The other day I tweeted a quotation from Bruce Iglauer, founder and head of the independent blues record label Alligator Records, which got scores of likes and retweets. It clearly struck a chord. It said simply,
“Blues is the most important, most emotionally fulfilling music ever.”
Blues music, Iglauer has said, “speaks to some primal, necessary place in people’s consciousness.”
The quotation in my tweet was taken from an interview Mr. Iglauer had done with Dr. Marie Trout, and appears in her excellent and highly-readable book “The Blues: Why It Still Hurts So Good.” Marie Trout explores the world of blues music and its fans, helping us understand why this music speaks so deeply to people. In interview after interview, and in Marie’s analysis, we get to appreciate the way that the blues helps people gets their lives into perspective, feel a sense of community, find a means of emotional expression and catharsis, and helps them “keep on keeping on.”
Dr. Trout has done us a great service in this book, helping us blues fan understand better what we know deep down – that the blues has the power to touch us deeply. On one level it’s simple music, both lyrically and musically – but there is something in the rhythm, the repetition, the emotional content of the lyrics, and the actual structure of the musical form that has extraordinary power. And, of course, the genesis of the blues in a situation of oppression and suffering, inevitably bleeds through and adds its own weight to our sense of it.
How many times have you heard a guitar solo that somehow seems to reach right inside you and physically twist your innards? How many times have you just wanted to listen for entertainment’s sake, only to be drawn in to the intensity of the music. The blues’ll do that do you.
As Iglauer said in his interview, “I think a lot of us blues fans think we’ve found the Holy Grail of music and nothing else compares.”
Walter Trout is the elder statesman of blues rock, with a solo career going back some 28 years. Sixty-six years old and just three years on from a liver transplant that saved his life, he says that he feels like he’s “in the best years of my life right now.” He says he “has a whole different appreciation of being alive, of the world, of my family, of my career, and that he wants “life to be exciting and celebratory.”
And that’s why his new album, We’re All In This Together, sounds so joyful. It’s fourteen songs, with a guest on each song, trading licks and runs with Walter. All but one are original songs – the odd one out is the outstanding The Sky Is Crying, with Warren Haynes. The songs are upbeat, melodic, feature blistering, smouldering guitar work and are hugely enjoyable, each tailored by Trout to the style of each guest. His guests – all friends – are all musical stars in their own right, and include John Mayall, Joe Bonamassa, Sonny Landreth, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Joe Louis Walker, Robben Ford, Mike Zito, Eric Winter, Charlie Landreth, Eric Gale, John Nemeth and Randy Bachman. Walter’s son Jon Trout, himself an exceptional guitarist, also features on one song.
Walter Trout has been hard at work, on tour with the new album, but Down at the Crossroads caught up with him before he takes his show to Europe in October.
DatC: Hello Walter. Thanks very much for taking the time to talk to us. First of all, I take it that you’re well and healthy? Hale & hearty, as they say!
WT: Hearty as I can be! Yeah, I’m feelin’ great.
DatC: Congratulations on the new album, Walter, which is only just out, but which has already got great reviews from both critics and fans. I loved one of the Amazon reviews, which described it as “a face meltingly amazing blues rock album.” You’re pleased with how it’s been received?
WT: Oh I’m very pleased. I think it’s getting the best reviews I ever got. I’ve done 26 albums, and this was my first album that in the United States was at number 1 on the Billboard Blues Chart. And it was also number 1 on Amazon and on iTunes Blues. So that was the first time I hit number 1 on the triumvirate on the market over here. And it felt great!
DatC: Tell us what you were hoping to achieve with the album – because it’s very different from your previous one,Battle Scars.
WT: Well, how do you follow up Battle Scars? That was my dilemma. That album was so personal and so intense and so…dark. How do you follow that up? I put a lot of thought into what do I do now. Do I just write 15 more songs and play ‘em with the band? And what do I write about? So it was a bit of a dilemma.
Then I did a gig at Carnegie Hall with Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Edgar Winter. And I was hanging out with both of them and I said, “Why don’t we record something together,” and they were both like, “Yeah, OK, let’s do it.” And then I got this idea that that was what I needed to do – something completely different, where I just jam with my friends and we have fun. And it’s about the guitar playing and the music, it’s not all these deep depressing lyrics. So, I wanted to do something that was the exact opposite of Battle Scars.
DatC: And that comes across. You’ve got a stellar cast of musicians on this album– was it difficult to organize such a diverse set of people?
