EC @ RAH

rlw

Anybody go last night?   An interesting evening as it was the first time I'd see him not on a blues night.  A mixed set so a few for the MOR people - acoustic Layla, You look wonderful tonight etc - and some stonking blues.  As someone learning to play I now appreciate the man's limitations a bit more - I recognize the notes and the scales and the repetition of same to a certain extent - but, bugger me, he can't half play.

Only one pedal on the stage too - some sort of wah thingie - which was only used twice to very good effect.  Perhaps some assistance at the mixing desk, I don't know?  But the sounds he got out of a single Strat (OK two when a string broke) were quite something and testament to the man's skill.

I know he's a bit marmite on here but, as I said, he really can play and if he isn't the most original player in the world now - aged 70 - does that actually matter?  Do what you're good at and doing it well seems like a good maxim.

Billy Preston, Chris Stainton, Nathan East in the band too.

HAL9000

Off to see him on Monday night and very much looking forward to it.

Namaqua

Saw him a couple of years ago at O2. Bloody superb to hear the skill of that man. No, he isn't the most original player these days but he was the guy a lot of people have copied since his God-like status in the late 60's. You can see why. Fingers of steel but with a touch of silk! Wish I had a ticket!

stickyfiddle

I saw him in Dubai last March. Great show, though 2 keys players and no second guitarist meant the organ solos got a bit out of hand for my tastes...

richardhomer

rlw;41415" said:

Billy Preston, Chris Stainton, Nathan East in the band too.

Definitely not Billy Preston - he died some years ago.

As I've often said before - I'm a massive EC fan. He might have a limited vocabulary in terms of harmonic knowledge - but few have expressed so much from so little.

The greats seem to transcend their instrument - what comes out of their amp is somehow an expression of their soul - as B B King proved so often.

Those are the players that 'get me' - there is an emotional reaction from me as a listener. On that basis, I'll take EC over pretty much any other player.

Tonight will be interesting - my guess is that B B King's passing will fire him up.

I'm really sorry I've not been able to get to these shows. Money is just too tight unfortunately.

mudslide73

I'd like to have seen him too.. always has great bands and has loads of great material to draw from.

rlw

richardhomer said:

rlw;41415" said:

Billy Preston, Chris Stainton, Nathan East in the band too.

Definitely not Billy Preston - he died some years ago.

As I've often said before - I'm a massive EC fan. He might have a limited vocabulary in terms of harmonic knowledge - but few have expressed so much from so little.

The greats seem to transcend their instrument - what comes out of their amp is somehow an expression of their soul - as B B King proved so often.

Those are the players that 'get me' - there is an emotional reaction from me as a listener. On that basis, I'll take EC over pretty much any other player.

Tonight will be interesting - my guess is that B B King's passing will fire him up.

I'm really sorry I've not been able to get to these shows. Money is just too tight unfortunately.

You know, I thought that Billy Preston was dead too and I excuse myself thus:

I went to the loo when whoever he was was introduced and we were too far away to see a face clearly and my wife said it was him and I believed her.  So...................and I have to say that he didn't actually look all that black either.

That's because it was Paul Carrack.

SRich

Should've Gone to Specsavers

freakboy1610

I saw Eric Clapton at The Albert Hall in January 1987. I was just to the left of the stage about 30 feet away from the band. No Billy Preston but he did have Mark Knopfler and Phil Collins in his line-up. When he played a slow number (probably Wonderful Tonight) some idiot in the front row of the stalls got up and started dancing with his girlfriend. A bouncer tapped him on the shoulder and whispered politely but he just ignored him. The bouncer then picked the guy up, fireman style and carried him out through a side door. EC was great anyway.

richardhomer

^ I saw him in Manchester on the same tour - though he had Steve Ferrone on drums.

MK was the consummate side-man and looked like he enjoyed being part of a band rather than the centre of attention.

Nathan East on bass and Greg Philingaines on keys - awesome players.

EC was on blistering form.

Reverend

SRich said:

Should've Gone to Specsavers

Nonsense, the acoustics are awful there and the bar is massively overpriced...

rlw

SRich said:

Should've Gone to Specsavers

Should have got better tickets...............

HAL9000

Saw him last night at the RAH. Excellent stuff. And a genuine hairs on the back of the neck moment when he threw in some BB King style licks towards the end of one of the songs.

