I'm a big fan of both Molly Gene and Bob Log - I wouldn't call them blues at all, but they sure do incorporate some of its style into their music. I can appreciate it for its difference to traditional blues. Bob is pure entertainment, and an accomplished musician at his playing style. He gets more of a novelty label at times for the helmet/mic get-up and the humor often evident in his songs and live acts, but if you take away the costumery and kept the vocals to a lower fuzz to emphasize the music, he knows how to keep a hellbilly tempo and guitar line going.
Molly Gene stops by Seattle a few times per year and I'm there when I can be. As far as Molly Gene and harmonica, she plays some on her first cd (clearly dubbed in as it sometimes plays behind her singing) and uses it live, but she doesn't pretend to be (nor is she) an expert at it in this musical style. She uses it more for atmosphere- droning tones and less technical melodies or additions to what her busy feet and guitar are doing. Her vocal style is clearly more howl as she replicates what her onstage characterization is - She's got a trampy alley cat vibe in dress and demeanor onstage, and the howling and growling and gritty wails fit right in.
Somewhere in all of this is also the underrated Scott H. Biram, who takes his country/rock/blues to a unique level and style as a one man band.
I really like it. And while in Switzerland, check out Reverend Beat-Man. These guys found the box and decided to play outside of it. A new way to package and enjoy a thing with old roots.
That's my 2 cents, and I'm probably stickin' to it.
that was not worth a shit......they would have to pay me to go into someplace like that...wish I could go back to the days when blind willie mctell was playing for tips@pig&whistle in atlanta...he could have got all my money!!!!
@Billy: You spend a lot of time finding bad faith and hypocrisy in other musicians. I happen to like Ben Prestage's music; you think he's a fake. So, full disclosure--and purely because I'm curious: What sort of family do you come from, that you find in Prestage such clear and pressing evidence of fake outsider pose where many people see a pretty compelling and authentic backwoods southern guy? (For the record: My paternal grandfather grew up in a dirt-floored shack in a one-mule town in the Lithuanian countryside and my maternal grandfather was a homesteader in the California desert.) And do you have facial hair? I'm sure you've posted all this in other threads, but I'm trying to catch up. I just don't get your claims about how certain kinds of beards make somebody a fake. Maybe there's a language of beards that you're hip to and that I'm completely ignorant of. Speak, brother! How do you know all this?
If you're the same Billy Shines as the guy with the page the website called OUTSIDER FOLK ART NATION.......
...then maybe you're judging Prestage harshly because he ISN'T a member of the club. Go a little easier on the guy! Maybe he's just a backwoods hick and isn't up on all the cool outsider-art websites. Maybe he's not a skilled networker.
Also, how do you know how much Ben Prestage's harmonica cost? And if it indeed costs $80, what's wrong with that? Isn't he allowed to save his pennies and buy whatever instrument he really enjoys playing? It sounds as though you're accusing him of bad faith simply because he plays what you believe is a somewhat more expensive instrument than he ought to be playing. Maybe he saved for it, as many of us do--or maybe one of his fans gave it to him and he tried it and liked it. Or maybe, just maybe, he's a f--king incredible musician and the new team at Hohner are smart enough to see a marketing future in him and are sending him free harps. You seem determined to prosecute him for bad faith, regardless. How do you know what the real story is? Or are you just guessing?
(I've played the cheapest over-the-counter Marine Bands for more than 30 years, BTW, and I love 'em, but I don't judge any harmonica player on the basis of the instrument he uses. I judge him on the basis of how well he plays--or doesn't play. Lately, after huge reluctance, I've started to experiment on gigs and in recording sessions with more expensive harps. I hope to hell nobody judges me adversely simply because--for example--I play one of Joe Spiers's custom harps on a song or two.)
I'm not as quick as you are in sussing out the fake hobos. But I do my best to hear the music behind the words, and you sound to me like a profoundly angry guy who likes to publicly express his anger and disdain, particularly at other musicians.
To be specific, in your post above you strongly insinuate that Ben Prestage and his ilk are "stereotyped blues douche[s]." Those are Class-A fighting words. I'm trying to figure out where you're coming from. Maybe you know something I need to know. I'm always willing to learn.