Warren Haynes (Photo: Jeremy Williams)
WT: You know, it wasn’t difficult to get in touch with them and talk to them. Two weeks after Carnegie Hall I played in Toronto with Sonny Landreth and Randy Bachman and I talked to them and they said, “Yeah, that’d be great.” And then a week after that I had a dinner in LA with Warren Hayes and Robben Ford we sat around for about four hours and had a great evening, and I talked to them [about it].
So it was easy to get in touch, but the difficult part of this album was the logistics. My wife handled that. ‘Cause all these guys are touring, they’re hard working players, so she had to schedule with each guy. A lot of ‘em were on tour – so she had to talk to them, get their schedules, “when do you have a day off? Do you think you could get in the studio?” And one guy would say, “In two weeks I have a day off in Cleveland.” So my wife would have to find a studio in Cleveland, set it up, find an engineer, go through all that stuff and then get in touch with Eric the producer, and have him get through to the engineer and send him the track. It had to be done with so many – what I don’t understand – so many bits and megabytes – all this stuff that I don’t get! And she really had the rough part of it. I just talked to my buddies and I had to write some songs and then go in and play! But the logistics of this were kind of a nightmare. She really put it together. I couldn’t have done what she did.
DatC: Did you write each song with the particular artist in mind?
WT: Yes, of course. I had to sit down and think – what do you write for Kenny Wayne Shepherd? OK, I got Kenny Wayne. I listened to a lot of his current stuff and it’s very blues-rock, like what I do. But then I think to myself – you know what, his roots are the blues. And my roots are the blues. So instead of writing some rocking thing, let’s play an up-tempo blues. Let’s play a shuffle, that’s where we come from.
So then I had to come up with some lyrics. And I thought about when I was a drug addict, what it felt like when you run out of drugs. I’ve been sober for 30 years, but I thought about when I was young and when I was addicted to drugs, and what was it like when they ran out. It felt good for a little while but then it hurt like hell. So, OK, I got a song here.
But yeah, the songs were written with the person in mind. For instance, Eric Gales. To me Eric is more of a kind of a funk fusion guy. He doesn’t really come out of the blues, he’s from a different genre. So I need to write something for him that he can jam over, but it’s got a bit of a funk feel to it. So I just approached each artist like that.
Photo: Michael Weintrob
DatC: Walter, as you say, the album is great fun, it’s good time music, But there are some serious bits here and there, aren’t there? Crash and Burn with Joe Louis Walker is a quite hard-hitting song. “Are we ever gonna learn, I’m getting mighty worried…” Is that a commentary on what’s going on in the United States at the moment?
WT: Well, of course, that’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? If I get going on this…That song is directly about what’s going on.
DatC: And then We’re All in this Together with Joe Bonamassa. “It’s up to you and me – black and white, left and right” speaks to the divisions in the country?
WT: That‘s exactly it. And you know what’s really funny, is three days ago my wife became an American citizen, and I went to the swearing in ceremony. And there were 5,000 new citizens being sworn in, and a lady got up and gave a speech, and she said, “All of you, you come from different countries, but now you are all American citizens, and I want you to remember something: we’re all in this together!”
DatC: Cue guitar solo!
DatC: It’s such a pleasure to hear you and Joe Bonamassa playing together. That interplay between both guitars at the end of the song is really something.
WT: Well, I’ll tell you, that was a lot of fun. What you’re hearing on there is the rehearsal! The only time we played the song! We were rehearsing it and I said to the band, “Here’s how the song goes,” and I said to Joe, “Here’s the lyrics I want you to sing.” Let’s see what happens. And at the end of it, I looked at Eric in the control room, because we were rehearsing, and I said, “Did you record that?” And he said, “Yeah.” And we all looked at each other and laughed and said, “There’s no reason to do that again!” So that was one take, spontaneous, no fixes, no overdubs, no nothing. And that’s the first and last time we played that song! And I think it gives it a real urgency.
DatC: So looking back, Walter, you’ve been immersed in the blues for a lifetime; you’ve played with John Lee Hooker’s band, Canned Heat, John Mayall, and artists like Big Mama Thornton, Lowell Fulson, Bo Diddley and the list goes on – what, for you, is the blues – is it the form of the music, is it the lyrics, is it the feeling? And what is it about this music that has such enduring appeal?
