Week 1 - 25 best live records of all time.

[bobsticks]

Swish - posts with gas

touchy, touchy

[BradH]

Yeah, I know, this is sooooo last week. But turn your head for a little while and look what happens: Swish throws down in front of God And Everybody with another Herculean effort to boost the RR post count up to the hot 'n' heavy days of Comp Fever 2000.

Maybe not.

Fillmore East. This list is already in trouble if this record is not in the top 5, maybe the top 3. There aren't 24 live records better than this. We could have a rational, open-minded discussion about this but you'd all be wrong.

Zappa's uptempo live version of Whippin Post off of Them or Us is, for me, the definitive version.

Gimme a BEEEEEEE. Gimme an ESSSSSSS. What's that spell?

Zappa's version is not uptempo compared to any live version by the Allmans. The striking thing about Frank's version is how faithful it is to the original, especially compared to his other cover songs with all the goofing and shenanigans. Hell, that was the tour he was goofing on a lot of his own songs but treated the Allmans with respect. R-S-C-T-P-C-E, find out what it means to me!

BTW, I saw that Zappa show. Oh yes, touch my ticket stub, touch it...

NP: Kayak II

[3-LockBox]

Yeah, I know, this is sooooo last week. But turn your head for a little while and look what happens: Swish throws down in front of God And Everybody with another Herculean effort to boost the RR post count up to the hot 'n' heavy days of Comp Fever 2000.

All pent up and no place to go...take yer coat off and stay a while.

Yes, having the Allman's Filmore East album at the bottom of a top-25 live albums list does smell a tad fishy. Prolly a token placement at that. This means prolly no Waiting For Columbus, no Frampton Comes Alive...ah well. Wouldn't be half as fun if it weren't some controversy.

[MindGoneHaywire]

I took a look at this list, and, like the last one Swish chose, it's more interesting than a typical '10 greatest guitar players who are always in the top 10 on GREATEST GUITARIST LISTS' type of list, in that it's going to inspire plenty of mixed opinions. This list seems like the guy who put it together was trying to be more provocative, while the team of geniuses who wrote 'The Mostest 50 Albums Evah' were going for a similar goal without understanding where the goalposts were.

So, in the interests of being provocative, there are some ridiculous choices, to be sure, along with a couple that make perfect sense. The Allman Brothers makes sense, of course, and while I personally don't quarrel so much with the placement, I understand why many would feel it should be ranked higher. I don't disagree so much as I don't really care...but maybe I can come up with 24 live albums I like better, maybe easily, maybe not so easily. That's because I like the blues & always have & have never been a big fan of what the Allman Brothers did with the blues.

There were plenty of people in the 60s who did things with the blues that were interesting, visionary, inspirational, respectful, authentic, maybe not so authentic, whatever. But while there were secondary figures who played large roles (Mike Bloomfield, Ry Cooder), or larger figures whose work with the blues might be overshadowed by other things they did, or merely by being overshadowed by similar, more prominent figures (Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix), in the end, the most significant figures in pop music in the 60s whose work helped to create an interest in, and an audience for, the blues, and/or actually managed to inject change into a rather well-defined genre, would be the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, and, arguably, Bob Dylan.

Their legacies are pretty solid, of course, and easily identifiable. And all departed from the blues at some point, with varying results. For me, personally, the only legacy I don't care much for is Clapton's, but that's another matter. He had been around for years, and had done some things I have always liked, years before the Allmans came around.

And then they did. And I don't hate them, and I don't hate this album, not by any means. I won't even go so far as to refer to it as overblown in any sense. But I have a problem with it even though I do think that musically there is certainly merit there.

They added nearly two minutes to Statesboro Blues, modest by their standards on this rec. No problem there, really. More than two minutes to Done Somebody Wrong, an Elmore James tune that apparently hadn't needed to be any longer than 2 1/2 minutes. Stormy Monday is another short song, usually less than 3 minutes, but often less than 2 1/2, and they blew it up to nearly 9 minutes. Did this song really require this arrangement? You Don't Love Me mostly clocked in at 3 minutes or less. In their hands...more than 19 minutes. In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed, typically 7 minutes, now nearly double that length at 13. And the 5+ minute Whipping Post more than quadrupled in length to nearly 23 minutes.

Should length really be looked at as this much of an issue? Of course not--if it's good, it's good, and if it's not, it's not (and besides, the released versions are said to be patchworks anyway). And there are some great moments on this rec, so I'm not arguing that it's not 'good.' But you get to a point where turning a 3 minute song into a 20 minute showcase doesn't work for people like me. I don't have to cling to a posture of preferring 3 minute songs, or accurate/authentic representations of blues songs, either: you want to rearrange, lay out, improvise, knock yourself out. If you're going to do that, this is probably the best example of it, at least with this sort of material. Yet every time I hear it I scratch my head wondering why it was necessary. And the only conclusion I can draw, in spite of the obviously-darned-good playing and general approach, is that it's not.

There's something very compelling about communicating what you want to get across within one or two runs of 12 bars that makes a solo potentially important to the context of the song. Rather than making the song an excuse to have 144 bars of soloing, or whatever multiple of 12 you prefer. You can say a lot of things in 144 bars, or 72, or 36...it's finding a way to make that statement in 12 that gets me. But then I'm not a fan of overemphasizing the role of guitar in the blues, where piano, vocals, and harmonica are simply not on the same playing field, so far as popular perception...due of course to the aforementioned Clapton, et al. Of course, it's not against any law that they did these this way, but Elmore James, et al, wrote with a particular structure in mind, even if that structure is rigid. Maybe it's rigid for a reason. And maybe it works best in spite of how rigid it was.

