Black Keys and White Stripes prove ‘less is more’

Black Keys and White Stripes prove ‘less is more’

“@paulgmerry. Well, thank you. I only absorb from those that speak the truth.”     DJ Bob (@zczbob). September 1, 2013.  Bluesmuse34. Is there a more insightful creative notion than less is more? The best designers and most successful musicians have always worked to this principle. Less is more is the forerunner to such modern recording studio…

Songs so dirty they’d be banned today

Songs so dirty they’d be banned today

Dirty blues lyrics and filthy rugby songs: the similarities. Like blues, rugby can be pretty dirty  CONTAINS PROFANITIES. PLEASE DON’T READ IF EASILY OFFENDED. At first glance, blues music and rugby union seem the most unusual bedfellows. Scratch the surface, though, and you’ll see the connections. The most obvious is how early blues work songs and after-match rugby songs…

Why I view the 1830s as blues’ first watershed

Why I view the 1830s as blues’ first watershed

BLUESMUSE31 UPDATED MARCH 4, 2023. While many blues historians write of the 1890s as the decade blues began, in my book ‘America’s Gift’ and e-Book ‘How Blues Evolved’ (Vol 1), I put a case for the 1890s being simply the second blues watershed before the birth of modern blues. The first blues watershed, I concluded, was in America in the…