WT: To me it’s the feeling. You know Count Basie said, “Blues can be approached in many, many different ways , but it still remains the blues.” So, when I run into purists that say the blues has to be played a certain way, I just start laughing – you need to broaden your vision. I think the reason it’s enduring – and the reason it’s in a very healthy state – there’s a lot of young, great blues players coming up through the ranks – is that it’s the basis of modern music. It is about human emotion and human feelings and I this era we’re in of corporately produced computer stuff that has absolutely no soul to it, the blues is all about human feelings. It’s a person with an instrument playing and singing from their heart, and there’s always gotta be an audience for that, for music that makes people feel something. That’s what it’s about. It’s about making people feel it.
DatC: Let me ask you this, Walter: There’s a spiritual dimension to some of your music, Walter – whether it’s Gonna Live Again, or Fly Away or Bottom of the River, Turn Your Eyes to Heaven. How important is that dimension of life to the blues or to you as a person?
WT: How important it is to the blues – that I can’t answer. But I know that to me it’s very important. Something that I feel very deeply. I don’t want to call it religious; I want to call it spiritual, that’s a great word. I believe we all have a soul, there is more to life than what you perceive with your five senses. There are things we don’t understand, and we are all connected. We are all in this together.
I want to produce music that reaches out to all of our common humanity, and the common problems that we share, and our common joys, our common concerns. And to me blues has the potential to go very, very deep. And I strive for that and I aspire to that.
DatC: And let me ask you about one of my favourite songs in your catalogue, Brother’s Keeper, on Blues for the Modern Daze – where you’re quoting Genesis, you’re quoting the Gospel of Matthew. It seems to me that you’ve got right to something very important here about Christian faith in this song – that is a quite remarkably spiritual song, would you agree?
WT: The teachings of Jesus have been very prostituted and perverted over the years. And especially right-wing evangelicals over here forget what it’s about completely. There was a video put up recently of me doing that song. And somebody went on there and said, “You’re a heathen, you’re putting down Christianity.” I’m actually a Christian and I’m calling out the hypocrites.
The right wing in American who go around talking about God and Jesus – are so far away from Jesus’s teaching. Health care for the poor? – no, no way. Feed the hungry? – no way. You’re on your own. Well, that’s not what Jesus had in mind. And then they go to church on Sunday. It grosses me out, really.
DatC: Over quite a number of years, you’ve written songs bemoaning the way the world is going (e.g. Can’t Have It All, Welcome to the Human Race), culminating, I suppose in your 2012 album, Blues for the Modern Daze – songs like Money Rules the World; Turn Off Your TV; Lifestyle of the Rich & Famous and so on – you get a lot of the modern world in your sights there, Walter. Whether it’s getting trapped by technology, or global warming or corruption in politics or the corporate world – that’s the way of the world – how do we escape it? How do we live in such a world?
WT: I don’t have any answers for that. But I do know the sooner we realize that we are all in this together, the better. I hate to keep quoting that phrase – but the sooner we figure that out and we get past our divisions and past our tribal mindsets, the better it’s going to be. I don’t want to be pessimistic but I’m not sure there’s really much hope for mankind – because we don’t seem to learn from our mistakes. I’m hoping the younger negation is going to do a much better job handling the world than my generation has done.
I’m from the sixties hippy generation and we had all these high ideal, but it all turned to s**t. And we have done more to screw up the world than any other generation. It’s sad to me, it’s embarrassing. Because the hippies had a wonderful idea – they were really talking about the teachings of Jesus. Let’s love each other, let’s help each other. And then they grew up and went out in the world and it turned into the quest for the almighty dollar. And my generation has really screwed up the world royally, and I’m just hoping the younger generation is going to do a better job.
DatC: And the thing I always think about when I listen to the blues, is that often the song starts off when things are very bad – you know, Trouble in mind, I’m blue – but at the end of the song there’s that little note of hope – Sun’s gonna shine in my backyard someday. And you gotta hold on to that, I guess.
WT: Yeah, well, I believe that too. You have to hold on to hope.And my hope is in the younger generation. I see a lot of great kids out there.
Walter Trout, in his recent hard hitting song Brother’s Keeper, highlights the compassion of Jesus for the poor and downtrodden: “Jesus said to feed the hungry, Jesus said to help the poor.” The problem, says Trout, “Some of those so-called Christians, they don’t believe in that no more.” Fair enough, Walter, we get the point – some sort of heavenly-minded, individualistic, Jesus-makes-me-feel-better sort of faith cuts no ice in today’s world, where the difference between the haves and the have-nots is getting greater all the time.
But, to be fair, there are an awful lot of Christians who are rolling up their sleeves and getting involved with their communities and the wider world – sometime to their great cost.