The legacy of jam bands & Southern Rock, not to mention the trend of taking 2:30 blues tunes & converting them into 20-minute wankfests by people who couldn't carry the Allman Brothers' gear, for the past nearly-four-decades for anyone within earshot, is not my cup of tea. I try not to judge a record on having spawned all this sort of thing that I don't care for...or I'd have a lot more issues with a record like Live At Leeds (among others) than I do. Having looked at the whole list, I guess I would agree that it should've leapfrogged others that were compiled by another guy trying to strike some kind of ironic hipster pose...but while I'll grant the credit I think this rec & this band deserves, I'm just never going to be a fan of how they did what they did. And that's reinforced by what they wrought. So I listen to them rather infrequently. Even after all this time, I still enjoy the first couple of Led Zeppelin records more. And amongst live blues recs, this can't touch Etta James Rocks The House OR B.B. King Live At Cook County Jail (which I've always preferred to Live At The Regal, and where, with perhaps one exception, you cannot make the same point I made above with regards to exaggerated song lengths).

See, we can have a reasonable discussion about this, and I'm not wrong.

[jasn]

MGH, I find it ironic that you've used almost more words than there are lyrics to criticize a live jam album for being too long.

[3-LockBox]

See, we can have a reasonable discussion about this, and I'm not wrong.

I agree with you. There's nothing about a blues song that warrants a 15 minute jam interlude, even if its the Allmans. I have to be in the mood to listen to the Filmore East album, but I can certainly see why its revered the way it is. That being said, I can certainly see where this album isn't a lot of people's cup o'joe. I seen that there list as well, and in my mind, the fact that this Allman Bros album made it on the list seems suspicious, considering the other albums in total.

But still, I enjoy lists like this because its a chance to, once again, consider music I may have otherwise never heard of, and that's why I came here in the first place. If I could guess every album on it, It'd be boring.

[jasn]

Is the entire list posted elsewhere?

[ForeverAutumn]

Is the entire list posted elsewhere?

DON'T LOOK!

It takes the fun out of the game.

[jasn]

DON'T LOOK!

It takes the fun out of the game.

Yeah, you're right.

[BradH]

Yet every time I hear it I scratch my head wondering why it was necessary. And the only conclusion I can draw, in spite of the obviously-darned-good playing and general approach, is that it's not.

There's no doubt that fitting an interesting, short solo into a well composed song is compelling. I agree totally, there's just something about it. But it's not the only legitimate way to make music. Jamming didn't start with the Yardbirds, it had been going on for years back in the swing era when soloists would take turns all night until the dancers were finally worn out in the wee hours. Then there was bebop. So there was plenty of precedent for this sort of thing in the 60's when rock bands were looking for ways to break the artistic constraints imposed by the music biz; it had just never been applied to the blues before until the Yardbirds did it. It was revolutionary, that's why it was necessary. Of course, there was much that was not necessary, Sturgeon's Law applies here as always. But I see a huge difference between a Duane Allman solo and any number of "lesser thans". It's all about focus. How long can you focus on the music before you're just moving your fingers. How much music do you actually have inside? Guys like Allman, Beck or Zappa seemingly never ran out of ideas when they jammed while other guys would fake it almost from the start. There's a difference between wanking and music-making.

Was any of this necessary for the blues? Does it matter? I don't buy the idea that Clapton somehow hurt the blues by being a non-traditionalist. The blues players were never as traditional as modern music lovers' fantasies would have it. It was very protean and took elements from country, folk, Tin Pan Alley, Hollywood, all kinds of things. Whatever it took to keep the audience interested, whatever it took to survive. These guys (and gals) were performing for people, not Alan Lomax. It was distinctly perceived by black audiences as show biz and performance, not folk music. I would agree that Clapton perpetuated the myth that the blues was always about some lone travelling guitarist who sold his soul blah blah blah. But young white blues lovers had already created that myth when they canonized Robert Johnson who, in reality, was practically unknown in his own time. Besides, rock 'n' roll was nothing if not blasphemous and non-traditional. That sense of experimention and pushing the boundaries and mixing genres was the driving creative force in rock music until the mid-70's. To say that the perfect song is the pinnacle of music is to say that nothing was "necessary" after Gershwin or Cole Porter or Weill or choose-your-weapon. There's more to music than the perfect song. Your description of the track lengths on Fillmore compared to the studio versions reminds me of that scene in Dead Poet's Society with the book describing how poetry could be measured on a graph. No one should be thinking about the clock when they're listening to music anyway. In fact, I would argue that jamming has a more human element to it than traditional songs because it more accurately reflects everyday life. Sure, you have to be at a certain time at a certain place on certain days and do certain things. But you don't really know what's going to happen so, in reality, you're making it up as you go along within a framework. (This wouldn't include free jazz.) In other words, I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with jamming. Obviously, this jibed well with the chemical inducements of the "youth movement" but it's not like all great songwriters were puritans either.

Anyway, as for Fillmore East, it was damn well recorded for its time and, to me, that's always a huge factor. After all, we're talking about live albums, not just performances. Are there 24 live albums that are better? Nah, not in the rock genre. But this is the problem we had with the other list because there are great live classical albums, live jazz albums, etc.; all kinds that won't be included.