Got me wondering though... with BB gone, and EC not as young as he used to be (not that I'm in any writing him off) who will be left to carry on the blues legacy? 

Yes, I know there's still Buddy Guy, Walter Trout, and a number of up-and-coming youngsters but none of these are the household names that the likes of EC, BB King, Muddy Waters were. I guess JB is the obvious candidate but, for whatever reason, there seems to be a lot of dislike towards him. There will always be the purists and afficianados but without a figurehead that the average man in the street can name, it feels to me that the blues will become much more underground and obscure and an irrelevance to a lot of people.

not_the_dj

HAL9000 said:

 it feels to me taht the blues will become much more underground and obscure and an irrelevance to a lot of people.

I'd say the blues is already pretty much like that, and has been for a while. It's not part of the mainstream media, and certainly doesn't really trouble the charts!

But like folk and jazz it's got a very loyal core base, and blues gigs and festivals will continue for sure.

HAL9000

not_the_dj said:

HAL9000 said:

 it feels to me taht the blues will become much more underground and obscure and an irrelevance to a lot of people.

I'd say the blues is already pretty much like that, and has been for a while. It's not part of the mainstream media, and certainly doesn't really trouble the charts!

But like folk and jazz it's got a very loyal core base, and blues gigs and festivals will continue for sure.

True. however, if there hadn't been a well-known name like Clapton promoting the blues I suspect I (and many others) might never have discovered earler bluesmen such as Freddie King, Albert King, Robert Johnson, etc. Also for many of us born in the 50s there is a very good chance that it was Clapton who first inspired us to pick up a guitar and fumble our first pentatonic licks. I simply don't see anybody, and paricularly anyone well known) around now championing blues music with the same fervour that the likes of Clapton, John Mayall, etc were doing back then.

rlw

So he had better not retire then then had he?

not_the_dj

It's a different world now, and yeah I'm sure there are less and less people listing to the first generation blues recordings.

I was born in the 70s, so for me the british blues boom was almost ancient history when I was getting into music (early to mid 80s)....so my route to the blues took a different path....even involving bands like Def Leppard who mentioned Led Zeppelin in interviews....so it was another step for me to get back to the records that Page/Plant were listening too.

It's right that white guys in London in the 60s brought all these old records and the original bluesmen into the limelight, but for a kid getting into music now that link becomes less relevant as those original artists did get into the limelight and became household names, so their legacy is there....but as for a modern champion, that is a tricky one. Bonamassa for sure, he's selling records/concert halls and anything else he can put his name on...but I imagine his is a mature audience (I've never been to any of his gigs but I imagine there are one or two balding white guys there in denim?)

Still, I've seen Laurence Jones tearing it up infront of a decent crowd so there are young guys out there into this music....but again looking around the crowd he could well have been the youngest guy there!

Jack White did well in re-packaging the blues for a modern audience, then there was Moby and his samples (blimey that was 16 years ago...eek), but it is a minority/specialist music genre these days.

rlw

not_the_dj said:

 but it is a minority/specialist music genre these days.

..as is Country - here at least - but the biggest selling genre in he USA (I think).

EricTheWeary

not_the_dj;638356" said:

HAL9000 said:

 it feels to me taht the blues will become much more underground and obscure and an irrelevance to a lot of people.





I'd say the blues is already pretty much like that, and has been for a while. It's not part of the mainstream media, and certainly doesn't really trouble the charts!

But like folk and jazz it's got a very loyal core base, and blues gigs and festivals will continue for sure.

I think things are all niche now. The number of sales you need to get in the charts is tiny compared to how it was. I'd bet JoBo sells more CD's, if a lot less downloads,than Rita Ora even though he is much less a household name [ quick google - his last studio album got to number 3 in the German album charts as a random example]. His audience certainly has a young element to it based on the two gigs I went to. Although I doubt they are 16 year old blues nuts if only because the way music is listened to now I doubt if many 16 year olds really narrow their listening focus so much. Most of them may have also been dragged along by their dads....

I think blues is what you get to if you develop an interest in the structure, theory or history of pop/ rock music - it's just such a major building block- so I think some interest will always be there. I think it is also the music most linked to the electric guitar. Basic blues rhythms and improvising around the first position blues scale are a fast track to sounding like something on the guitar, it's a convenient fit with the design of the instrument. So, I think somebody, somewhere, will be playing the blues whilst we still have the electric guitar