Take Joan Cheever, for example. Joan is a former legal journalist, an attorney and founder of the Chow Train, a non-profit mobile food service which provides restaurant-quality meals for food insecure and homeless people in San Antonio. Since 2005, Cheever has been serving three-course hot meals for up to 125 needy people in various locations in the city several times a week.
The problem for Joan, however, is that she’s just been cited by San Antonio police officers for feeding the homeless in Maverick Park and faces a potential fine of £2,000. She argues with the officers that she should be allowed to continue sharing her food because it is a valid expression of her faith under the state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act. One of the police officers replied, “Ma’am, if you want to pray, go to church.” Joan’s retort was jam-packed with good theology: “This is how I pray,” she said, “when I cook this food and deliver it to the people who are less fortunate.”
As the author of 1 John says, “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?” Joan Cheever knows the answer to that.
How come the police have suddenly become aggression to Cheever after all these years? It seems this is merely the latest incident in a series of homeless crackdowns by police. It seems the city wants its homeless population out of sight, out of mind, and acts of compassion are being viewed as encouraging the “problem.” The authorities would prefer their Christians to have a quietest faith, which doesn’t interfere with business and politics, which sticks to church buildings and prayer meetings and doesn’t cause any fuss.
The problem is, if Christian faith is domesticated and becomes confined to church buildings and starts to revolve around the faithful themselves, it loses touch with Jesus and the New Testament. Jesus expected his followers to be feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, and spending time with the sick, those in prison and poor immigrants (check it out – Matthew 25). Joan Cheever’s got it exactly right – this is the essence of prayer.
Let’s hope common sense and compassion prevail when Joan gets her day in court.
2014 was another excellent year for the blues, as you can see from the list below. Blues music is so diverse that it’s very difficult to make a list that contains both acoustic and electric blues and everything else in between. But…notwithstanding that, here is Down at the Crossroads Best 25 Blues Albums of 2014. Feel free to disagree…
First of all, our top 10 –
Kenny Wayne Shepherd: Goin’ Home
Still only in his mid 30s, Shepherd has a 20 year career behind him. This is a wonderful, mature album, where he gives us 12 of the songs which first got him excited about the blues. We get guest appearances from Ringo Starr, Joe Walsh, Warren Haynes, Keb’ Mo’, Robert Randolph, Kim Wilson and the Rebirth Brass Band in a hugely enjoyable journey through the some of the absolute classics of the genre.
Keb Mo: Bluesamericana
Slick return to his blues roots, this is a very fine album from Keb Mo. A highly enjoyable set of songs, all but one are originals and there is some excellent guitar work. And nice to see a couple of songs dealing with topical issues in The Worst is Yet to Come and More For Your Money.
Luke Winslow-King: Everlasting Arms
Luke Winslow-King, ably assisted by his talented wife, Esther Rose, have given us a stunning album of rootsy, bluesy Americana in Everlasting Arms. It’s old-time, yet always manages to be fresh, and it’ll bring a smile to your face every time you listen to it. With 13 songs that weave seamlessly through the blues, country and folk with hints of jazz, the whole album is a delight from start to finish.
Walter Trout: The Blues Came Callin’
Willie Dixononce famously said, “The blues is the truth.” Walter Trout has given us a blues album that tells the truth, is all its starkness and rawness. Recorded prior to his liver transplant when he was quite ill, the music on the album attests to his remarkable strength of spirit. Here and there, Walter’s voice isn’t as strong as we’ve heard it and despite the subject matter of some of the songs, the album is life-affirming.
John Mayall: A Special Life
The Godfather of British blues, after more than 50 album releases, presents us with a very well crafted and excellently produced classic blues album. Four of the songs are originals and all eleven are beautifully performed by a talented band. Most enjoyable.
Kaz Hawkins: Get Ready
Kaz Hawkins’ new album, Get Ready, is inspirational, honest, warm, full of energy and infectious passion. Blues and gospel with a dollop of soul and R&B served up by an excellent band and a truly remarkable singer. Kaz’s voice is powerful, emotional, rasping, passionate, bluesy. And her music comes from a deep well of personal experience, trial and hope for the future. One not to be missed.
JP Soars: Full Moon Night in Memphis
JP Soars’ third studio release, Full Moon Night in Memphis, is one of the most enjoyable albums I’ve listened to this year. Every track of the 14 is simply a joy, with divergent blues styles which show off Soars’ fabulous guitar chops and excellent, gritty vocals. Entertaining, engaging and enjoyable.
