As Ottawa Bluesfest continued this past weekend I had the chance to catch Lukas Nelson, the son of country superstar Willie Nelson. Definitely shades of the old man, soul filled voice, story telling writing, a love of music and his audience were shouting “chip off the old block”…then the band picked up tempo and turned into a rocking blues band and Lukas showed us his blues guitar techniques.
On this clip you can you see him playing with his teeth, the showman was front and center
Found this clip of him performing a sweet version of “Flooding Down In Texas…” the firmly played anthem of another Texas son – Stevie Ray Vaughan.
There’s no doubt Lukas Nelson is finding his way, he has all of the tools it will be fascinating to see how he puts them all together as the months and years go by.
Filed under blues guitar by on Jul 10th, 2012. Comment. 
Here’s a funky little blues guitar shuffle in E I put together earlier today…this is my Stratocaster played through an older Fender “The Twin” amp with a Blue Daddy Goudie FX box boosting the gain and tone notch.
I played this with my fingers so I could gets some simultaneous base line walking with fills as I went…sounds pretty good for no backing.
This entire song is played in the open E position with a walking base line in E that looks like E-G-B-C-E played with my thumb while my bottom second and third finger played the higher E and B strings of the E-cord – same position but moved to A and then finishing in the V position of the I-IV-V blues progression on B back down to A and back to E.
The fills are various E blues scale fills including some open string type stuff that you may find Freddie King cooking up on Hideway and such.
What do you think?
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Leave a comment, love to hear from you guys.
Filed under Jeff Smith by on Jul 8th, 2012. Comment.
It’s Christmas time here in Ottawa again!
What? Christmas in July?
Christmas time for Blues Junkies like me – it’s Ottawa Bluesfest time again…and even though the Festival gets bigger and more diverse each year, there are still some great blues moments I’ll be taking in.
One of those happened on Thursday evening when hometown heroes (and recent Juno award winners for Best Blues Album “To Behold” – a solid mix of rocking blues, soul and funky R&B that defines the MonkeyJunk sound) collaborated with New Orleans performer Johnny Sansone for a deep-fried blues set joined by the Texas Horns.
After some MonkeyJunk original songs to heat up the set, Johnny Sansone (a giant of a man by the way) joined them for a smoking rendition of “Corn Whiskey”.
If anyone doubted they were in for an authentic Southern blues experience despite the Northern roots of MonkeyJunk, those doubts were quickly erased. The crowd built and for another 1-hour we were treated to a heated exchange of blues guitar from Monkey Junk guitarist Tony D, funky base and soul from Steve Mariner and steady back-beat of drummer Matt Sobb.
You all know I’m all about blues guitar, but Johnny Sansone is perhaps one of the lesser known blues harp players (at least I haven’t heard as much about him as say Sugar Blue or the late Paul Butterfield or even Kim Wilson of the Fabulous T-Birds)
HINT – see that MonkeyJunk and Johnny will be playing together at Ottawa’s ultimate blues destination – The Rainbow Sunday July 8th – you will want to check that out if you can.
Here is a small taste of what we saw – if you get the chance to see either MonkeyJunk or Johnny Sansone – take that chance for sure.
Jeff
Filed under Blues Festival by on Jul 7th, 2012. Comment.
Came across this video sharing the details of Jimmie Vaughan’s guitar setup…if you are a fan of Jimmie you know that he is a minimalist (that’s what they called Steve Jobs by the way…so nothing wrong with that!)
I’m a huge fan of Jimmie Vaughan’s simple, clear, biting tone – but find at times he could use some more sustain and little more low end.
Indeed, in this setup we see why he gets such a “thin” tone…it includes often setting the Fender Strat pickup to one of the lower positions, setting the tone to high treble and playing the guitar “cold” (not at full volume) as well as his amplifiers are set with presence and treble extremely high (almost full) with Bass way down near 3-4.
Interesting talk with his guitar tech, always learn from these setup reviews:
Filed under jimmie vaughan by on May 11th, 2012. Comment.
I have to admit – a great Texas Shuffle a la Stevie Ray Vaughan or Freddie King before him just gets my blood pumping.
I have a son that is just now learning guitar, and though today’s generation is into all of this Electronic Dance Music stuff, I have to admit he even taps his foot when he hears a good blues guitar shuffle come on.
It’s one of the very first things we often learn on guitar (after mastering the basic chords), but getting a great blues shuffle down has as much to do with timing, feeling, swagger (confidence) and right handed picking technique as anything technical.
Here’s a great Kenny Wayne Shepherd number that features a bad-ass Texas Shuffle, tell me if this isn’t the coolest sound you have ever heard!
Kenny Wayne Shepherd – Shotgun Blues by Zone19
Doesn’t that make you want to go pick up your guitar and try to get that timing down, not to mention the great fills between chords…how’s your Texas Shuffle coming?
Filed under texas blues by on Apr 29th, 2012. Comment.
Wow man, I was so impressed by this Jimmie Vaughan interview, mainly because he goes through the thought process of how he (and how other great blues guitar players like BB, Freddie King, Eric Clapton and Gatemouth Brown) developed their own style.