[3-LockBox]

Anyway, as for Fillmore East, it was damn well recorded for its time and, to me, that's always a huge factor. After all, we're talking about live albums, not just performances.

Considering the writer followed this album with Tim Hardin and an album that was recorded in a bingo hall, it makes you wonder what the criteria is.

[Swish]

Considering the writer followed this album with Tim Hardin and an album that was recorded in a bingo hall, it makes you wonder what the criteria is.

....rock music, in all its glory, has largely failed to produce very many great live recordings, and that many of the greatest live performances were captured by bootleggers. He has some very interesting choices on his list, to say the least, and I hope that once I've posted the entire 25, everyone will post their favorite 25. In all honesty, I couldn't come up with 25. No way, no how, but rock historians like J sure can.

Let's just try to have fun with it. It appears to be drawing some interest, which is exactly as I intended, even though most of us, including yours truly, will disagree with many of his choices, or, at least, his ranking of them.

Swishalishous

[jasn]

1/2 here know the list and want to trickle it out, the other half left in the dark and scratching their heads. Too hip for me...

[3-LockBox]

1/2 here know the list and want to trickle it out, the other half left in the dark and scratching their heads. Too hip for me...

I guess I can see why you'd feel that way. It ain't tough to find the list if you're really feeling un-hip. I'll let you figure it out - it took me all of 5 minutes to find it. But no, I do not intend to 'trickle it out'. We've only discussed the last two weeks thus far. We've done this sort of series before and it makes for good, weekly discussion. But, scratch if you like.

[3-LockBox]

....rock music, in all its glory, has largely failed to produce very many great live recordings

agreed

Let's just try to have fun with it. It appears to be drawing some interest, which is exactly as I intended, even though most of us, including yours truly, will disagree with many of his choices, or, at least, his ranking of them.

dispair, wailing and nashing of teeth...for 23 more weeks....cool.

I'm so there.

[Rich-n-Texas]

I'm so excited!

[ForeverAutumn]

but rock historians like J sure can.

I wish I had 1/10 of J's knowledge! Not to turn this into a J appreciation thread but...

J, I love reading your posts like the one above. I always learn something from you. Keep it up.

(for those who may not know, J = MGH).

[MindGoneHaywire]

MGH, I find it ironic that you've used almost more words than there are lyrics to criticize a live jam album for being too long.

Too hip for me...

Sorry...



>There's no doubt that fitting an interesting, short solo into a well composed song is compelling. I agree totally, there's just something about it. But it's not the only legitimate way to make music.

That wasn't what I said...

>Jamming didn't start with the Yardbirds, it had been going on for years back in the swing era when soloists would take turns all night until the dancers were finally worn out in the wee hours. Then there was bebop. So there was plenty of precedent for this sort of thing in the 60's when rock bands were looking for ways to break the artistic constraints imposed by the music biz; it had just never been applied to the blues before until the Yardbirds did it.

Or Alexis Korner, or John Mayall...like I often say, jazz ain't rock...and in this context (putting aside momentarily the influence of blues progressions on jazz), it isn't blues, either. I'm not opposed to diluting the purity of a relatively simple form like the blues, or making it more complicated than it was. But that doesn't mean I have to be a fan of what the Allman Brothers did with it, either.

It was revolutionary, that's why it was necessary.

Yeah, fine, but, you know, I'm not much of a fan of Cream, either, but in spite of disliking their legacy, I find them a lot easier to take than the Allmans in this respect.

>Was any of this necessary for the blues? Does it matter?

To me it does. That doesn't stop anyone else from enjoying it, mind you, nor am I passing judgment on anyone's tastes if they do because I don't. I'm just responding to a placement on a list by explaining why I'm not a big fan. I have no problem with it at #25, or even #5 for that matter even though it might not crack my top 25. Saying the list ain't jack because it's this low is something I am willing to argue.

>I don't buy the idea that Clapton somehow hurt the blues by being a non-traditionalist.

Well, there isn't much to add to that, now, is there. I'll stand by the idea that every hacker who just has to keep on going for another 12 bars, and then another, because they just haven't said enough yet, is directly traceable to him; and had he done more I thought was great, the more of a pass I'd give him. I'm not a fan of much between the Bluesbreakers rec in 1966, or maybe Eric & the Powerhouse, and the Robert Johnson covers album from a few years ago. So I don't give him that much of a pass.

>The blues players were never as traditional as modern music lovers' fantasies would have it. It was very protean and took elements from country, folk, Tin Pan Alley, Hollywood, all kinds of things. Whatever it took to keep the audience interested, whatever it took to survive. These guys (and gals) were performing for people, not Alan Lomax. It was distinctly perceived by black audiences as show biz and performance, not folk music.

Yeah, I know, and you know I know this, too. But from some point probably around the 'Eric is God' thing, Clapton & followers like the Allmans had the luxury of audiences who were satisfied that they'd been entertained by a purist form, not something where the performer had to reach into a bag of tricks to earn their pay.

Now, I like bop just fine, but Louis Jordan had a problem with musicians just standing on stage, doing nothing but playing, therefore, by his reckoning, entertaining themselves & their fellow musicians more than the audiences. The Allmans, & Clapton, too, are sort of symptomatic of this in rock music. I'd rather see an act with an approach towards entertainment that isn't solely about the music, one that doesn't embrace either extreme; so give me the Stones (of that era), the Stooges or MC5, Dolls, or, perhaps most appropros in light of the impact of the Allmans, the Flamin' Groovies. With any or all of these, and you could probably add the Who or even Led Zeppelin into this, my perception is they had a show that sort of made the Allmans look like they were glued to the stage by comparison. What does that have to do with music? Depends on your perspective. Mine is that one doesn't have to sacrifice interesting, or experimental approaches towards the blues because you actually want to entertain your audience in a different way than what the Allmans did.