[EDITED TO ADD]: Actually, I just went to Prestage's website and found his bio. You've misread it pretty badly, I believe. He says nothing about coming from poor black sharecroppers. He comes from poor moonshine-brewing whitefolk on one side--or at least that's how I read what follows--and white musician/bohemians on the other. The word "black" never shows up in his bio. The word "blues" definitely does, though--as does the word "outsider." Your claim in your post just above is essentially that his beard, his expensive harmonica, and his confected bio make him a pretender. This seems like an awfully sketchy claim to me. In any case, I believe that his music speaks for itself.
Here's the full text copied from his bio page: __________________________________________________________
Ben Prestage’s musical background began before he was born... even before his parents were born. Ben’s great-grandmother was a Vaudeville musican who toured with Al Jolson and also participated in medicine shows. Her daughter was a Boogie-Woogie pianist and painter who used to play for Ben when he was coming up. On the other side of the family tree, his grandfather, who was a Mississippi sharecropper turned Ben onto the sounds and culture of Mississippi and Blues in general.
“When my father was growing up in Mississippi,” states Ben, “ they never had running water and the only electricity was one light bulb that hung from the ceiling, but they had it better than some of their neighbors, because they didn’t have dirt floors. I grew up in rural Florida, on a 14-mile-long dirt road, near the headwaters of the Everglades. It was 7 miles either direction to the nearest paved road, and when you got to pavement, you still weren't near a town. It was panther, gator, and cottonmouth country. Out there, there was only one kind of music in the house. Whether it was being played on an instrument, or on a recording, it was Blues.
“One day though, in my early teens, I went to help a neighbor build a chicken-coop on his property. When we went inside to eat lunch, I asked him about a banjo I saw in the corner. He picked it up and I heard Bluegrass music for the first time. He was from a musical family and learned old-time banjo from his father from the South Ohio/North Kentucky hills. He lived half a mile away, but it was so quiet out there, you could hear that banjo all the way to my house, if he was on his porch and I was on mine.. He made homemede wine with my dad and when he’d come over, he’d bring his banjo and show me how to pick with my fingers instead of a plectrum.”
Later while living in Memphis, Prestage became a busker (street performer) on historic Beale Street. This is where he perfected his drum-kit. "I played out there a few times with nothing but a guitar and my voice. Once people heard me they liked it, but it was hard to get them on my side of the street with all the other music going on down there. There were some other guys out there who played drums with their feet, and they always got people's attention. I started playing drums with my feet as an attention grabber but soon found out that the drums played with foot pedals actually enhaced my music dramatically. Not only were people listening and buyin' discs, they were now dancing and hollerin' to boot. Now I am to the point where, if you close your eyes, you would think there was a professional drummer with a full-size drumkit behind me. I learned alot from the guys I shared the street with, including John Lowe, (inventor of the Lowebow, a type of diddley-bow that I play), Robert Belfour, and Richard Johnston."
Ben returned to Memphis over the next few years for the International Blues Challenge (the world's largest gathering of Blues musicians) and within three consecutive years took he 4th, 3rd, and 2nd place. He is also the only two-time recipient of the Lyon/Pitchford Award for "Best Diddley-Bow Player." Ben's interesting approach to instrumentation, (fingerstyle guitar, harmonica, banjo, lap-steel, fiddle, resonator guitar, foot-drums, vocals, and his award-winning original songwriting (recipient of "The Most Unique Performer" at "The Song- writers' Showcase of America") has earned him invitations to perform across North America, Europe, and as far as North Africa. All awards aside, he has proven himself, through his live performances, to be the future of American Blues, Roots Music, Americana and is one of today’s most talented outsider.
Last Edited by on Jun 03, 2012 9:00 PM
@Billy: Nah, nobody is going to kick you out for expressing strong opinions. God knows I've pissed people off for speaking my mind. I just think you're being way too hard on Ben Prestage--personally hard on him, in a way that seems a little excessive and a little too focused on stuff that I don't think he's paying any attention to, like the kind of harmonica he happens to be playing. (Full disclosure: I've never met or spoken to Prestage, but at one point I invited him to Hill Country Harmonica and he emailed me back to say that he'd learned a few things from my YouTube lessons.)
