Johnny Winter at Woodstock: Mean Town Blues

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

R&B somehiow ended uop in a sort of no-man's land and it must have taken some special appreciation and awareness to really get deeply into rediscovering R&B - which by the late 60s was very much a "historical" style of the blues in the same way that "hown home blues" actually was a historical style too, eccept that quite a few "down home" blues artists still were around (or had been rediscovered) and still playing their music, whereas those R&B men who still were around had gone on to much more modern styles (cf. Johnny Otis etc.).

The letters on some of the keys of my PC are coming off, too (But it's teaching me to type without looking down )

I'm not sure that it really required a special historical appreciation to get into R&B in the sixties. As I recollect (at least for myself) the first thing I ever read (but I was already a fan, just didn't know the history) that pointed to R&B and the R&B aesthetic was a 1961 article in the Record Mirror (a pop paper of the time) about Clarence "Frogman" Henry, between the British release of "But I do" and "You alwas hurt the one you love". The article was written by someone called Jones, who I think was the assistant editor or something quite senior in the RM. That was followed, next week, by a load of letters from readers who wanted more of this kind of educational stuff. And so the RM became the pop magazine of choice for fans of all kinds of black pop music (except jazz). Yes, there was lots about Soul, of course, because that was pretty well unknown to most pop buyers at the time (eg Marvin Gaye, in 1963, was a "Great unknown" - Motown had no British hits until 1964), but there were articles on all sorts of people; Blues, Gospel, R&B, Soul and, later, Funk. But also Rockabilly, which was perceived as being relevant, too. I also recall some brief histories of indie record companies.

Funny, I usually read the New Musical Express in those days, because it had excellent listings of all forthcoming releases, including catalogue numbers, so I could pre-order stuff. But that week of the Frogman article, I happened to pick up the Record Mirror (as well? instead? dunno). Some accidents have a big effect.

MG

[kenny weir]

MG, your post above is just the sort of thing I'm thinking of - the music press coverage you talk of seems less inclined to let pigeonholes get in the way.

Some accidents have a big effect.

Too true, that!

Edited February 28, 2010 by kenny weir

[A Lark Ascending]

From what I've read, for every purist Eric Clapton (as he admits he was at the time) there was a Small Faces (who seemed well on top of R+B). I wonder if the purest thing was particular strong amongst the more introverted type, stuck in his bedroom listening to records (that was me later on!); where R+B struck home with those who went out and partied. There's probably an element of class there too in the UK experience!

There's a distinct difference with having a personal 'non plus ultra' based on what sounds right to you; but trying to generalise that into some objective limit, well....

I think it has something to do with a human desire to tidy up the past and present it in clear boxes. You often have to do that in order to get a shape with which you can deal with it (something I've always found with learning and teaching history). Sometimes people forget that those arrangements are just there for convenience and that the past is much more overlapping and messy and open to an infinite variety of perpectives depending on where you are standing.

One of they joys of the 'Devilin' Tune' series is they way you get jazz, country, blues, MOR on top of one another. Just as you would have heard them at the time.

Edited February 28, 2010 by Bev Stapleton

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

From what I've read, for every purist Eric Clapton (as he admits he was at the time)

Well, he wasn't THAT purist. I recall some interview where he said his favourite record in his collection was Don & Dewey's "Soul motion"/"Stretching out", (which he had on the original label - Rush - though it's MUCH more difficult to find the original British issue, on Pye's Cameo-Parkway label, which sold about 6 copies). Don & Dewey were a well-known west coast R&B vocal duo, who had learned violin and organ. Don was later better known as Sugarcane Harris. The single was produced by Sonny Bono.

Well, it's an ACE single. Not Blues, not Jazz, not R&B, not Soul, but just fantastic.

MG

[A Lark Ascending]

Well, he wasn't THAT purist.

More to the point, if he was that purist he could never have written 'Wonderful Tonight'! I've broad ears but thats my 'non plus ultra'!

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Well, he wasn't THAT purist.

More to the point, if he was that purist he could never have written 'Wonderful Tonight'! I've broad ears but thats my 'non plus ultra'!

Don't know that song. Shrug.

MG

[Brad]

Clapton always seems in conflict as what he wants to be: a bluesman or one appealing to wider audiences. He seems to go back and forth. Perhaps his more successful pop aspects allow him to indulge in his blues predilections: a loss leader if you will.

