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Jonh Ingham
Jonh Ingham
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What This Mog Needs Is Some Muddy Waters

Posted over 2 years ago
It always raises a smile to think that so much psychedelic music was just blues played at jet-age volume with lashings of feedback and distortion. What a great idea! All those guys had already been playing the tunes for ages in their “folk years”, before The Beatles and The Stones made them realise it always sounds better on a louder guitar, but they had ample opportunities during the psychedelic years to drink from the source. During the heyday of the Fillmore, Avalon and Winterland, the cream of blues artists appeared: John Lee Hooker, Etta James, Howling Wolf, Albert King and BB King, Lightning Hopkins and of course, Muddy Waters. Hearing what “the kids” were doing to their music, do you think any of it rubbed off?Unfortunately, “13 Mile Road” is way too long at 11-1/2 minutes to upload, but you can stream it "here":http://concerts.wolfgangsvault.com/ConcertDetail.aspx?id=134|9950. If you think you’ve heard Muddy Waters, go and listen – he reaches deep into the amp and pulls out the loudest, dirtiest, muddiest, wickedest sounds you’ve ever heard a man made. The band go right after him. I’d love to have seen the faces of all the guitarists come to check out the Master.“Rock Me Baby” is the next song after the lesson in guitar shredding. Now he’s going to show how you dig a groove. Learn well.The band:Francis Clay - drumsCalvin Jones - bassSammy Lawhorn - guitarGeorge Smith - harmonicaLuther "Georgia Boy" Johnson - guitarMuddy Waters - vocals, guitar
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Comments (17)