Eric Bibb: Blues People
Top notch acoustic blues from blues troubadour Eric Bibb, with his characteristic upbeat songs and delicious guitar picking. In part a tribute to the memory of the Dr. Martin Luther King, the album is a fine mixture of country blues, folk, gospel and soul. Taj Mahal, The Blind Boys of Alabama, Ruthie Foster and Popa Chubby all guest in what is one of Bibb’s consistent offerings.
Luther Dickinson: Rock n Roll Blues
Luther Dickinson’s take on the blues is, I guess, not for everyone, but his quirky vocals, handy guitar chops and a terrific set of songs makes this a stand-out album of acoustic folk, blues, and country. This is raw and honest music, a welcome relief from much of the slick, over-produced stuff that is all too common.
Janiva Magness: Original
This is LA-based artist Magness’s best work to date, to be sure, 11 original songs, 7 of which she co-wrote. Wonderful vocal variation and control throughout these excellent bluesy, soul-laden songs. A treat.
And – here are our next 10 Best Blues Albums of 2014…
Gary Clark Jr.: Live
Often hailed as the future of the blues, Gary Clark’s Live is a very fine album of the best live versions of his song. Intense and passionate, it showcases his considerable guitar playing and grabs your attention from the get-go. Classic and traditional blues are fused here into a compelling fresh sound, which holds great promise of things to come from Clark.
Joanne Shaw Taylor: The Dirty Truth
Classy fourth studio release from Taylor who gives us ten strong songs of hugely enjoyable blues rock. The guitar work is outstanding as we would expect, but Taylor’s vocals are delivered with considerable aplomb. Much to enjoy here.
Ian Siegal: Man and Guitar
Ian Siegal – prolific songwriter, gifted guitarist, commanding performer – it’s all on display on this album recorded at the Royal Albert Hall by the BBC. With outstanding sound quality, this is a wonderful concoction of blues, folk, rock and roots music that is punctuated here and there with Siegal’s witty banter with the audience.
Rory Block: Hard Luck Child
Following her excellent tributes to Robert Johnson, John Hurt, Fred McDowell and Gary Davis, Block has given us a fine album of acoustic songs by Skip James. As usual, Block’s guitar work is terrific and she doe full justice to one of the most important early country blues artists, whose music was often haunting and unusual. The album has one original song, Nehemiah James, which serves as an introduction to James’s life story.
John Hiatt: Terms of My Surrender
Prolific Americana artist Hiatt offers us a compelling set of blues-infused songs with echoes of J.J. Cale, recent Bob Dylan and Guy Davis. Hiatt’s voice is as world-weary as ever, the songs heavy with a life-time of experience. Hugely enjoyable stuff.
Royal Southern Brotherhood: Heartsoulblood
HeartSoulBlood is remarkably upbeat and inspirational. Outstanding guitar work and lovely harmonies characterize the whole album which is funky and full of good tunes. There’s a lot of hope here, exemplified by the song “Love and Peace Will Heal the World.”
Nick Moss: Time Ain’t Free
This is a band in exceptional form here, with a heady blend of blues. soul, funk and rock-and-roll. No nonsense blues rock of the highest calibre.
Jo Harman: Live at the Royal Albert Hall
Recorded and produced by the BBC, this is a 2013 performance at Blues Fest at the Royal Albert Hall. There are 8 songs, all showcasing Jo’s excellent band and most of all her wonderful, emotional vocal performance. There is much to enjoy here – some very tasteful guitar work, versitile keyboards, terrific interaction between the two, and overall the band is a tight unit which seems to be enjoying itself.
Bad Brad & the Fat Cats: Take A Walk With Me
Bad Brad and the Fat Cats reach out and grab you by the lapels from the opening guitar riff of Take a Walk With Me and pull you right inside their rockin’ bad ass blues whether you like it or not, until finally they spit you out at the end of the Les Paul-laced Uma, thirteen tracks later. 13 original tracks of classic blues rock that always manage to stay fresh.
Joe Bonamassa: Different Shades of Blue
Guitar virtuoso’s first album of all-new material in two years. Blues rock, but at the same time should appeal to a wide audience. With help from a couple of Nashville songwriters, Bonamassa has given us a fine, varied album, well produced and featuring, of course, his trademark guitar chops.
And, Down at the Crossroads’ final 5 Best Blues Albums of 2014
Satisfaction, written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards in 1965, was, according to Richards, “the song that launched us into global fame.” It was the Rolling Stones’ first number one in the US and became their 4th number one in the UK, despite initially being played only on pirate radio stations because its lyrics were considered too sexually suggestive. The song is considered by many as one of the best rock songs ever recorded. It placed 2nd in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of “The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time”, and in 2006 was added to the Library of Congress National Recording Registry.