Edited February 28, 2010 by Brad

[AllenLowe]

just to go back - John L I agree with a lot of what you say, but Bloomfield the guitarist was superior to BB King in every way. Just the most compelling guitarist of the 1960s, black or white. And one only had to listen to BB that night I heard them together at the Fillmore to know this was true - Bloomfield turned him inside out, played his own stuff back at him with more finesse and swing and variation. Ingenious stuff.

As for what I think was the OVERWHELMING influence of white boys on black musicians in the 1960s, well, for many African American performers it was simply a matter of trying to go where the $$ were; certainly many thought they were trying to reclaim what was rightfully theirs. I might disagree with this idea, but it is certainly the way they felt they needed to go.

Edited February 28, 2010 by AllenLowe

[Big Beat Steve]

when Soul bcame the #1 music with the Black people. R&B did live on in a way in some elements of Soul but still ...

So how were those young Whites really to discover R&B

Sorry, everything I've read and heard, then and since, leads me to believe that R&B (in the way it's being discussed here) and soul (ditto) are part of a continuum. Yes, there were differences - a Civil Rights factor, for instance. But for many, many of the participants at the time, I doubt such a "change" was barely worth remarking on. Bobby Bland and Solomon Burke are just two that come to mind as having s stake on both camps. Bland and Little Milton recorded for Sun before going to Duke and Chess/Stax respectively. To me, Bobby is an R&B artist AND a soul singer.

As for R&B, well in one of those odd twists, it may have actually been easier for a teenager in NZ to latch on to that stuff than a likeminded soul in the US, at least one who wasn't already to scouring joints for 2nd hand discs or hanging out in black clubs.

Not that we had the records in our shops (plenty of blues, but no R&B).

But through reading the likes of Blue Unlimited, I certainly became quickly aware of the likes of Joe Liggins and Floyd Dixon.

And this Specialty comp (and its Vol 2), from the early '70s, were hugely influential on me:

And after that came the Route 66 label with releases by Wynonie Harris, Dixon, Roy Brown and many more.

(Yeah, yeah, I know - this timeframe is a little later, just saying ...)

As well, while the Brit R&B/mod bands did a heap of Muddy and wolf, as well as Burke and Irma Thomas and so on, it wasn't unknown for them to also cover this type of R&B - as well as Buddy Holly.

Uh oh ... been away from my PC for only a couple of hours to tinker in my garage and pow! the thread explodes and it becomes real hard to catch up ... :D

I would not really disagree with you, Kenny, so let me just elaborate on a few details so my earlier post is not misunderstood:

- IMO Muddy Waters would be one of those who MIGHT fall into the R&B category but IMHO he was not always perceived as such. The entire Muddy/Little Walter school is what I would file broadly under "Chicago blues" or "electric blues" as a sort of opposite spectrum to all those "down home" (acoustic/contry) blues artists "rediscovered" from the early 60s. But where was everything else from the field of blues in between these two poles that had been around and in full bloom a decade earlier? You know if Muddy, the Wolf or Elmore are about as far as these white blues boys would get into R&B then they only caught a glimpse of the whole field of R&B and, what is more, one extreme of R&B that in many regards and according to quite a few blues scribes might as well qualify as some kind of electrified, updated "down home" blues)

- No doubt that there were quite a few R&B artists and hit makers in the STRICTER sense of the word who continued neatly into Soul music (e.g. Bobby Bland). However, stylistically speaking there was much more to R&B, and a lot of it did NOT evolve straight into Soul. Now, speaking of the early or mid-60s when the white boys latched on to the blues, would it really have been EASY to find non-OOP records in the stores by all those R&B artists ranging from Amos Milburn to Wynonie Harris to Joe Liggins to Big Jay McNeely to Big Maybelle to all those blues shouters (beyond Joe Turner and Jimmy Rushing) to whoever you'd care to name ...? In short, the entire field of what is also termed "Jump blues" must have passed largely under the radar of those white blues boys of the 60s. See what I mean?

Remember the mid-80s three LP volumes of "Jumpin' The Blues" that ACE released with late 40s/early 50s "jump blues" R&B of the shouters and (some) honkers variety. Would you believe German Brunswick had already reissued tracks that all later resurfaced on these ACE LPs on a 12in LP in the early 60s? Must have been EXTREMELY odd among the usual blues vinyl fare of the 60s and really one of a kind.

