the blues as a popular art form and a musical form. I have no interest in the blues as a fashion statement, however.

 

IMHO - Musically it has to do mostly with rhythm. As art and personal expression is has to do with honesty.

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Originally posted by Jode:

By the way, raise your hand if you've recently purchased EC's Me And Mr. Johnson and haven't been able to pry it out of the CD player. I know I'm not the only one.

<------- Raising hand ---------->

 

Also got Honkin on Bobo...different, but Fun ;)

Lynn G
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My mission for a while- maybe still is- to liberate the blues rom that I-IV-V box it got stuck in a while back... Lissen to Bessie Smith, ain't no I-IV-V- the form is there, in a variety of forms, all kindsa chords get you around. I love a thing where anything that gets done, is blue- no matter how high-falutin' the context- there's country cats like that, and Ellington done it all in every shade of indigo.

 

'Trane, it's like he'd only play blue when he was so far out he forgot not to play blue- what's with that? That always threw me. Then lissen to Mrs. Trane, Alice, and every damn thing she touches is deep blue, even when she plays chinese music on the classical harp, inspired by Stravinsky. Now that I can dig!

 

"The blues is a lowdown shakin' chill-

you ain't never had them, I hope you never will." -RJ

A WOP BOP A LU BOP, A LOP BAM BOOM!

 

"There is nothing I regret so much as my good behavior. What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?" -Henry David Thoreau

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I have a tape of the original Robert Johnson tracks, but I never have been able to get into it, that much. There's only 29 songs, total that he recorded. Ever heard them? Man... that's not what I would call accessible music.

 

The stuff I like takes that blues vibe, and takes it to the next level. Although I do like straight ahead blues, I like it more when it's taken up a notch, but not too far.

What's the difference between a duck?

 

I don't know, you tell me, wise ass!

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Super, hehe - listen to the barrelhouse & ragtime and blues piano players of the time. Now listen to Robert Johnson again - get it ? :wave:

 

His phrasing and how he grabs notes reminds me a lot of those old piano players...

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I only mention Chuck as just past Blues. Kind of a primal framework for what is now the standard pop song. Didn't he kind of invent the standard pop song? Some of those lyrics are still familiar to everyone today.

 

My dingaling everybodies Ding... Won't you play with my...

Double Posting since March 2002

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We've been into debates about Chuck here before. My take on his whole thing is that he certainly set the template for the modern pop song. Lyrically, anyway.

 

While the blues dealt with certain subject matter, ie; "My baby done left me", "My money's done gone", and the like(even those blues with an "upbeat" tempo had hard times and lookin' for something better lyrics). Berry found a way to relate to kids, and in a way they could relate to the lyrics. And it crossed over perfectly. Songs about dancing("Around and Around", "Reelin' and Rockin'", "Oh, Carol"), School days sweethearts("Little Queenie", "Sweet Little Sixteen"), buying cars, parking and all the other strife of young life that black AND white teen-agers, always the largest record buying audience, had kinship with. He was just in too good a mood to wallow in the blues. But Berry's experience in the blues certainly came in handy in the formulation of his style, and still provides a very distant connection between the blues and modern pop music. Sad thing is, too many pop performers born within the last 20 years or so fail to understand that connection, and let that ignorance corrupt their creative thread.

 

Whitefang

I started out with NOTHING...and I still have most of it left!
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