It’s one thing to learn the guitar, another to be able to play like your heroes and still another to have the confidence and desire to forge your own sound.
Not only do you become a musician and guitar player, but you become an innovator and artist using this approach.
Isn’t it better to leave this earth having shared and created your own sound instead of just imitating others?
How do you develop your own style… Jimmy’s way of describing it is “play what you hear”…now that makes total sense!
I remember hearing BB King talk about how he developed his style of “fills” by trying to come up with the horn (sax) fills he would hear in songs…that became the BB King style of blues playing.
So if you want to or already play guitar, think about what do you want to hear and try to incorporate that into your playing.
Here’s the video:
Filed under jimmie vaughan, texas blues by on Apr 5th, 2012. Comment.
He’s been paying his dues, which these days has as much to do with hitting the social networks as it does hitting the clubs.
Texas blues guitar player Tyler Bryant, by all accounts, is the real deal impressing live audiences and YouTube nation…a double whammy marketing effort building his brand before his first album is due out this summer. His “Living Room Jams” have hit it big with YouTube audiences as he builds his reputation and chops.
It certainly doesn’t hurt to have the likes of Eric Clapton and Vince Gill in your corner not to mention stints opening for Jeff Beck and playing with Aerosmith.
Learning lessons from the likes of BB King who takes an active interest in all of today’s blues greats making sure they focus on their music and not get wrapped up in the destructive lifestyle that seems to take so many from us too early…not a bad lesson for 21-year old that is about to make it big.
Here are a few videos that show Bryant’s considerable talent…if you’ve had the chance to see him live, leave us a comment and let us know what you thought.
The first one is an acoustic slide called Lipstick Woman – shows some good potential on the slide, my own advice would be to slow things down a notch, amp up the feeling and put more into each note instead of trying to dazzle with the max number of notes. Stevie Ray always had Jimmie (his brother) to balance his amazing energy and speed with gut-wrenching feeling.
Now, an electric blues (sweet Gibson) through a Fender Amp called Shackles where the slide playing is a little tastier…
Finally, a shot from his opening slot with Jeff Beck..how amazing would this be to jam with Mr Beck?
All-in-all, at 21 he has so much blues guitar playing in front of him…let’s see where he takes it.
Filed under texas blues by on Apr 3rd, 2012. Comment.
Ottawa blues trio MonkeyJunk took away the top Canadian Blues Award at this weekend’s Juno Awards…nice icing on what has been a very busy and positive year.
From day 1 – when Matt Sobb, Tony D and Steve Marriner came together for an open blues jam at Irene’s Pub – the chemistry has been strong.
Tony D’s amazing raw blues guitar talent combined with Matt’s steady back beat and the immensely talented Steve Marriner has just worked…can’t wait to see what comes next.
Their 2011 CD “To Behold” is the basis for their success in 2011 and the Juno Award, definitely worth a listen for those of you who have not had the chance to listen to this exciting, fun band.
They have just finished work on their latest CD collection where they will once again refine their sound into a mix of R&B, blues, soul and rock& roll…seems like the Sky’s the limit, we’ll all be looking upward. Here’s more in the Sun Ottawa newspaper.
Filed under New Blues by on Apr 3rd, 2012. Comment.
At first I have to admit to thinking Carlos Santana, guitar God of the psychadelic 70’s, sold out accepting a 2-year Gig at (of all places) Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.
After all, isn’t this where old stars go to live out the twilight years of their career – Celine Dion, Bobby Vinton, Tim Allen (Oh ya, he wasn’t a musician, just a handyman guy or something)
But then I thought, House of Blues with 1500 intimate seats with a mix of rock and blues guitar legends joining him on stage like Buddy Guy, Derek Trucks, Ben Harper or pretty much anyone you can think of and pretty soon you could erase all of the tackiness going on outside.
If I happen to end up down in Vegas during one of his 80 shows I do know I’ll be looking him up – usually I escape to the sanity of BB Kings blues club when I am stranded on the Strip, now I can take in a little Carlos Santana – come to think of it…pretty cool!
Here’s the release – he talks about “experimentation” – doesn’t that just summarize the career of the wonderful Carlos Santana
Filed under blues guitar, Blues Legends by on Feb 25th, 2012. Comment.
Obama kicking back with some of the BIG GUNS of the blues including BB King, Buddy Guy, Mick Jagger, and Jeff Beck as they film a special Tribute To The Blues related to black history month – should be televised Feb 27th on PBS, I’ll be watching for that.
I think its great when a President like Obama not only puts his weight behind something like this, but actually has the courage to stand up and live out everyone’s dream – to jam with the greatest bluesmen alive in King and Guy.
Not a bad voice either, have to give him credit for belting it out – but he can use some more authority in getting his message across (wait a minute, I was talking about the song!)
Not a great fan of mixing politics and art, but in this case they all looked to be having a great time…would have been cool to see him with a hat and some sunglasses though, what do you think?
Filed under Blues Legends by on Feb 24th, 2012. Comment.