And this cannot only be a matter of these artists not having been on the R&B hit parades anymore. Down home blues artists (you know .. the typical image of the weary, guitar strumming oldsters in the gutter ) weren't exactly the hottest thing in the black U.S. ghettos either and Robert Johnson or Leroy Carr were even farther down the road in the mists of history than were, say, those early 50s blues shouters ... any yet they struck the fancy of those white boys trying to get into the blues whereas the (jump blues) "core" of R&B for the most part did not.

How come so much R&B remained off the radar of many blues enthusiasts?

Stylistically overzealous purist attitudes (or narrow-mindedness) on the part of early white promoters of the blues such as Mike Leadbitter and his ilk? Maybe .. but they were only part of a long line of blues "purists" who apparently found it hard to accept R&B (especially the more jumping small combo variety) as a legitmiate style of the blues. Period music press features seem to bear ths out. (As if every blues record is to be a tale of woe and sadness ...) And strangely enough, somebody quite narrow-minded in other respects such as Hugues Panassié seems to have been one of the very few prominent writers on this music who gave R&B of the above kind its due and a relatively O.K. measure of appreciation (read his early 60s Bulletins of the Hot Club of France and you will see).

Finally, those Specialty LPs you showed above were a major revelation to me too when I stumbled across them in '75 or '76, just like those mid-70s reissues by Roy Milton and Joe Liggins on U.K. Sonet that came shortly afterwards (and the contemporary reissues on the French Riverboat label, and then of course Jonas Bernholm's Route 66 labels).

But like you said, this was more than a decade after the British blues boom. And if i remember correctly even in the mid-70s anything on vinyl connected with either downhome blues or Chicago/electric blues outnumbered the "core" of R&B not by 10:1 but rather by 100: 1, I guess.

[AllenLowe]

I would argue, by the way, visa a ve the prior post, that Muddy and Little Walter were the new electric down homers, not the opposite.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I would argue, by the way, visa a ve the prior post, that Muddy and Little Walter were the new electric down homers, not the opposite.

I think that's what Steve was saying, though he didn't put it neatly, as you did. I always thought of MW, HW and LW as a louder, City version of the Mississippi John Hurts & R Johnsons. And I felt there was a big difference between them and B B King, T-Bone, Lowell Fulson and others. The obvious thing was that there was a lot of jazz in those latter people's music, much as there had been in late forties/early fifties R&B. And still was in Ray Charles' records.

MG

PS - Oh, and the fact that T-Bone and Lowell came from way out west made a difference, too.

[JSngry]

Bloomfield the guitarist was superior to BB King in every way. Just the most compelling guitarist of the 1960s, black or white.

Is this being presented as fact or opinion?

Either way, again, it depends on what you're looking for...

[Big Beat Steve]

I would argue, by the way, visa a ve the prior post, that Muddy and Little Walter were the new electric down homers, not the opposite.

I think that's what Steve was saying, though he didn't put it neatly, as you did.

Indeed that's what I was trying to say, MG. And I agree with what you said about the "jazz" content too.

[kenny weir]

How come so much R&B remained off the radar of many blues enthusiasts?

Stylistically overzealous purist attitudes (or narrow-mindedness) on the part of early white promoters of the blues such as Mike Leadbitter and his ilk? Maybe .. but they were only part of a long line of blues "purists" who apparently found it hard to accept R&B (especially the more jumping small combo variety) as a legitmiate style of the blues.

We've been down this road before ... on the thread about the Maybeth Hamilton book.

I'm sure Blues Unlimited an the like played a role, but ...

I distinctly recall Leadbitter, Slaven, Bruce Bastin and John Broven being responsible for me getting into some of this stuff - as well as cajun music and thinking of Fats Domino as more than pop star! And I recall reviews as diverse as Presley's Sun sides. Even then those guys were sluts.

I'd put the "off radar" factor more down to those more directly involved in propagating the Johnson/Crossroads myth.

I wonder if the purest thing was particular strong amongst the more introverted type, stuck in his bedroom listening to records (that was me later on!); where R+B struck home with those who went out and partied.

Yep, Jagger, Richards & Co were wallflowers!

[A Lark Ascending]

Yep, Jagger, Richards & Co were wallflowers!

I wouldn't be at all surprised if Richards had been - until he got the opportunity through fame to be other! I seem to recall reading somewhere that Ritchie Blackmore - a one time wild man of rock - spent his teens practicing the guitar instead of partying!

Pure party animals would be more likely to seek music where the girls are. Which is unlikely to be in any purist camp!