>I would agree that Clapton perpetuated the myth that the blues was always about some lone travelling guitarist who sold his soul blah blah blah. But young white blues lovers had already created that myth when they canonized Robert Johnson who, in reality, was practically unknown in his own time.

Was he really canonized before those reissues with their glowing reviews came out 15-20 years ago? The blurbs made a lot of people feel they HAD to own that box set. Think many people still play it? If Clapton blew Johnson's legend up, I actually can't hold that against him in spite of Johnson's being overrated because nobody knew who he was & maybe Clapton felt he was doing a public service.

>That sense of experimention and pushing the boundaries and mixing genres was the driving creative force in rock music until the mid-70's. To say that the perfect song is the pinnacle of music is to say that nothing was "necessary" after Gershwin or Cole Porter or Weill or choose-your-weapon.

Yeah, but you chose to read it that way. We've been doing this for 8 years now, you know that's not what I meant.

>There's more to music than the perfect song. Your description of the track lengths on Fillmore compared to the studio versions reminds me of that scene in Dead Poet's Society with the book describing how poetry could be measured on a graph.

Whoa there. I qualified that statement specifically, so sell that to someone else, because it's a BS analogy & you know it. Let's make a direct comparison with Dylan, okay? Look at Tombstone Blues: decidedly non-traditional, not exactly short or typical. Pushed boundaries. I have no issue with length there. Now listen to Take A Lot To Laugh...the alternate version from No Direction Home, where the arrangement is the same as Tombstone Blues. This is the distinction I draw.

Dylan expanded the possibilities of the blues. The Allmans did some fine playing and had some interesting ideas as far as arrangements, plus brought top-notch musicianship & chops aplenty to the table. But when you turn a 3 minute song into 20, a 5 minute song into 23...that's a different agenda. Dylan was pushing musical boundaries more than anything else. The Allmans were doing that to an extent, but it's noticeable that their idea of getting that done was seemingly only possible by going to these extreme exaggerations, time-wise. You really think I have a problem with the song lengths, on their own? What I'm pointing out is that they did this to most of these songs, all at the same time, and it just doesn't float my boat, especially since I look back to Dylan & it somehow seemed effortless for him. In the meantime, the British bands did some things, some more interesting than others, but, at least in terms of influence, it seems like the Allmans somehow took a wrong turn after Super Session or something.

And part of why I ask whether or not it's necessary is because with that kind of talent, I question why they did it the way they did it when I believe they could've been as groundbreaking as Dylan was while working with blues structures 5-6 years earlier, with more emphasis on the sorts of approaches he took...therefore minimizing whether or not the length of the Allman's versions meant anything. You give me a 3 minute song turned into 20 with the approach that Dylan brought to Bringing It All Back Home & Highway 61 & I don't care if it's 40 minutes. You come to me with a vision for a song that's in the mold of Ry Cooder and/or Mike Bloomfield, and length becomes WAY less of a factor. Duane Allman's talent covered a lot of ground, but he wasn't seeing things with regards to the blues as Dylan was just a few years before. I don't think he bought into the cult of the guitar hero as much as others may have, but he couldn't escape this new pop music hero-worship construct, either. Clapton created parameters that made the blues a guitar-based form. Maybe Duane Allman could've changed that somewhat, but it didn't happen, and this live album is a big part of why.

If he'd spent more time with a guy like Dr. John...maybe we don't have this conversation.

>In other words, I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with jamming. Obviously, this jibed well with the chemical inducements of the "youth movement" but it's not like all great songwriters were puritans either.

Depends on context. Sick as I am at listening to most blues guitar players, there's always a Shuggie Otis, a Freddie King, a Magic Sam. Otis Rush, even. SRV could've played rings around all of these guys, but I get tired of that after awhile in spite of how much respect I have for his ability. And his followers don't thrill me either.

Followers of these other guys I mentioned? Well, if they're even lucky enough to get signed to a label like, say, Delmark, who the hell is hearing them but the converted who have already been preached to? And even then, they're either second- or third-rate has-beens or never-wases who do nothing for fans of Clapton who think he embodies the blues.

And to them I say, hey! Nick Curran & the Nitelifes!

Who?

>Are there 24 live albums that are better? Nah, not in the rock genre.

I'll have to get back to you on that. I have a feeling I can not only disagree off the top of my head, but back it up. Blues albums? I already named two upthread. NOBODY'S going to tell me that the Allmans' album tops the Etta James live rec from 1963.

>But this is the problem we had with the other list because there are great live classical albums, live jazz albums, etc.; all kinds that won't be included.

Well, unlike the other list, I think I saw that this one said it was limited to rock, which of course changes things. As for the list, well, I didn't exactly go looking for it. I ended up finding it, but I expected I was going to anyway...remember, Swish, the '50 Albums That Changed Underwear' I saw linked on one or two other sites before you even posted it here. I waited a bit to see if I'd see a link to this one, and I fully expected to, but took a few spare minutes to hunt it down, not to spoil the surprise, but only because I figured I was going to come across it anyway in my travels. I haven't gone back to a couple of the sites where I might've found it linked anyway, so it's possible--likely--I would've been exposed to it one way or another. But I ain't gonna spill any beans, and I encourage people to let it trickle out in the more-than-capable hands of Swish, who is the best person to yank us around with this BS anyway!