I'd be the first to admit that Prestage's bio is working the "I grew up on Tobacco Road" angle pretty hard. But some people who work that angle actually DID grow up in the boonies, and many blues artists, white and black, have press bios that stress this sort of stuff. Keb' Mo's bio--not his current bio, but a recent one--stresses his "Mississippi Roots" because his parents came from there. My buddy Brad Vickers, a NYC blues scene guy through and through, has a bio on his website that reads "Brad comes from the Pine Barrens of Long Island’s rural East End. He is the scion of a musical family from the Pine Barrens of Chintoteague, Virginia, where his grandfather played lap steel and drums." The pine barrens of Long Island! Now there's a blues pedigree! But heck: he's a fine player and he's paid his dues with any number of real blues guys. I'm a downstate New Yorker and NYC guy, but I've been living in Mississippi for a decade and I'd be a fool not to play it up. At least I don't make a point of saying "I'm the guy who sold his soul to Mr. Satan."
whats all this about some Hobos being fake,For the record Hobostubs has nothing to do with being a train hoping Hobo,Its about a broke ass gambler smoking cigar stubs,Inside story,anyways I just happed to read about Hobos and know it wasnt about me,But hey people start setting rules to be a hobo,I just thought i would say you have to know me,and none of you do to understand where the name Hobostubs comes from.;-)But I am broke ,play a homemade guitar, and stink,been working in the garden needing a bath anyways,Dont exspect me to be jumping of a train anytime soon in a town near you.Ok back to your arguments on Hobos;-)Oh I hate to shave but ill do it once in awhile let it grow shave agian, ---------- Hobostubs
Last Edited by on Jun 04, 2012 3:41 PM
Again I know you wasnt talking about me,But its funny Ive had this thought run though my head awhile back,Cause Hobostubs was a poker name I have and used on poker sites back when i was playing daily and music had lost my interest in,When I started getting more into music again and started playing around with recording,I thought hey whey not use the name,But the last couple of years Ive got to thinking although im about as poor as a ruff dog,and definatlty could write a book on lifes dues,trials and tribulations but then again anyone who's alive has a book of there own,Im not homeless right now and havent rode trains from town to town and really dont want to imply I have,cause thats bad Mojo,but its the name I have.But sometimes I wonder how its looked at. ---------- Hobostubs
Last Edited by on Jun 04, 2012 4:58 PM
hes not from east germany hes from west germany. when he claims he was in mississippi learning from african american masters he was actually in a band with me in florida married to an american girl just to get a greencard. on his homepage it shows dr slides lowebow i showed this to johnny and he went throught the roof and wrote him saying "GET MY NAME OFF YOUR GUITAR" pfffffttt. if your a walking peice of shit that had to change your name to save your life just dont talk about your past at all but stop making up shit that simply isnt true. oh and before he discovered pimp shops and went bald he had long hair and wore socks with sandals and cutoffs. really downhome american blues like frenchfries and mayonaise.
Billy, I don't particularly like Dr. Slide's voice (see video below), but he's a decent guitar player, and I'm surprised, again, by your outrage about the fact that a blues aspirant--an ambitious musician looking to vault himself ahead of the pack--would change his name. Chester Burnett and McKinley Morganfield did that. In fact, if you're right that he had to change his name in order to save his life, he's a legitimate badass, even if he is German. It's nice to know that a few white blues guys have the nerve to be bold.
i played with a guy from his real hometown in WEST germany named yurgen. he said if axel ever come home we kick his ass! he had to go back home thats why he changed his and and appearance. like my grandma always said be careful what you do it will follow you for life. yeah adam he is a good guitarist. i also like ben prestage beleive it or not.
that clip of rl and jon spencer? that's very close to what Jag is doing and me with him. it's hard, distorted, goes off time here and there, it's loose and pretty wild. for me incredible amount of freedom on harp. i can see where rl and others of that ilk inspire those cats in europe to go kind of wild and seek a form of freedom not always found in keeping things neat and tidy and on time musically. this has been such a revelation for me, starting around the time i first heard the remix version of "it's bad you know/i went on and told her". and the fact is, i had no idea how that stuff had begun to influence me until i hooked up with Jag and we began playing! there is a wild aspect to the style. is it blues? maybe that's in the ear of the beholder. did Memphis Minnie do blues? Tbone Walker? Chuck Berry? again, one must decide for oneself. when a band i was with in the 90's started doing Chuck Berry it sounded like blues to me but looking back we were doing prototypical rock.
