Slidin'
& Glidin'
By
Dominic Horton
I
was very sad to hear of the passing of the blues legend BB King on
Thursday, hot on the heels of the death of the Labour party following
the general election the week before. BB King was my first love in
the world of the blues and so he has a special place in my heart.
More specifically it was King's album King
of the Blues Guitar that
got me into the blues originally. At the time, when I was 14 or
15 years old, Halesowen library used to have a collection of vinyl
records that you could hire out (for ten new pence a pop, if I recall
correctly) and so I used to try different types of music and artists
and I borrowed King
of the Blues Guitar as
part of this controlled experiment. When I dropped the needle on the
first track, Slidin'
& Glidin', I
instantly knew that it was for me. The album was a compilation of
instrumental tracks so at that stage I was yet to have the pleasure
of hearing BB's rich and characterful voice but I played the album
over and over and was keen to get back to the library to borrow more
blues albums. Next I hired a Muddy Waters record, I forget which
though I remember I
Can't Call Her Sugar was
the first track and it was a recording from the 1950's, so I was
introduced to the harder edged Chigago blues, which is of course
altogether different from BB's velveteen guitar. That was
it, I was off and running as a lover of the blues and I haven't
looked back since.
 |
| The late, great BB King, the Chairman of the Board. |
I
was intoxicated by Muddy Waters' slide guitar playing and the
accompanying sound of Little Walter's harmonica so I saved up and
bought those instruments myself and tried to replicate the sound. I
didn't have a great deal of success but I must have driven the
members of my household mad trying. I sounded less like Muddy Waters
and Little Walter and more like Muddy Harmonica and Little Talent.
It
is strange how when you revisit books or films that you enjoyed
earlier in your life that your experience of them, and how you
interpret the work, can change over time: I first read On
the Road by
Jack Kerouac when I was eighteen years old and at the time I found it
to be a joyful whirlwind of electric energy but when I re-read the
book a few years ago I found it to be very dark and brooding. The
book, of course, had not changed but I had. But music doesn't seem to
be burdened with this change of perception and after hearing of BB's
demise I dug out the tape that I made of King
of the Blues Guitar and
it instantaneously sounded every bit the same and as good as it did
when I first heard it when I was a youth.
The
cassette itself had weathered well and the sound quality is still
more than acceptable after all these years despite it being a cheap
tape in the first place, so you can keep your ipods and MP3 players,
I'm happier having something more tangible in my hands. It
was exciting rooting through boxes in my cupboards and unearthing the
tape, putting it into the stereo and pressing the play button and
hearing the delights of Lucille, BB's guitar, cascading out of the
speakers – you simply can't have that experience with an ipod
download. Nor can you replicate the thrill of dropping the needle on
a much anticipated vinyl record.
 |
| Mojo Buford, by request of Toby In-Tents |
Years
ago, before people had access to the internet, I was desperate to
find a record, Blues
with a Touch of Soul, by
Mighty Joe Young after hearing a track from it on Paul
Jones's Rhythm and Blues show on BBC Radio 2 but I couldn't
seem to get it anywhere. So I employed the services of a record
search agent and many weeks later, when I had all but forgotten about
the matter, they contacted me to say they had tracked down a copy of
the album in the U.S. It cost me a pretty penny but you can imagine
my elation and unbridled excitement when the postman delivered the
record. I hastily unpackaged the disc and before even reading the
liner notes I put the record on the turntable and readied to play it.
But before I settled the stylus down I hesitated as I was
suddenly plagued with an unwelcome thought – what if the
record is sh*t? Fortunately the album turned out to be as magnificent
as I'd hoped it to be and it remains a firm favourite of mine to this
day.
 |
| Mighty Joe Young. |
After King
of the Blues Guitar I
listened to a number of other BB King albums and started to read
about the man and his life so it was with great excitement that I
found out that a documentary about BB was to be shown on the
television and I could barely contain myself waiting to watch it. But
frustratingly on the night of the broadcast my step-father wanted to
watch another programme so I was scuppered, there was no video or
catch up TV or anything like that and we only had one television set
in the house, so I had no means of watching a recording of the
programme. We take it for granted these days that we can see
television programmes at our leisure by a variety of methods but back
then you either watched a show when it was broadcast or you missed
out altogether. Things changed later that year when I was bought a
black and white portable television to watch the Mexico World Cup,
which meant that I could hole myself up in my room, as teenagers tend
to do.
I
saw BB King in concert just the once, at Birmingham Symphony Hall,
and the world class acoustics lent themselves well to
King's classy playing and band. But I never got to see Muddy Waters
in concert as he died in 1983, when I was just 12 years old, but I
did get to see one of his harmonica players, Mojo Buford, at the Bear
Tavern Blues Club in Bearwood in the early 1990's. While Tom Holliday
and I were waiting for Mojo to start the gig Tom made favourable
comments towards a tall, leggy, long haired blonde woman who was
standing in front of us with her back to us, accompanied by her
boyfriend. It transpired that the “boyfriend” turned out to be
none other than the internationally renown rock star Robert Plant (of
Led Zeppelin fame) and the “woman” turned out to be a fella. Once
Tom found out this information all of a sudden his comments about the
person turned less favourable.
 |
| Mud Morganfield. |
Also
a few years ago I saw Muddy Waters' son, Mud Morganfield, at a gig at
the Jam House in Birmingham. When the support act were playing I
looked over my right shoulder and to my delight there was a man
watching the band who was the spit of Muddy Waters so I immediately
knew that he must be Mud Morganfield; I enthusiastically shook
his hand and welcomed him to Birmingham and said to him that I hope
that he enjoys the show. Mud said nothing but just smiled
and nodded his head. The support band wound up and it was
time for the main act, so the emcee took the stage and roared into
the microphone, “And now from the South side of Chicago, Illinois,
USA, direct from the Windy City, give a warm welcome to the stage the
man himself MR MUD MORGANFIELD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Whilst clapping
vigorously I looked over my right shoulder again to see Mud standing
there, waiting for him to rush to the stage. But he stood perfectly
still. Then from my over my left shoulder another fella proceeded
towards to the stage, high-fiving with members of the audience as he
went – it turned out that the man who I had earlier shook hands
with was not Mud Morganfield at all but a regular punter there to
watch the show, just like me.
It
goes without saying that Hugh Queensbury and Dustin Scoffman, who
accompanied me to the gig, were highly amused but not for the first
time in my life I was embarrassed to say the least. You could say
that the incident gave me a bad case of the blues.
©
Dominic Horton, May 2015.
Lowlife
is dedicated to the memory of the late Jonathan Rendall
Email:
lordhofr@gmail.com
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