Seriously, it does a great deal for discourse on this site. I remember fondly when we used to have shootouts like this more frequently, and I'm sorry if anyone has any issues with it. Brad & I have been doing this forever, & Troy's just a weirdo who says dumb things about Elvis & somehow we NORMAL folk tolerate him & his eccentricities. As for me, my posts are long, so skip 'em if you wish. Won't bother me. That said, I do appreciate the compliments, and I'll also mention that any compliment that comes my way should really be extended to Brad as well, even if it'd be fair to say that we have more of a Mojo-type mindset than one centered around Pitchfork. That's a generalization, but an accurate one, sez me.

Swish, when you coming to town? I've got to prepare...that's a threat...later.

[3-LockBox]

(1)But when you turn a 3 minute song into 20, a 5 minute song into 23...that's a different agenda....(2)You give me a 3 minute song turned into 20 with the approach that Dylan brought to Bringing It All Back Home & Highway 61 & I don't care if it's 40 minutes...(3)Clapton created parameters that made the blues a guitar-based form.

(1) I believe they called it 'jamming' and a lot of potheads liked it - You did notice that a lot of current and former stoners like these jam bands. They don't care who initiated what, innovated what, immitated what...These guys still like Waiting For Columbus even though its pretty much accepted that it isn't 100% live. There's hundreds of reason to like something.

(2) but then Id have to listen to him sing - I can only take Dylan in very small doses. And I found those to be just as boring. Now, throw in multiple movements within that same timeframe like Yes' Close To The Edge or Ritual, Triumvirant's Illusions On A Double Dimple, Genesis' Supper's Ready or more recently, Tranatlantic's All Of The Above, which clock's in over 30 minutes, but doesn't feel a minute over 20, and then we're talking.

(3) I think Clapton was just following in Chuck Berry's footsteps, as far guitar hero things go, but more than likely, Clapton's rise to fame mirrored Elvis Presley's a decade before - everyone wanted a white guy to do it, so they could put him on a pedestal. Clapton as god was a stretch, as it is for anyone to which they give that moniker, but he made the loner guitar-slinger-for-hire persona more palable for certain people, fair or not. He is a hack, but no more hackish than many who ply the same trade. He's now popular for being popular, like BB King.

[BradH]

...like I often say, jazz ain't rock...and in this context (putting aside momentarily the influence of blues progressions on jazz), it isn't blues, either. I'm not opposed to diluting the purity of a relatively simple form like the blues, or making it more complicated than it was.

How were they diluting it? Did Hubert Sumlin start doing 20 minute solos through stacks of Marshalls? No. Were the afficionados who trekked to the Crawdaddy every week to see Korner's ad hoc jam sessions fooled into believing they were seeing an exact replica of the artists the bands were covering? No, they were all students of the genre who were importing and trading the original records. Did the "Clapton Is God" brigade from '65 think Eric was faithful to what had come before? No, and that's why they loved him; because it was new. That's why they were using the term "progressive blues" by '68 to describe the long jamming style. They knew what they were up to.

...Saying the list ain't jack because it's this low is something I am willing to argue.

I said the list was already in trouble and I think that may have been confirmed by #24. I have a feeling this list will be about "keeping it real" and artists vomiting forth their inner torment.

I'll stand by the idea that every hacker who just has to keep on going for another 12 bars, and then another, because they just haven't said enough yet, is directly traceable to him.

I don't care if they feel like they've said enough or not. What matters is what they're saying. Do they have real music in their solos or are they bs'ing it? Forget whether they succeed or fail, you're blaming Clapton because guitarists are allowed to try long solos at all.

But from some point probably around the 'Eric is God' thing, Clapton & followers like the Allmans had the luxury of audiences who were satisfied that they'd been entertained by a purist form, not something where the performer had to reach into a bag of tricks to earn their pay.

I don't belive that. I agee with 3-Lock Box, it was mostly about audiences being young, stoned and looking for something new instead of revelling in some purist form of music. Even if they did think it was pure blues, who cares? Why care? Why does it matter? What percentage of any audience has a clear understanding of what they're hearing or seeing?

Now, I like bop just fine, but Louis Jordan had a problem with musicians just standing on stage, doing nothing but playing, therefore, by his reckoning, entertaining themselves & their fellow musicians more than the audiences. The Allmans, & Clapton, too, are sort of symptomatic of this in rock music..

Well, Jordan was a hell of an entertainer so he would say that, wouldn't he? It's easy to imagine to how alien that all must have been to a generation of vaudeville performers and dance hall kings and, of course, the dancers themselves. But audiences continued to pay to watch Parker & Gillespie just like they continued to pay to see The Allman Bros. In fact, they were the most popular American band of the 70's.

The Allmans, & Clapton, too, are sort of symptomatic of this in rock music..

I'd say they were totally symptomatic of this. The Allmans were hugely influenced by Coltrane and specifically included that in how they were going to approach music. Oh wait, Troy said they were trailer trash. Sorry, my bad. Somebody shoulda told Jaimoe.

Re: Robert Johnson

Was he really canonized before those reissues with their glowing reviews came out 15-20 years ago? The blurbs made a lot of people feel they HAD to own that box set. Think many people still play it? If Clapton blew Johnson's legend up, I actually can't hold that against him in spite of Johnson's being overrated because nobody knew who he was & maybe Clapton felt he was doing a public service.