  1. Michael Goldberg
    Michael Goldberg says I didn't see Muddy when he played the Fillmore in the '60s (I did see the James Cotten Blues Band open for Cream at Winterland, but was too young to appreciate James Cotten -- my idea of great blues, in those days, was John Mayall; Mayall's albums during the '60s and beginning of the '70s were and are great, but...). In the mid-'70s I saw Muddy play a theater right next door to the original Fillmore Auditorium and while he was on in his years, it was still a great performance.
    Permalink posted 07/19/2007
  2. Jonh Ingham
    Jonh Ingham says I am sooo jealous. Still, I saw BB King at Winterland in 68 and that is stuck in my brain like glue - a powder blue suit to offset the red of Lucille. Those guys knew how to put on a show. (My idea of blues in the 60s was John Mayall as well!)
    Permalink posted 07/19/2007
  3. mousetrap
    mousetrap says Aw, HELL yeah!!! That live "Rock Me Baby" is a sweet one. There was something so elemental and _basic_ about the way he played and sang...it just feels like you're getting down beneath the veneer and making contact with the raw, skeletal essence of the blues. No pretense whatsoever. Contrast this with B.B.'s version of "Rock Me Baby" (which I like very much) and you see how different these two bluesmen are. Thanks for the cool post - it's always good to recognize Muddy's place in the musical cosmos.
    Permalink posted 07/19/2007
  4. steve simon
    steve simon says awesome. bill, was so far ahead of his time, he used to book all those great bands that the kids didn't know and tell them, "before you get your desert( the dead), you have to eat your meat or vegitables(miles davis etc...)" that is brilliant
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  5. Jonh Ingham
    Jonh Ingham says Amen on 'Muddy Waters, Folksinger'! For those who don't know, it was put out in 62 or 63 when folk music was all the rage. It's a blatant attempt by Marshall Chess to ship records. What you get is a wonderful acoustic album with some extraordinary interplay between Muddy and Buddy Guy. Steve - Both Bill and Chet Helms (at the Avalon) had great, freestyling taste. I love the way you describe it!
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  6. ivylander
    ivylander says This is the kind of post that makes me wish that, in addition to the "Like" button, MOG had a "Love" button. At his best, Muddy conjures something that is very, very close to pure evil. That's what makes him great.
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  7. Spike
    Spike says Great post. Great poster (another Wes Wilson work?) Thanks for alerting me (us?) to the existence of the streaming concert website. If two guys in one post recommend the _Folk Singer_ album, it goes onto my list. Jonh, when you write that the Beatles and the Rolling Stones made the blues guys realize they should play loud electric guitar, that's true in a sense. But in the fifties, they had been playing loud. When the folk labels signed some of them up in the sixties, they had to unplug. In Muddy Water's case, he also had to unjazz. I had seen him at Club 47 in Cambridge and the Electric Circus in Greenwich Village _after_ the above Fillmore concert, and he was playing jazz blues, because he was used to playing to black audiences who by then wanted something more sophisticated than raw delta bottleneck blues. At the Electric Circus performance, some young white guy in the audience finally yelled at him to play something in his old style, and Muddy dutifully pulled out his bottleneck. To finally hear his '66 Fillmore performance here, it confuses me because he's playing in his old style, so why was he playing jazzy blues in New York after that? One of his greatest contributions was to unjazz the blues after WWII, and it's ironic that in order to survive twenty years later, he had to unjazz once again. Another contribution of his was his harpist Little Walter's method of cupping his hands around the microphone and the harp, creating a creamy tone rather than the usual tinny tone. Check it out on an earlier version of "Rock Me Baby" (1951) that wasn't reissued until 1991.
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  8. Shud33
    Shud33 says I am so diggin' this John. Awesome post!
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  9. contrabandwidth
    contrabandwidth says It always raises a smile to think that so much psychedelic music was just blues played at jet-age volume with lashings of feedback and distortion. So true. I've got a great bootleg of Chuck Berry backed up by the Steve Miller Band at the Fillmore in 68, and it's just straight blues. Good stuff. Also, listen to early Black Sabbath (well all of the 70's output pretty much), although it's heavy, Ioni was a great blues guitarist. In some ways in helping create the Metal sound they figured out how to simplify electric blues, heavy up the drums and bass, and of course add the volume and distortion you talked about. I listen to sabbath and it knows its place in history, where as a lot of new metal doesn't know it's place in history.
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  10. Grievous Angel
    Grievous Angel says seems like a good place to post this love the intro with levon helm
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  11. Ben FELTEN
    Ben FELTEN says You can never have too much Muddy Waters. Muddy was an amazing performer, a superb singer, a simple yet powerful guitarist and he knew how to surround himself with the best of the best. Muddy died when I was 10 and by then I'd never heard of him (I didn't know he was the guy belting out "I'm a man" on the Levi's adverts). But he was the first blues artist that I really dug. For another side of Muddy, I strongly recommend getting Folk Singer. Along with Buddy Guy and Willie Dixon (amongst others) he displays another facet of his talent that blended the rawness of the early delta blues and the sophistication of the NY Folk crowd. Oh Yeah...
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  12. Jonh Ingham
    Jonh Ingham says Spike - Indeed, it's a Wes Wilson poster - I bet it looks wicked under the blacklight. I meant the psychedelic guys had been folkies and then plugged in due to the Beatles and Stones, not the blues guys. I should have been clearer. Yeah, it's interesting what you say about him being jazzy while the hippie audience is expecting raw blues. My impression on this particular concert is that he witnessed or overheard Quicksilver shoving distortion, feedback and guitar dueling onto a Bo Diddley beat and reacted accordingly. This is the last night of a 3 day engagement, so he would have had ample time to soak up the atmosphere. (If you haven't heard '13 Mile' you should have a listen - it's way out there.) Once he'd left town, his normal style came out again. Mog is acting up right now so I'll listen to the track later. Though just the thought has me tripping on an early version of "Howling Wolf" that has all the licks he does on this night in '66. GA - Great video. Here's a man who definitely does NOT subscribe to the T-Bone Walker idea of showmanship. Shud -- You're more than welcome! Contra - "I listen to sabbath and it knows its place in history, where as a lot of new metal doesn’t know it’s place in history" Love it - It's how we sort the musicians from the pretenders. Chuck and Steve Miller...now that's an interesting concept.
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  13. ivylander
    ivylander says And then, Sonny Boy Williamson played with the Yardbirds, who started out as a blues band masquerading as a pop band, and later got heavily psychedelicized. Which leads us to Jimmy Page, and....seems pretty clear that blues and acid were actually a pretty good combination.....
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  14. kat3260
    kat3260 says This post rules (and all the comments). Muddy Waters built the bridge, man! I am beyond jealous of all you who were around for the great shows in the 60s & 70s. At least I have recordings...here's a lil somethin from Club 47 as Spike was discussing above...
    Permalink posted 07/20/2007
  15. ZZTodd
    ZZTodd says love me some muddy waters. this is some dirty stuff.
    Permalink posted 07/21/2007
  16. wassonii
    wassonii says After all this MW, I'm feelin' a little dirty and I even showered already! Seriously good stuff. A great many thanks!
    Permalink posted 07/25/2007
  17. Girlcrawl
    Girlcrawl says Superb tune, and you can't beat a line like this one: "Rock me like my back ain't got no bone" - Muddy Waters; what an ace!
    Permalink posted 08/03/2007

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