Richards suggests he conceived the song in his sleep and his three-note guitar riff begins and drives the song along. As well as the obvious to sexual connotations of the lyrics, there also seems to be a frustration with the increasing commercialism of the modern world expressed. The radio blasts out “useless information” and the ads on TV tell us “how white my shirts can be” and that you can’t be a man unless you smoke a certain brand of cigarettes. Jagger’s lyrics go on to bemoan the pressures of touring, of “ridin’ round the world.”
Fast forward seven years to the Stone’s sojourn in France to a period of excessive drug abuse and the album Exile on Main Street. The Stones have been a hugely successful rock’n roll band all over the world for some years, so wealthy they are tax-exiles, living outside the UK. The song Rocks Off goes:
And I only get my rocks off while I’m dreaming, (only get them off)
I only get my rocks off while I’m sleeping.
Feel so hypnotized, can’t describe the scene.
Its all mesmerized, all that inside me.
The sunshine bores the daylights out of me.
Chasing shadows moonlight mystery.
Headed for the overload,
Splattered on the dirty road,
The song sounds jaunty and upbeat, but the lyrics are thoroughly dispiriting. Even the sunshine “bores the daylights out of me.” The singer is thoroughly jaded – neither making love nor getting kicked causes any interest any more. The only escape is into the world of dreams, of unreality. Mick, Keef and the boys still can’t get no satisfaction.
Success, fame, adoring fans, an excess of whatever it is you can have, smoke, or inject just doesn’t seem to do it. An interesting article in the New York Times by Arthur C. Brooks (Love People, Not Pleasure) recently made this very point. He quotes a research project from the University of Rochester which found that some people had “intrinsic” goals, such as deep, enduring relationships, whereas others had “extrinsic” goals, such as achieving reputation or fame. Guess which group turned out to be happier – yep, the “intrinsic” group.
Our society is addicted to fame, to celebrity, but it’s precisely those who want desperately to be noticed, loved, wanted who end up the unhappiest. And let’s not forget about social media, where we all crave the “likes” and the admiration of others for our clever or funny posts or photos of us doing great things. Brooks quotes the results of many psychological studies: “People who rate materialistic goals like wealth as top personal priorities are significantly likelier to be more anxious, more depressed and more frequent drug users, and even to have more physical ailments than those who set their sights on more intrinsic values.”
Brooks comes to the conclusion that, “If it feels good, do it” is nothing but a popular piece of life-ruining advice. Money, fame, sexual hedonism, accumulation of things all have their lure – but the evidence leads to the conclusion that a cycle of grasping and craving can’t give us no satisfaction.
The true wisdom of happiness lies in relationships with others.Walter Trout realises this in his song Blues for the Modern Daze, from the eponymous album. “You get yours, I’ll get mine…Ain’t nothing left to give, It’s dog eat dog, In the Modern Daze.” And in Take A Little Time, from The Blues Came Callin’, he bemoans the “telephone…buzzin’,” the “people at the door,” and the fact that “the days are flyin’ by, goin’ too damn fast.”
The answer? “You gotta take a little time, baby, Take a little time for love.”
The simple truth is we can’t get no satisfaction in things or in fame. We get satisfaction in loving others. And as Arthur Brooks says,
“It requires the courage to repudiate pride and the strength to love others — family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances, God and even strangers and enemies. Only deny love to things that actually are objects. The practice that achieves this is charity. Few things are as liberating as giving away to others that which we hold dear.”
Walter Trout has had a pretty torrid last year with serious illness that ended up with his being at death’s door awaiting a new liver. I saw him play in Belfast last autumn, where he looked a shadow of his former self, but nonetheless played his heart out and seemed to draw life from the response of the appreciative crowd. He’s now got his new liver and reports are that he’s recovering well. Let’s hope that continues and that we get to see him playing his unmistakable blues licks and taking command of the stage as only he can. I saw him play Glasgow about three years ago – the support band was a group of young guys, up and coming, with a guitarist who could play blistering solos, at great speed and with great intonation. They were very, very good. But when Walter and his guys took the stage, the whole gig was transformed – here was a guy who had all the technique and musicality, but who owned the stage, who connected with his audience, and who reached out and grabbed you with his music and his lyrics, and who sent you away with a smile on your face.
Remarkably, Walter’s new album is released this month – The Blues Came Callin’. Willie Dixon once famously said, “The blues is the truth.” The blues has always told the truth – not only about individuals’ struggles and feelings, but about the way the world is, the injustice it contains. Well, Walter has given us a blues album that tells the truth, is all its starkness and rawness.
