I'm going to a Jason Ricci and Newblood show on Friday night. Apparently Brody Buster is opening for him. I don't know a whole lot about him, but I've watched several youtubes of him when he was a kid, and listened to his current music on his myspace page.
B.B. King called him "one of the great harmonica players of our time despite his age". I know in another thread Adam had different comments. Anybody heard him play lately?
Should be a fairly good concert on a Friday night. I'll report back on Saturday morning. Actually, it may be more like Saturday afternoon! Jason and crew are scheduled to start at 10:30, and if they play their usual 4 hour set I may be wiped out. I'm an "early to bed, early to rise" kinda guy. Late nights are hard on me these days, and hangovers hurt more than they used to.
Brody Buster is a classic example of a player who's success got to him too early. He never really progressed past the point he was playing at when he was 10 or whatever.
Too many people told him he was great, too many people called him the "best" etc and it capped his ability to play. Now that he's in his 20s he's the kind of player most of us would say is very average.
This is why you must ALWAYS push yourself to be better. This is why you have to look at yourself realistically and work on your weaknesses.
Most of the people out there don't even know what a good harmonica player is and you're really selling yourself short if you accept what others say.
This is one of the reason I am fairly hard on most of you guys. I tell you how it is and where you stand. I don't want any of you to be the next Brody Buster.
Keep an eye on LD Miller, he's the next person who has a great opportunity to wear the Brody Buster crown. I watch him at SPAH and that kid thought he was the shit and didn't take the time to learn from anybody. When he sat at my table, I showed him a few things, he couldn't do it and then left because it was too hard. OOOOOOPS..... Jay Gaunt stayed at the table and now look at him. Jay is going to be an amazing player but he'll always be a punk to me. Jay if you read this... PUNK!!! LOL
I was thinking about that one - LD seems to be super super fast but I haven't heard much else to set him apart from any other players - so as he gets older - his young age really won't matter as a talking point and he'll have to look for other things to stay in the limelight.
Budda good point on the realistically evaluating your own music. That's tough! Know matter who you are and what level your at. You will never be able to do everything, but that also means that there is always something to learn! I consider myself a student of the harmonica. Its more fun that way Buster Brody can play the harmonica. Is he impressive by any means? NO! Give them hell Budda! Just leave me out of it!! LOL I'm going to post some shit soon!
I saw Brody Buster back in 1996 or 1997, when we were playing the Kansas City Jazz and Blues Festival. I'd heard a lot about him. I wasn't greatly impressed, and I wrote a piece about the contemporary blues scene back in 1999 that began with him. His mother wrote an angry letter to the editor in his defense. This sort of proved my point: blues isn't really a kids game, and a coddled, protected kid-bluesman is due for trouble later down the line. He'd better HOPE he's due for trouble, since it's learning how to survive and deal gracefully and soulfully with trouble that the best blues are about.
I haven't followed his career since then, except to discover that he's got a MySpace page and is still gigging pretty regularly. I think this is great. Gigs produce musicians, over time--at least if the musicians are willing to keep growing.
So I have absolutely no opinion about his playing. I haven't heard him recently, and when you're dealing with a 28-year old that you haven't seen since he was 12, it fair to assume that some growth has gone on. Buddha suggests that not much growth has gone on. I wouldn't know. I'll be curious to hear your report from the front lines.
Last Edited by on May 27, 2009 12:42 PM
Adam, I think it's unforgivable for a professional harp player to be playing sour harps like that. drop it and pick up another one, how hard is that?
Some of you may think Brody's playing isn't bad in the clip Adam posted and ignoring the sour harps the playing is not that bad. The point is how much had he improved since he was young? Almost NONE.
check out this video from 1996 - 10 year prior to the video Adam posted. The playing in 1996 is borderline great when you consider he's 12.
Brody was a no show, No call, no excuse, mystery on that date with us in KC. Apparently when he does show up, he is focusing on guitar in an alternative rock band these days with little to no harp. The promoter of the show was awesome too (I felt bad for him) and although we had very few people there that evening by comparison to our other shows, there were more people than we had ever had in KC before so that was cool and the club rocked. Preston thanks for saying hi! I am a huge fan of BB KIng and have been. I believe Live at the Regal to be the single greatest blues record ever made. BB King seems by almost all accounts to be a wonderful, giving and concerned human being, however BB is very prone to saying lots of grandiose things often.In his defense This usually occurs while he is under some pressure to do so. I believe that BB quote about Brody was spoken on either the tonight show or Letterman etc.. Remember BB and BK )Burger King) you know BB's had better burgers than a whopper but a couple million makes a whopper taste a whole lot better. No hating on BB aloud! lol
