Paul Merry Blues

Blues 100 years ago: from America’s first female guitar hero!

Coming soon. New Carlos Wilde tracks.

First slide guitar blues. Who, when & where?

Iconic rock book, but no rock prophesy.

I’ve just re-read one of the seminal books on the evolution of rock & roll, 47 years after I first obtained it, so if that doesn’t date me, nothing will. Perhaps I was given it by the author. I simply can't remember. When I say ‘evolution’, I mean the history of...

Earliest Electric Guitar Blues.

When did rock & roll get hip again?

Shein Die: the mystery photographer keeping blues alive

Birth of the Blues/Rock Guitar hero.

Electric blues and rock guitar heroes … do they still exist, or are they relics of the past, now most possible note combinations and innovations have long been worked out? That’s not a question I feel I'm qualified to comment on, subjectivity being the main influence...

Muddy on Stones. Keith on Muddy.

When pianos thundered in Texas.

American Thunder: How rock 'n' roll evolved. Part One. The first thunderous notes of the oldest of rock 'n' roll's forerunners were hammered out by black musicians, on second-hand, often second-rate pianos called tin pans, in north-easternTexas, sometime around...

Click ‘Browse Archives’, on the black bar above, to access the index, and click on ‘Why America’s Gift’ to get the lowdown on my book of the same name.

America’s Gift, you’ll find, is 390 pages explaining American music’s unique evolution into blues and rock ‘n’ roll.

For the first time, all you ever wanted to know about the history of blues and rock is now in one book, full of blues firsts and blues facts.

Below is our video for August 2017. It includes a great live version of Willie Dixon’s ‘Spoonful’ by UK supergroup Cream as well as Howlin’ Wolf’s earlier version..

“Of all America’s creative gifts to the world, does anything touch us more than the music we call the blues?

Rock’n’roll, old school R&B, rock, soul, funk, jazz, metal and pop are just some of the captivating musical genres that have rocked and rolled out of the blues. It is the mother of all American music.

For lovers of popular music, how can blues not be America’s greatest gift of all?”

Paul Merry.

Preview here: America’s Gift