The song Willie alludes to Walter’s experience of being ripped off in the music business, about someone who has come back to “pick my bones and “peck away my eyes.” We get blues about lost love in Hard Time and blues about facing your own fears in The Blues Came Callin’. And, perhaps most poignantly, Walter gives us an insight into what he’s being going through of late in Wastin’ Away and The Bottom of The River. As his health failed, he found himself looking through the mirror, realizing he’s “living day to day” and feeling like he’s “wastin’ away.” Regret for the past surfaces when he sings “lookin’ back at where I’ve been, good times and mistakes I’ve made, The people I have loved.”
He goes on to compare his experience to falling into a river and getting caught in a current so that he almost drowned. “It was cloudy – it was cold, At the bottom of the river, Is where I met my soul.” Again the past haunts him – “all the people I had loved…all I had done wrong,” yet somehow he hears a loud voice telling him “This ain’t your time to die.” “That’s when I decided to make it to the light,” he says – a remarkable testimony to Walter’s inner strength and determination in the most adverse of circumstances.
The music on the album attests to this remarkable strength of spirit. These are all blues songs, but none are downbeat. Yes, you can hear, here and there, that Walter’s voice isn’t as strong as we’ve heard it. But there’s life, there’s hope, there’s determination here. Despite the subject matter of some of the songs, the album is life-affirming.
In Take a Little Time, Walter reflects, as perhaps – sadly – only people facing the most adverse of circumstances take the time to do, on the need to step away from the pressure, the busyness, the “telephone…buzzin’,” the “people at the door,” and just take a deep breath, and focus on the most important thing in life – the people you love. As somebody famously said, nobody on their death bed regrets not having spent more time in the office. The truth is, for most of us, “the days are flyin’ by, goin’ too damn fast.”
So has it always been – Job, in the Bible said, “My days are swifter than a runner, they speed by,” and the writer of the Psalms thought we should “number our days, so that we might live wisely.” Or as Walter puts it:
“You gotta take a little time, baby, Take a little time for love.”
Walter’s looked into the face of death and gained some perspective on life. That gives the rest of us the opportunity to get that same perspective now, before we reach the point where regrets loom large.
Thanks, Walter, for giving us this gift of an album – honest, lyrical, beautifully arranged and produced. Let’s hope we can all take your advice. (And here’s wishing you a speedy and full recovery).
Postscript: Walter’s wife Marie wrote on 1st June: “Walter continues to do well…[he] now has a very good chance of living for a couple decades or more. His body will regenerate… The experience has shown us the beauty of the human spirit. We have experienced a powerful and encompassing sense of community and goodwill.”
In the places where the blues were regularly performed in the early days, the juke joints, there was a considerable amount of violence. “Wherever the blues is played,” said Charles Love, ragtime jazzman, “there’s a fight right after.” A great deal of “cutting and shooting” went on in the juke. These could be very dangerous places; violence was widespread in country “frolics,” where blues were played. Memphis Minnie said that at juke joints she and her husband would “have to run at night when they start cutting and shooting.” Minnie herself was not averse to resorting to violence – Johnny Shines recalled, “they tell me she shot one old man’s arm off, or cut it with a hatchet…Minnie was a hellraiser, I know that!”
The mixture of letting your hair down on a Saturday night after a long week of hard labour, freedom from white supervision, alcohol and the music was an explosive one. The violence of the juke is evident from many of the blues songs – Mississippi John Hurt’s Make Me a Pallet, which talks about his “good gal” who might turn up and catch his new lover to “cut and shoot” her; Little Walter’sBoom Boom, Out Goes the Light, where the singer says “I’ve been looking for my baby all night, If I get her in my sight…Boom Boom! Out goes the light”; a popular early blues number, See See Rider 44, which says, “I’m gonna buy me a pistol, just as long as I am tall, Gonna kill my man and catch the Cannonball” – are just some examples.
Even as late as the sixties, there was violence associated with the blues.Paul Oscher was a white harmonica player for Muddy Waters for a while and recalls that everybody carried guns. He claimed that Muddy Waters always carried a .25 automatic and a .22 in his shirt pocket, not to mention the .38 in his car. Even with the band, it was said that the only reason everybody didn’t get killed was that everybody knew everybody else had a gun. Paul Butterfield, a white blues guitarist in the 60s said that many times in the Chicago blues clubs he was scared – “I saw knifings and shootings…It was a very violent scene, man.”
