Although Hendrix is widely recognized as one of the greats in the Rock pantheon, his contributions to the development of the blues are inarguable. His unorthodox and wildly original style influenced his contemporaries, as well as the next generation of blues guitarists. Take a listen to British blues in the mid-sixties (the Rolling Stones, Yardbirds, etc.), and then listen what unfolded after Jimi exploded onto the scene (Cream, Led Zeppelin, etc.). Hendrix’s playing was instrumental (pardon the pun) in pushing the blues into the flamboyant, psychedelic direction it’s been hurtling down. Players have been following in his footsteps ever since: Stevie Ray Vaughan, Kenny Wayne Sheppard, Eric Johnson, Joe Bonamassa… He is the original guitar hero.

The folks over at MusicRadar have been collecting the thoughts, inspirations, and recollections of these players over the past few weeks, leading up to the anniversary of Hendrix’s passing. In their series “What Jimi Hendrix Means to Me,” they’ve got interviews with Sheppard, Bonamassa, Johnson, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and many others. Enlightening reading, and a fine tribute to a player whose style and influence will not soon be forgotten.

Lest ye forget, check out this classic footage of Hendrix at his “wildest”:

Jimi Hendrix: a celebration via [MusicRadar.com].

Each sample is tabbed out and includes a sample MP3 with a full backing band at full speed and a slowed down version to help your ears show your fingers what to do.

They sound great and make good stuff to work into your own lick-bag. Check it out, and while you’re at it, why not contribute some of your own licks by linking to them in the comments below?

[Coming soon: Drew's diatribe on terms like "lick." Am I playing a Popsicle? But that's for another day...]

Blues Lick·Tionary: Four Phrases to Add to Your Repertoire – Premier Guitar [via Premier Guitar].

One day you will need to mic up your amp. This is either because it’s a small amp and it won’t compete with the band, or that it’s a big amp and you’ve just been booked to play your local Enormodome! You might also want to mic up to reduce your on-stage volume as a band, and achieve a nice, balanced and full front-of-house sound, perhaps to preserve your hearing, or because your singer(s) like to be able to hear themselves [just never admit that you're conceding to them! – Band Politics Ed].

Yeah! Damn singers…

The article goes on to cover using a two mic setup, in addition to the traditional one-mic technique, and discusses the advantages of pointing a couple of mics at your amp while recording and performing.

All-in-all, a quick read, and interesting stuff. Check it out…

Gear Tips & Advice: Mic’ing a guitar amp via [Guitarist Magazine]

Included in the article is the interesting story of how SRV almost signed with the Rolling Stones’ record label, but was passed up due to Mick Jagger’s tepid enthusiasm over the possibility of selling many blues records:

One day in early 1982, Mick Jagger dropped by the horse-racing track Manor Downs to view some thoroughbreds. Millikin was also the general manager of the track, and he passed a videotape of one of Vaughan’s performances to his old friend. A few days later, Stones drummer Charlie Watts called Millikin and asked when he and Mick could see Vaughan play. Millikin hastily arranged a private showcase party in New York City at the Danceteria nightclub in April. Aside from members of the Rolling Stones, only a handful of people showed up, but a photograph and an article about the party appeared in Rolling Stone magazine. Rumors spread that Vaughan was going to sign a deal with Rolling Stones Records, but Jagger passed, saying as many others had that the blues just doesn’t sell.

If this article whets your appetite for more of the Texas guitar-slinger’s story, and you can’t wait for the book to come out (it’s schedule to be released later this month), I highly recommend you grab a copy of Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford’s excellent biography, Stevie Ray Vaughan: Caught In the Crossfire.

Stevie Ray Vaughan: Lone Star Rising – Guitar World [via GuitarWorld magazine].

If you think about it, in a typical jam scenario — with a vocalist, another guitarist, a harmonica player, maybe a piano, and even a saxophone — you’ll probably get a couple-dozen bars to solo over in a given song (if you’re lucky), which means that the rest of the time, you’re playing some kind of rhythm. You should, therefore, be focusing as much time practicing your rhythm guitar as your lead playing. Probably more, when you get right down to it.

One of the most important skills a good musician has is the ability to keep good time. With that said, one of the most important tools a good musician should use when practicing is a time-keeping device. And the best is often the plain-old, stripped down metronome. Drum tracks and loops are fine, but a metronome keeps things simple and shines a harsh light on your mistakes, when you fall out of time. That’s what you want when you practice: honest self-critique. For that purpose, a metronome is your best friend.

I remember when I first started taking lessons, my teacher Will Brady told me to get a metronome, go home and practice the scales he had taught me that week. I did as I was told, and, on returning to my next week’s lesson, confessed, “I think this thing is broken, Will. It keeps speeding up and slowing down while I’m playing.”

Mr. Brady appraised my newly acquired tool wryly, looked at me and said, “No, Andrew. I think it’s the player that needs adjusting.”

And so it was.

When you first start playing with a metronome it can be a difficult exercise. You’re forced to think about things you might not have been aware of before, and all of your attention shifts towards the clicking box, away from your fingers. If you stick with it, however, you’ll learn to feel the metronome rather than listen to it. This is when your timekeeping starts to really solidify.

Start by using the metronome for playing scales or exercises that are fairly non-musical. Chromatic scales work great for this purpose. Then work slowly into using the metronome as your guide while practicing tunes, riffs, and licks. Ultimately, you should have that thing clicking anytime you’re working on something that you already have comfortably under your fingers.