Adam has a habit of stimulating the thought process and getting us thinking in different directions. i for one am grateful for that. ---------- http://www.reverbnation.com/jawboneandjolene
It's some sort of Tom Waits/Son House-inspired alt blues. There's a lot of interesting European alternative roots music coming out. I'm a fan of T-99 as well, though they're a lot more conventional than Bob Log III etc
There's a good couple of compilations of some of these sort of artists covering Hank Williams and Leadbelly. To be honest I prefer hearing them rather than an over reverential straightforward cover http://www.emusic.com/listen/#/album/various-artists/hiram-and-huddie-vol-1-hiram/11386627/:
I see the trash/ punk/ alt blues as a little similar to what Sublime were to ska/reggae bands, infusing it with a some punk sensibility and picking up a different audience. But I'm probably over-analysising here.
Last Edited by on Jun 05, 2012 5:06 AM
II? wtf? theres only one sonny boy. yes when youre a god incarnate in human flesh on the earth arrested and imprisoned on trumped up charges. escape by means of magic and higher supernatural powers. yes you need to change your name to avoid rearrest by the revived evil roman govt (i never spell that word out yecchhh!) then you need to change your name. when your a 2 bit theif and other musicians are looking to kill you/ set your car on fire then at some point you need to cut the shit admit youre an asshole that cant have a full band because you cant get along with anyone. stop lying to yourself that you can sing like a 500 lb african american and simply lay down and die. sonny boy has many names eleggua/eshu/yeshu/exu and he will get even with you for this transgression. moeja
"when your a 2 bit theif and other musicians are looking to kill you/ set your car on fire then at some point you need to cut the shit admit youre an asshole that cant have a full band because you cant get along with anyone."
Sounds a lot like SBW II to me. He could play harp, but he wasn't a nice guy.
theres only one account of sonny stealing anything. eleggua has two sides http://thehiddenpowers.com/images/exu_detail.jpg one good one evil just like sonny boy http://usr.audioasylum.com/images/1/12058/Sonny2BBoy2BWilliamson2B2B4.jpg sonny was a god who is a mortal to judge him?
I have a high regard for the MBH forum. It offers an ongoing education.
@kudzu and posters of the videos Thanks for this thread sharing some music I had not heard, and some I had heard.
@posters Thanks for any sharing of opinions about the MUSIC, and why you like and dislike the MUSIC in the videos.
No thanks for any posted arbitrary judgmental critiques of the authenticity of performers, steeped in a sense of self-righteousness and grandiosity.
This is just another form of "othering" and self aggrandizement by demeaning others. It reflects more on those who post such critiques than the musicians being criticized.
Music lives beyond any pigeonholing of genres. Music comes from a wide range of backgrounds and is part of human experience/expression.
I suggest that we hear, discuss,and play more music. Let's focus on the music. ----------
in defense of the "judgmental critics", I find these,can add soul and life to the forum. Keep on being soulful, soulful people! Especially the latest one on the thread: very bluesy!
disclaimer: I am not calling for breaching forum creed.
Billy, I don't cite it to disparage SBWII, just to gently point out that perhaps other people embellishing a bit here and there are just doing it in homage to one of the greats of blues. :)
yes nac but the fact is all sonnys stories check out. people called him a liar because a gods life is always more exiting than your average slubs headed nowhere. and to compare yourself to a god is absolute blasphemy. as a general rule if it sounds too good to be true its usually bullshit. but this just isnt the case for sonny boy the one and only real one and not II.
and doug i cant understand a word of that i went to elementary school in liberty city (vanilla ice didnt hes a liar)
@mikolune "critiques" not "critics" I was talking about what was written, not who wrote it.
The point of the post wasn't to stop anyone's expression of strong opinions about this or any music. I think that it is good to post our reactions to the music, and I think the OP has said he expected disagreement.
I was previously not aware of these performers, and I am not sure what I think. I might listen to this kind of stuff on a long late night drive, but not when I want to mellow out.
My post didn't name any individuals who posted.
My post was about a type of criticism some posters were using, of attacking the performer, rather than the strengths or weaknesses of the performances, or of the style or quality of music performance.
I don't think putting others down because they don't fit your standard of being authentic is in any way soulful or brings any kind of life or energy except for negative energy.
But if a poster thinks some posted music sucks, then go ahead and say why you think so! Please talk about the music...
Edited after Billy posted while I wrote the above:
Billy, sometimes you say some really cool stuff, and show great understanding, feeling, and insight. Sometimes your posts are almost poetry.
Sorry if I got too far into formal language - I used to have to write a lot of reports, and sometimes I get carried away with how I put things.
My posts state my opinion that it is useful to criticize what someone DOES (music, etc), but that attacking the PERSON performing the music for not being authentic by some standard, is not good, and not productive, and serves no good purpose.