[Big Beat Steve]

We've been down this road before ... on the thread about the Maybeth Hamilton book.

I'm sure Blues Unlimited an the like played a role, but ...

I distinctly recall Leadbitter, Slaven, Bruce Bastin and John Broven being responsible for me getting into some of this stuff - as well as cajun music and thinking of Fats Domino as more than pop star! And I recall reviews as diverse as Presley's Sun sides. Even then those guys were sluts.

I'd put the "off radar" factor more down to those more directly involved in propagating the Johnson/Crossroads myth.

No doubt about John Broven ("Walking To New Orleans" hit me rather early on) but my doubts about Mike Leadbitter probably are due to the way he excluded R&B in a very wide sense from the early issue of his discography, and other quotes from his early publications found in the "How Britain Got The Blues" book seem to indicate it took him quite a bit of time to see the light, or else he had a slightly skewed picture of the "Unlimitedness" of the "Blues" (pun intended ). Signs of the (selective awareness of) the times, I guess ...

About this "Maybeth Hamilton book" that you mention - can't recall it here on this forum but is this MaRybeth Hamilton"'s "In Search of The Blues"? Is it a worthwhile read? I have yet to start "The Land Where The Blues Began" by Alan Lomax (bought a couple of months ago) so maybe I ought to get this one too for a BALANCED view?

[kenny weir]

We've been down this road before ... on the thread about the Maybeth Hamilton book.

I'm sure Blues Unlimited an the like played a role, but ...

I distinctly recall Leadbitter, Slaven, Bruce Bastin and John Broven being responsible for me getting into some of this stuff - as well as cajun music and thinking of Fats Domino as more than pop star! And I recall reviews as diverse as Presley's Sun sides. Even then those guys were sluts.

I'd put the "off radar" factor more down to those more directly involved in propagating the Johnson/Crossroads myth.

No doubt about John Broven ("Walking To New Orleans" hit me rather early on) but my doubts about Mike Leadbitter probably are due to the way he excluded R&B in a very wide sense from the early issue of his discography, and other quotes from his early publications found in the "How Britain Got The Blues" book seem to indicate it took him quite a bit of time to see the light, or else he had a slightly skewed picture of the "Unlimitedness" of the "Blues" (pun intended ). Signs of the (selective awareness of) the times, I guess ...

About this "Maybeth Hamilton book" that you mention - can't recall it here on this forum but is this MaRybeth Hamilton"'s "In Search of The Blues"? Is it a worthwhile read? I have yet to start "The Land Where The Blues Began" by Alan Lomax (bought a couple of months ago) so maybe I ought to get this one too for a BALANCED view?

Yeah, well I have no doubt Leadbitter (especially as regards the discog) is due his share of blame - IF blame is due anyone at all!

But as I said, I recall pretty catholic tastes within the pages of the mag itself - including one issue with a cover that comprised a photo of himself chatting with Jackie Wilson.

Yes, that's the one - MaRybeth Hamilton. I found it a fascinating read. Not about the music so much as the processes by which the early blues police and so on formed the listening habits of so many of us. Sadly, I also found it quite a limited read in terms of its scope - it never mentioned various tangents touched upon in this thread, for instance.

However, knowing as I do your interests and approach over this and related threads, I'd it's pretty much mandatory.

The thread based on it kicked off with, I think, a scathing review of the book by Dave Marsh, which was seen by several here as a strong commendation.

BTW, on my many forays into New Orleans and South Louisiana - going back aways now - His South To Louisiana book was my bible. It, too, is getting on in years, but AFAIK no one has gone close to bettering it. I also talked to guys like Johnnie Allan who recalled their amazement and delight when the likes of Broven and Leadbitter started coming through and knocking on doors.

And now, I've got to insert these for my son:

Edited February 28, 2010 by kenny weir

[AllenLowe]

I second the Mary Beth Hamilton book - and I would caution you to ignore the reviews, positive and negative, because I swear, these guys never read the book. Every review I have read is a completely inaccurate reflection of it - and I personally found it quite a brilliant work.

[paul secor]

just to go back - John L I agree with a lot of what you say, but Bloomfield the guitarist was superior to BB King in every way. Just the most compelling guitarist of the 1960s, black or white. And one only had to listen to BB that night I heard them together at the Fillmore to know this was true - Bloomfield turned him inside out, played his own stuff back at him with more finesse and swing and variation. Ingenious stuff.