The Berklee College of Music offers an excellent YouTube segment on using a metronome for practicing blues. By having each click count for the 2 and 4 of a measure, you get more of a back-beat feel while practicing. This method really swings at faster tempos. Check it out:

YouTube – Essential Blues Guitar Practice Tips [via YouTube user BerkleeMusic]

So… what say you? Do you practice with a metronome? What tips and tricks do you have? Let’s hear it!

Uhhh… Box? What’s that?

Luckily, “box” is a term used to describe a very common pattern used by bassists and guitarists in both major and minor blues tunes. Once the song got going, I recognized right away what he was after, and managed to fall in after a couple of bars.

A blues box is a rhythm pattern, typically played with a swing feel, where the bassist and/or guitarist cycle through the I, V, bVII, and octave notes, forming a “box” on the fretboard as you play. In the key of A, you’d be playing the notes A, E, G, and A again (only one octave higher). You can either play them in an ascending or descending pattern. Take a listen to a couple of samples:

Blues Box Pattern, Ascending, in A

[audio:/loops/12bar-Blues-Box-Asc-A-132.mp3]

Blues Box Pattern, Descending in A

[audio:/loops/12bar-Blues-Box-Dsc-A-132.mp3]
This pattern sounds great at just about any tempo, and as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, works with both major and minor blues, because the third isn’t played. Without the third note of the scale there to tell clue you in, it’s “tonally ambiguous” (not to be confused with “totally bogus!”).

Take some time to get this pattern under your fingers, going up, and coming down. You’ll get a TON of mileage out of it, I promise you.

Here’s a quick video showing how the fingering works on a guitar:

For practicing, you can download more MP3 backing tracks in different keys and tempos over at the Loops page.

Have fun!

For those of you out there who’ve never heard of Ms. Brown, you oughta check her out. I think I’m going to add this song to my jam repertoire. It doesn’t follow the traditional I-IV-V pattern; the chorus is a 16-bar blues (with four extra bars of the one in there), the verse vamps between the I and the IV, before ratcheting up to the V chord. Here’s how you’d play it (loop track to follow):

CHORUS ("Mama, he treats your daughter mean"):

I  / / / I  / / / I  / / / I  / / /
IV / / / IV / / / I  / / / I  / / /
I  / / / I  / / / I  / / / I  / / /
V  / / / IV / / / I  / / / I  / / /

VERSE ("Mama he treats me badly.. etc.")

I  / / / IV / / / I  / / / IV / / /
I  / / / IV / / / I  / / / IV / / /
(as many times as you've got faults to point out... 
 wrapped up with...)

I  / / / I  / / / V  / / / V  / / /

Anyway, Ruth Brown: One of the greats in the R&B pantheon. This YouTube clip just KILLS me.

If you’re a fella’ who wants to play Ruth’s tunes, just give them a “sex change.” For instance, I’ll often do “Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean” as “Mama, She Treats Your Baby Mean.” In the end, romantic injustices go both ways; you can usually take a tune sung by a member of the opposite sex and spin it in your favor. Need an example? Bonnie Raitt did a marvelous job with John Hiatt’s “Thing Called Love.”

Ruth Brown, the so called “Queen Mother of the Blues”, died in 2006, which is too bad. In addition to her career as a vocalist and hit-maker, she was heavily involved in musicians’-rights issues and was instrumental in forming the Rhythm and Blues Foundation in the late 80′s: an organization dedicated to the historical and cultural preservation of rhythm and blues music and pivotal in assuring royalty rights for Blues musicians. Additionally, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993. Her voice is missed.

You can learn more about Ruth Brown’s life and influence over at Wikipedia. Check her out…

Video courtesy of YouTube user BIRDIE29

Got an iPhone? Acoustic Guitar Magazine has a review of four different iPhone tuners. Pretty incredible stuff when you think about it: You can use YOUR PHONE to tune your guitar!

I am personally sold on Agile Partners’ Guitar Toolkit which, in addition to offering a very accurate chromatic tuner (for the uninitiated, the microphone that you talk into picks up the sound of the guitar string, and the app analyzes the frequency to provide tuning information in an attractive, familiar interface), works as a metronome and chord reference. Virtually indispensable nowadays. In app terms, it’s kind of pricey at $9.99, but I remember buying my first dedicated Sabine electronic tuner for $49.99 back in the day. So, by that comparison, it’s relatively cheap, and extremely practical. And we love us some practical stuff here at the DrewsBlues!

It has created a quandary for me, however. Now I find that I can’t go anywhere without my phone, and I use it for so many different purposes that keeping a decent battery charge is a constant challenge when I’m on the go. Nice problem to have, I guess.

This article only covers iPhone, which is too bad, as it ignores the excellent batch of Android and Blackberry devices out there. If you’re using one of those smart phones, I’m curious: What guitar apps are you using ?

Anyway, check out the article.

Acoustic Guitar: Four iPhone Tuners Review.

Right now, it’s pretty much focused on my neck of the woods (Southern California), but they’re always looking for jams. Anywhere. If you know of an event in your area, drop by the site and add it to the calendar!

JamCalendar.com – Local Live Music, Unscripted.

I’ll be creating and posting more in the coming days, but these should get you started:

[audio:/loops/16bar-6-144.mp3] Download 16-bar blues

[audio:/loops/16bar-G-144-nobreak.mp3] Download 16-bar blues (no break)

[audio:/loops/8bar-A-120.mp3] Download 8-bar blues

Check out all of the loops!