Nobody knew who Robert Johnson was until King of the Delta Blues Singers came out on Columbia in 1960 or thereabouts. That's when the mythology started among the white college age kids. I don't think Clapton carried on the myth as public service, I think he believed in the myth. In that blues segment of PBS's Rock n Roll he emphasizes how the blues was always "one guy, one guy" standing against the world. That's what he took from it, the lone guitarist, and obviously a lot of people in Britain did the same thing. 3-Lock took the words right out my mouth; I think this fascination with guitarists in Britain stemmed from the huge popularity of guys like Buddy Holly and Eddie Cochran.

>To say that the perfect song is the pinnacle of music is to say that nothing was "necessary" after Gershwin or Cole Porter or Weill or choose-your-weapon.

Yeah, but you chose to read it that way. We've been doing this for 8 years now, you know that's not what I meant..

Actually it's coming up on nine years and no, I don't know that's not what you meant. During those nine years you've equated "overplayers" to child molesters on more than one occasion so I have to assume you think there's some kind of extreme purity involved somewhere that I haven't found and you keep denying. Either you're not crazy or I suck as an analyst. I'm hoping it's all just a good, clean, healthy "kill the hippies" worldview from yer early punk years cause I'm kinda down with that.

Duane Allman's talent covered a lot of ground, but he wasn't seeing things with regards to the blues as Dylan was just a few years before....If he'd spent more time with a guy like Dr. John...maybe we don't have this conversation.

That's the mistake that so many traditionalists make. You're assuming that Duane Allman didn't understand the beauty of the traditional forms of the blues because if he did he would've played it. Dead wrong. Dr. John doesn't get this either, believe me. The Dylan analysis is interesting in regards to song length. That makes sense to me but you're still back to the "if it ain't song its fluff" argument. It's as if you see no legitimate emotional content to music unless players are serving the song. I completely disagree. But you knew that.

I do appreciate the compliments, and I'll also mention that any compliment that comes my way should really be extended to Brad as well, even if it'd be fair to say that we have more of a Mojo-type mindset than one centered around Pitchfork.

Thanks, that's like an honorary degree right there! Mojo mindset. HAHA!! I never really thought about it but I guess it's true. Mojo reminds me of Musician, Player & Listener in its early years and their worldview had a huge influence on me, no doubt about it. They were lame by about '84 though.

[bobsticks]

...bereft of feckless, smartass meandering you guys get down to the business. And, cheers to Brad and MGH for elevating the discourse.

FWLIW, I think the crux of the biscuit happens somewhere around,"I don't care if they feel like they've said enough or not. What matters is what they're saying. Do they have real music in their solos or are they bs'ing it? Forget whether they succeed or fail, you're blaming Clapton because guitarists are allowed to try long solos at all." I can see both perspectives too.

From a musicians standpoint even a little wankathon ain't necessarily bad, perhaps in recognition of the attributes intrinsic in the creation of said wank, although I can see how someone born into the punk ethos might debate this. Yet at the same time alot of the time even a little is too much and just becomes extemporaneous "fluff"...nothing wrong with just the meat and potatos.

I think it was Darius who said ,"I like good music", and that's gonna be a song-to-song proposition done moment-to-moment...IMO

[Luvin Da Blues]

I think it was Darius who said ,"I like good music", and that's gonna be a song-to-song proposition done moment-to-moment...IMO

Nail on the head.

[MindGoneHaywire]

(1) I believe they called it 'jamming' and a lot of potheads liked it - You did notice that a lot of current and former stoners like these jam bands. They don't care who initiated what, innovated what, immitated what...These guys still like Waiting For Columbus even though its pretty much accepted that it isn't 100% live. There's hundreds of reason to like something.

(2) but then Id have to listen to him sing - I can only take Dylan in very small doses. And I found those to be just as boring. Now, throw in multiple movements within that same timeframe like Yes' Close To The Edge or Ritual, Triumvirant's Illusions On A Double Dimple, Genesis' Supper's Ready or more recently, Tranatlantic's All Of The Above, which clock's in over 30 minutes, but doesn't feel a minute over 20, and then we're talking.

(3) I think Clapton was just following in Chuck Berry's footsteps, as far guitar hero things go, but more than likely, Clapton's rise to fame mirrored Elvis Presley's a decade before - everyone wanted a white guy to do it, so they could put him on a pedestal. Clapton as god was a stretch, as it is for anyone to which they give that moniker, but he made the loner guitar-slinger-for-hire persona more palable for certain people, fair or not. He is a hack, but no more hackish than many who ply the same trade. He's now popular for being popular, like BB King.

1. No quarrel on the jamming, just the worship of it, chemicals aside.I'm not a much a devotee of the 'perfect song' as Brad is framing me, because I know there's more to it than that, but we always seem to hear a lot about the worship of the playing & very little about the worship of the song. Which is fine in a way, because shifting the worship would then become annoying as hell in its own way. The problem is the matter of balance, and there's not enough emphasis on the importance of the song in the realm of jam bands & overplaying blues hackers.

2. If you find Dylan boring, then...well, then you're probably not going to care about hearing the songs that serve the point I was making. Which is fine, but I don't think the examples you list have all that much to do with what I'm talking about, because my point wasn't necessarily about the length of songs per se, but what taking short song forms & blowing them up & still keeping them basically as blues tunes, just ones that go on forever, even if they're fleshed out with the best window dressing they could've possibly had (which in this case means, at least to me, the Allmans in their prime, as opposed to, say, Clapton). Dylan's ideas, & Bloomfield, didn't discount the idea of adding time, but there was some experimentation with structures and unusual approaches to sounds. Yet they were still blues tunes, unlike the ones you're talking about, unless I'm making a horrible mistake with any of those titles.