As for what I think was the OVERWHELMING influence of white boys on black musicians in the 1960s, well, for many African American performers it was simply a matter of trying to go where the $$ were; certainly many thought they were trying to reclaim what was rightfully theirs. I might disagree with this idea, but it is certainly the way they felt they needed to go.

Just out of curiosity, Allen - how old were you when you heard them at the Fillmore that night?

[kenny weir]

Here is the original thread:

In Search Of The Blues

[AllenLowe]

Paul, I was.....

16 -

and before we counter this with the issue of experience, I have heard numerous recordings of Bloomfield, live and in the studio, and they are pretty much as I remember - and by that age I had already seen (in person) Miles, Monk, the Dead, the Doors, Paul Butterfield, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters, Johnny Cash, Sonny Rollins, Jaki Byard, Ray Charles, Eubie Blake and more than a few others - so I had a firm frame of reference.

Edited February 28, 2010 by AllenLowe

[paul secor]

Paul, I was.....

16 -

and before we counter this with the issue of experience, I have heard numerous recordings of Bloomfield, live and in the studio, and they are pretty much as I remember - and by that age I had already seen (in person) Miles, Monk, the Dead, the Doors, Paul Butterfield, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters, Johnny Cash, Sonny Rollins, Jaki Byard, Ray Charles, Eubie Blake and more than a few others - so I had a firm frame of reference.

I don't trust the musical impressions that I had when I was 16 - or even 21, for that matter. Perhaps you were precocious. I'll take your word for it.

[AllenLowe]

well, who knows - given the fact that it was such a straightforward format - all blues - I trust it more than I might if it had been, say, a bebop concert. But I was pretty precocious in that sense and that night was just one of those things that sticks with you - and one could even see the response of BB, who was not the least bit perturbed but obviously impressed - funny, because the only equivalent I can think of in my experience is seeing Jim Bunning pitch a perfect game against the Mets in '64 - by the 5th inning there was a strange and constant tension in the air, as everyone knew something very important was happening (that future reactionary had a fast ball that practically broke the sound barrier, that day). Same with the Bloomfield/King encounter - time kind of stood still, there was a constant focus, and Bloomfield was simply other-worldly. Everything else happening was shut out (unfortunately no tapes have ever come out of that evening).

Edited February 28, 2010 by AllenLowe

[kenny weir]

However, stylistically speaking there was much more to R&B, and a lot of it did NOT evolve straight into Soul.

Lot, NOT? Really?

Stax had quite a few vocal groups that while being soul are recognisably part of the doo wop tradition. Admittedly, they weren't part of what came to be the real big Stax thing, but obviously at the time and they were seen as a significant part of the label's portfolio. Motown, groups galore.

Moreover, it could be said that a heck of a lot of soul music was influenced directly by the wailing and finger-snapping of the Five Royales - my favourite group! And also Hank Ballard & The Midnighters.

I guess the the Charles Brown/NK Cole/Cecil Gant crooning stuff could be one. Ray Charles was heavily influenced by the first two, but as he became more sanctified, that influence pretty much disappeared.

So what else didn't make it from '50s and earlier R&B to the soul era?

[Big Beat Steve]

Trying to sum it up rather briefly, most of what you would have labeled those "jump blues" combos in the late 40s/early 50s. Especially the high percentage of instrumentals (Booker & The MGs do not make a full-fledged instrumental "post-R&B" soul-R&B subgenre yet ).

And then, of course, the entire "Honking Sax" tradition (I will not count King Curtis as a straight successor to that ... ).

And I am not so sure you could draw that straight a line from ALL the early R&B shouters to James Brown either. Vocal chord stamina ain't all ...

I do realize, of course, that a lot of this is a matter of personal taste and preferences and of how much of a change and evolution you are willing to lump into one and the same style.

Maybe this example will help: Take some typical early to mid-50s Chicago blues artist or record (or any "electric blues" from that period) and then compare it to a mid-60s Chicago/electric blues recording. The continuity is easy to grasp.

And now take an early to mid-50s jump blues artist/record and let's see what remained of that in the mid-60s with the same (relatively) limited stylistic evolution as in the case of Chicago/electric blues ... I do realize that in a way it IS nitpicking but see what I mean now?

BTW, thanks for the link to that In Search of The Blues book discussion. I've taken it in (in fact I had found those two reviews earlier after doing a web search yesterday). Though I guess I will crave for more in the same way that you mentioned for yourself it is high in my Amazon shopping cart.