I recently joined GC and was shocked to find there's a thread for every type of music under the fucking sun..besides the blues..so i'm making one. If you do, in fact, dig the blues, then please, by all means feel free to post your favorite blues tunes, artists, or bands. Also feel free to write a little about what you do or don't like about it etc. etc.. Blues is so unpopular, but it resonates with me in a big way...a much bigger way than Liz Kahlifa and Cryley Cirus . So before you hipsters and wangsters go and criticize it as lame, at least give it a listen....and remember rap wouldn't exist without the blues .. Still Can't for the life of me figure out how the likes of them became so fucking popular Anywho i'll kick it off I suppose; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAOlQaLVJdw
Well i should've known this thread was doomed, LOL. Fucking close it or whatever, Blues is a dying...give him one last shot and a spliff, then let him go in peace..
Blues isn't dead. It's just shifted more. Those who grew up listing to blues from there parents. Are now using that in rap. Me personally I do enjoy it from time to time. But I like it to be shuffled. I like BB king. Buddy guy. John lee hooker. Um that prisoner song from O brother were aren't though. Blues is dead as in people don't sing or really know what it is anymore. But some country artist do know how to do it right. Ryan Bingham is really good. But unless you have a big vinyl collection or Satellite radio you'll never hear much of it anymore. Which is sad. But at last there are a few clubs who still do play and only play the blues. Sent from my iPod touch using Grasscity Forum
Yeah i'd say you're right on the money.. You go down to Memphis and it's still some old heads that really know the blues, but 99% of the populalation don't actively listen to it, I assume. It's definitely dying..i mean compared to rap, or even the shit they play on radio nowadays, it's just not getting played or listened to man. You can ask any random stranger, and 9/10 are going to have some bizzare, borderline propagandized ideals of what blues is, or what it's supposed to be. I incorporate my blues guitar playing into practically any syle, even play along with the occasional rap song lol, but that shit ain't real music, no matter how real them negroes rappin about it is...the melody is just fake man, all clicks and whistles.
I grew up in Memphis, and saw many old blues guys play at the Overton Park Shell during the 60s...most of them, like Lighting Hopkins, were so old they had to be walked out on stage...and some of them seemed to forget why they were there... A lot of the British "rockers" were heavily influenced by the old southern blues...Clapton, Stones actually based a lot of their early music on the blues, but the kids in the US had no clue that was where their sound came from. For a good sample of what I mean, listen to some real early Stones albums and covers they did....
Gotta love the blues man, it influenced modern music tremendously. Some of my personal favorites are blind Willie mctell, buddy guy, bb king, junior kimbrough, etc.. I also love what some bands have done with the blues particularly jack white and the white stripes, Gary clark jr, benjamin Booker, early black keys like pre magic potion... I could go on and on.
i dont listen to it much anymore, but when i was teaching myself guitar, it was probably the biggest music genre that i learned from. the emotion that i could unlock and then express it through the ol 6 stringer, i still have a huge respect for blues. looove it.
Zeppelin started my love for blues. Second that junior Kimbrough, dude rocks! RL Burnside, muddy, son house, bb, freddie king....and the king of all Mr. Robert Johnson!
Music changes. There will always be blues, but a lot of what I hear these days that passes for blues is more rock than blues.
Blues isn't dead... It lives on in every single form of modern music today... Jazz, rock, r&b, rap, hip hop, country, metal.... Plus, tons of people still love straight up blues, like myself. Slash the guitarist, I just went and saw him open for Aerosmith and that was a sold out show. And it was very blues based. Blues is fucking awesome. I also saw clapton recently, and it was packed. Rainbow family
Blues is the most down to earth music imo. You take a simple (or less commonly, complex) 12 bar chorus, and have a soloist play a super extended solo (like 60-120 measures) and you can really hear their soul develop and take you on a journey through their emotions in their mind. To me, blues is the most honest, most true form of music. It is pure expression. I'm a functional stoner
Greetings! New to GC and just found this thread...blues lover from way back, even got to hang with some of the current greats in Chicago.. I have a strange theory on the waxing and waning of blues popularity...for most people, music is not a thing but rather a path and that path takes you many places as you go. In my case the path was pop (kid) to rock to hard rock to harder rock to metal to...the blues. When I heard my first live well-played blues tune in Chicago it was like a lightning bolt hit me, that every step I had been taking had lead me to this point. In the blues I recognized so much of every other genre and the other way around as well. The thing is that I don't think I would have learned to appreciate the blues to the degree that I do if I had not take that journey. It would be too easy to write it off and old peoples music. Now? Now I get more meaning and inspiration from stuff that was recorded nearly a century ago....Robert Johnson is still amazing to me. FWIW, I do love what both Ash Grunewald and Chris Thomas King do making his tunes fresh today... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_b9r-EA_yc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHxv75z53ek
Another fave from down under, Ash doing Smokestack Lightnin' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0HP5qjFtyc
The blues are what my soul feels like. They're not good for all day every day listening, but it's good for emotional evocation. When I want to feel, I mean really want to feel, it's those gritty, sultry, smoky bar room, blues that get me.
Now see that is what is so cool about the blues, it hits everyone differently yet it still hits everyone in the same spot: the heart. I can see where you are at on only needing/wanting it sometimes. In my case, I derive everything I need from the blues (up, down, happy, elation, etc), its just a matter of picking the tunes. Robert Johnson leaves me introspective. Albert Collins makes me wanna party. BB makes me mellow, Ash Grunwald makes me jump. Bits and pieces of a larger mosiac...
This was a fun find: Lurrie Bell circa 2013 doing Tin Pan Alley in his usual...style. I love seeing Lurrie live in a close venue like Nicks or Rosas lounge....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX1zKSUA09o
And if you really are from Michigan then you should have better manners than to post crap like this here. The rest of these folks are what they are but more is expected out of you....