3. Disagree totally. The term 'guitar hero' in circa 1954 probably best describes someone like Merle Travis more than anyone else, or Django Reinhardt. Chuck Berry was, if anything, an 'entertainment hero.' It wasn't so much what he was playing, but his own innovative take on blues structures, along with a stage act that connected with people in a big way. I'm tempted to say it was original, though I don't know whether his ideas were completely his or whether he borrowed or even stole from others. Regardless, he wasn't the one Clapton was emulating. Berry was doing things to be popular, which meant putting on an entertaining show onstage, hence the presence & choreographed movements; Clapton left the Yardbirds because his goal wasn't the success Berry was obviously trying to achieve 10 years before. The likes of Chet Atkins & Dick Dale--two guys who could've been legitimate guitar heroes--didn't achieve the success (or at least the mass notoriety) of Berry or Clapton. Meanwhile, I'm not sure the 'white guy' thing holds water, because Hendrix was pretty much there by 1967 even in America.

That said, I think we are agreeing far more than disagreeing. Now I've got to deal with Brad, who is pretending I think the world of pop music should be nothing but toons like 'She Loves You' with no regard for something like 'I Am The Walrus' or Quadrophenia or SMiLE.

I need a beer.

[MindGoneHaywire]

>How were they diluting it? Did Hubert Sumlin start doing 20 minute solos through stacks of Marshalls? No.

Dylan's songs on the albums I mentioned is what I was referring to. That's diluting in the blues in a sense by making certain songs 4-chord blues that unless I'm sorely mistaken contained fairly innovative structures.

I just got a DVD which is a documentary about Dylan's influences. Haven't seen it yet. What he did with blues during that period, especially on those two albums, is probably the single most interesting aspect of his career to me, and this is the guy who is, all by himself, more responsible for the genre we now call 'singer-songwriter' than anyone.


>Were the afficionados who trekked to the Crawdaddy every week to see Korner's ad hoc jam sessions fooled into believing they were seeing an exact replica of the artists the bands were covering? No, they were all students of the genre who were importing and trading the original records. Did the "Clapton Is God" brigade from '65 think Eric was faithful to what had come before? No, and that's why they loved him; because it was new. That's why they were using the term "progressive blues" by '68 to describe the long jamming style. They knew what they were up to.

This is not related to the point I was trying to make. Jazz fans had become used to 5 guys standing on a stage not being particularly entertaining in a physical way ala Cab Calloway. Fans of rock'n'roll were getting Chuck Berry doing his dance on the stage, Bo Diddley's unique brand of charisma & a little swaying at the same time, Elvis, the Beatles, & the Rolling Stones doing what they could to connect with the audience by jumping around, posing, strutting, whatever they did. Jerry Lee Lewis & Little Richard, need I say more? And in no way am I implying this wasn't genuine.

What it was, was a matter of not allowing the music to be the sole element as far as entertainment, which is what bebop brought in jazz. In other words, hey, I'm standing here, and I'm playing my heart out, and that's enough: I don't have to jump around like Chuck Berry or dance around like Mick Jagger or lasso the mic like Roger Daltrey (or, in jazz, 'Tom' it up like Louis Armstrong, which is a disgusting view, but I guess you have to sort of at least try to understand why it existed amongst those who saw him as above such antics: Strange Fruit wasn't written in a vacuum). I ain't moving, the music is what's important, listen to that & forget about the bells & whistles. This is more art to me than it should be entertainment to you.

I don't think this is the most horrible thing in the world, mind you. But I think that it led to a lapse in work ethic amongst certain types of musicians, who forget that they are following people who came up in an industry where entertaining the audience was as important as the music, because sometimes it was how musicians got the music over in the first place (which is a point you made earlier).

In jazz, this is fine by me. In rock, I do think that the best material tends to come from performers who retain an entertainment quotient. Is it art? Yeah, it should be. You want to stand stock-still on the stage? Fine--I just don't think it works as well. That's a personal bias. I believe the guys who remember to entertain have a better handle on understanding that there should be a balance in pop and rock music, that it shouldn't be one extreme or the other, that understanding the importance of entertaining is actually key to producing great art (I'd give someone like Daniel Johnston a pass in this regard if we're talking about some addled reclusive genius, the point I'm making is a generalization). And yes, I know that Dylan's stage rep is in conflict with this view, but this wasn't always the case.


>I said the list was already in trouble and I think that may have been confirmed by #24. I have a feeling this list will be about "keeping it real" and artists vomiting forth their inner torment.

If that's the case, then it's easy to dismiss, and the Allmans at #25 is just a matter of the author being a jerkoff. We'll see.



>I don't care if they feel like they've said enough or not. What matters is what they're saying. Do they have real music in their solos or are they bs'ing it? Forget whether they succeed or fail, you're blaming Clapton because guitarists are allowed to try long solos at all.