Violence, of course, is pretty much part of the fabric of life, and has been since Cain killed Abel. The bad guys use violence to get what they want and the good guys then need to defend themselves using violence. And so the spiral continues. There seems to be an inexorable logic about it – it’s a pity, but there it is, violence is needed to quench violence. It’s an idea that is played out night after night on our TV screens and in cinemas around the country. One of my favourite TV dramas at the moment is Justified – cool customer and lawman Raylan Givans can be relied on to sort out whatever ruthless, psychopathic criminals he comes across and it’s entirely right and proper that he pulls the trigger in order to do so, without a moment’s thought. I watched Man of Fire (2004) recently, starring Densel Washington as a retired CIA operative who, at great personal cost goes after the kidnappers of child. He gets the job done – of course – but leaves a bloody trail of mayhem, explosions and shot-up bad guys behind him. Well, that’s what’s needed, right?
The continual diet of violence that we are exposed to, moulds our thinking, even if we don’t realize it. Quoting recent studies in the Lancet and other journals, and organizations like the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association, an article in the New York Times recently concluded that, “The weight of studies supports the position that exposure to media violence leads to aggression, desensitization toward violence and lack of sympathy for victims of violence.” At the very least we are convinced that violence is a legitimate means of bringing resolution and peace.
The myth of redemptive violence. That’s how theologian Walter Wink describes the paradigm which is reinforced in popular entertainment but which also underpins the very fabric of the modern nation-state. Wink says this is “the real myth of the modern world…the dominant religion in our society today.” Wink explores the primordial myth of ancient Babylon where creation is essentially an act of violence played out amongst the gods, where order is brought out of chaos by violent disorder. He suggests that this same myth prevails across a wide range of cultures, resulting in a view that violence in itself is not wrong, it is simply a fact – the social order depends critically on violence to suppress the powers of disorder.
He then goes on to discuss the way the Bible tells its creation story. Here we have a good God who creates a good creation, where good is prior to evil. Neither evil nor violence is part of the creation, but enter later, as a result of the first couple’s sin and the connivance of the serpent. He says “A basically good reality is thus corrupted by free decisions reached by creatures. In this far more complex and subtle explanation of the origins of things, violence emerges for the first time as a problem requiring solution.”
While we must reckon with the troublesome way violence is portrayed in the Old Testament as God-sanctioned – and easy, spiritualizing ways won’t cut it – the way of Jesus seems quite clear: love your enemies, pray for them, go the extra mile, turn the other check. All of which is followed up by the earliest Jesus-followers – St Paul, for example, with “bless people who harass you…don’t pay back evil for evil…live at peace with everyone…don’t try to get revenge for yourselves.”
Why have Jesus followers so easily made peace with war, when the New Testament and the early history of the church shows a strong commitment to peace and non-violence? Well I guess it’s not easy to disengage with the prevalent, assumed value of the need and the right of violence that is all around. Wink says that “the Myth of Redemptive Violence is the simplest, laziest, most exciting, uncomplicated, irrational, and primitive depiction of evil the world has even known.” He goes on to suggest that violence has become “pleasurable, fascinating, and entertaining,” in such a way that we are deluded into” compliance with a system that is cheating [us of our] very lives.”
The old blues songs merely reflect the violence that was and is part of society, whether as part of the oppression by whites on blacks during the Jim Crow era or within the juke. More recent songs kick back at the need for violence. Check out blues woman Caroline Wonderland’s powerful song about peace, Only God Knows When. The first verse has the great line “violence is no solution when life ain’t like you planned”, which Carolyn tells us applies to individuals and nations alike. Despite the appetite for war we’ve seen over the past ten years in the US and Britain, “There’s a hollow victory in winning, when everybody pays the cost, With retaliations by the hour, lives and generations lost”.
OrWalter Trout’sBrothers Keeper, which asks, “Are we supposed to be our brother’s keeper, Are we supposed to catch him, Catch him when he falls?” It recalls the murder of Abel by Cain, where Cain cynically asks God, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Trout answers the question by taking us to the words of Jesus – “Jesus said to feed the hungry, Jesus said to help the poor.” Violence is not the answer to the anyone’s problems – there is another way; there is a better way. Time to see the myth of redemptive violence for what it is – destructive, life-sapping, false.
You have heard that it was said, You must love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who harass you. Jesus (Mat 5:43)
Blues music, Iglauer has said, “speaks to some primal, necessary place in people’s consciousness.”
The Blues: Why It Still Hurst So Good by Marie B. Trout, PhD, Las Vagas, Yakkabiz, 2017
