A weird thing I’ve noticed lately watching reaction videos to musical performances is the kind of takes people have when exposed to good musicianship. Some amazing performance on whatever instrument and a lot of times people would say “That’s good but it takes a lot of talent to do something like that.” And it’s like, no motherfucker, it takes a lot of PRACTICE to do something like that. I think they know this and are just trying to rectify the cognitive dissonance of having illusory superiority while also realizing they’ll never do this:
I wonder if that is partly why people are obsessed with singers and rappers. Both of those things appear to be deceptively easy to lazy idiots (of course they are not easy). We all probably know some tone-deaf howler that fashions himself a natural Freddie Mercury gunning for American Idol. Similar thing for kids thinking they would all be rich rappers and DJs by doing no work.
Buddy Guy’s live show includes a lot of crassly educating (mostly white) audiences on the history of the blues. Definitely worth checking out if he’s still around after the COVID World Tour.
I’m all for authenticity and educated historians pairing political statements with unconventional approaches like piano blues sans rhythm section. It sounds really impressive on paper. The only problem is that, in practice, it’s musical anesthesia. Buddy Guy plays the guitar with this ass.
Just learning now that Henry Butler passed away two years ago at the age of 69. Man, that guy was so much fun to listen to. Who doesn’t love barrelhouse piano?
The best thing about Spotify is seeing what your friends are listening to. Sometimes I click on someone’s playlist and it’s filled to the brim with non-mainstream bands I’ve never even heard of. “Music” is a pretty big place.