My remarks are based on years of hearing hacks do this. If I thought even as many as half of them were actually turning out inspired playing, rather than recycling cliched blues licks to impress some chix in the bar, then I'd forget about Sturgeon's Law on this issue. I'll listen to someone who's even halfway decent. But I've lost patience after years of hearing even halfway decent guys pretend they're the first geniuses to pull this or that trick out of their butt. Most of them are saying the exact same thing either Clapton said, or Allman, or some combination thereof, or with some other rock guitar god thrown into the mix. A SRV in this genre is rare. I'll give you an example, and I have nothing against the guy, really--you ever hear of this Joe Bonamossa? This guy's good, he's talented, people love him, he's got a nice little career, people rave about him, he's a regional sensation down where you live. I can't listen to the guy. I've watched clip after clip & all he does is remind me of a way more competent & polished version of every one of these hackers I've had to endure in clubs & even as opening acts in theatre-sized venues. I even have his new album & am planning to give it a spin only because I do not like saying I don't like music I haven't heard & can't speak to specifically. But I suspect I know what I'm going to hear before I hear it, try as I might to keep an open mind. And my bias tells me, this guy just ain't no Danny Gatton. But he is in the mold of Eric Clapton, so while I don't want to blame Clapton, with this, well, someone deserves the blame besides the hackers (and this Joe B guy is clearly not a hacker, but still...). And I listen to Clapton wank all over an attempt by Lennon to do some fun covers on Live Peace In Toronto...and I just want to rip the guitar off him & smash it. So if I shouldn't blame him, then...?


>I don't belive that. I agee with 3-Lock Box, it was mostly about audiences being young, stoned and looking for something new instead of revelling in some purist form of music. Even if they did think it was pure blues, who cares? Why care? Why does it matter? What percentage of any audience has a clear understanding of what they're hearing or seeing?

40 years have passed. The way rock music was delivered had...shifted. Fine. No problem. I'm still allowed my preferences. I don't have a quarrel so much with the initial round of audiences who ate this up. That it turned into an art form that was roundly worshiped by 'rock' fans, to the point where there was maybe something wrong with you if you didn't recognize the genius in this...yikes. Taking hallucinogenics & listening to the Dead mangle covers doesn't bother me...in the context of the 1970s. People traveling across the country to follow bands like String Cheese Experiment or Disco Biscuits makes me scratch my head. I mean, I hope there aren't people who actually do this...but they did for Phish, so who knows.

Is there someone--I know Clapton' not the culprit--I can blame Steve Kimock on?


>Well, Jordan was a hell of an entertainer so he would say that, wouldn't he? It's easy to imagine to how alien that all must have been to a generation of vaudeville performers and dance hall kings and, of course, the dancers themselves. But audiences continued to pay to watch Parker & Gillespie just like they continued to pay to see The Allman Bros. In fact, they were the most popular American band of the 70's.

This ignores my point that rock isn't jazz.


>I'd say they were totally symptomatic of this. The Allmans were hugely influenced by Coltrane and specifically included that in how they were going to approach music. Oh wait, Troy said they were trailer trash. Sorry, my bad. Somebody shoulda told Jaimoe.

And I just don't hear a good result when jazz & rock are mixed, and never did. This is in the realm of 'this is good music' or 'this is not good music,' mind you--to me. Coltrane influence? I don't like it in what I've heard in Santana's music (which I don't like) and I don't think it adds all THAT music to the MC5 (which I do). I mean, the experimentation aspect of it, fine, no problem. I just don't think the end product justifies the mixing of two genres that are too much like oil & water.

That said, I'm never going to say that you can't end up with an end product that I'll like just because you're doing this mixing. But fusion is pretty solid evidence that my tastes just don't allow for a positive mixing of these influences into the rock form & format. Do I like & appreciate Tyner's vocal on 'Looking At You'? Sure. But if I could set things in motion where he sang that straight, and far fewer people dabbled in certain types of experimentation, I probably would. Experimentation is great, and it's a free country and all...it's just that, like so many other things, so few do it well. So I'd lean towards the idea that things would've been better with just a little less of it. And in this context I have no quarrel with prog: although I'm not a fan, I think it's a far more organic & interesting development than fusion AND turning a 3 minute blues song into a 20 minute showcase.



>Nobody knew who Robert Johnson was until King of the Delta Blues Singers came out on Columbia in 1960 or thereabouts. That's when the mythology started among the white college age kids. I don't think Clapton carried on the myth as public service, I think he believed in the myth. In that blues segment of PBS's Rock n Roll he emphasizes how the blues was always "one guy, one guy" standing against the world. That's what he took from it, the lone guitarist, and obviously a lot of people in Britain did the same thing. 3-Lock took the words right out my mouth; I think this fascination with guitarists in Britain stemmed from the huge popularity of guys like Buddy Holly and Eddie Cochran.


Well, then, that's a shame, isn't it. And it's another reason why I don't appreciate Clapton's legacy: there's no Big Joe Turner in his vision of the blues, no Wynonie Harris, no Big Maybelle, no lone hobo-type with a harmonica instead of a guitar like Little Walter or even James Cotton. The Rolling Stones WERE Elmore James, Brian Jones permitted the Chuck Berry influence & covers to throw Keith Richards a bone. The Allman Brothers were the Grateful Dead by comparison--and that's not a damning condemnation, just an opinion..



>Actually it's coming up on nine years and no, I don't know that's not what you meant. During those nine years you've equated "overplayers" to child molesters on more than one occasion so I have to assume you think there's some kind of extreme purity involved somewhere that I haven't found and you keep denying. Either you're not crazy or I suck as an analyst. I'm hoping it's all just a good, clean, healthy "kill the hippies" worldview from yer early punk years cause I'm kinda down with that.

I joined this board in July 2000. No, it's not a punk/hippies thing, because I love the work of Robert Quine & Mick Jones even though I consider them overplayers (of course Jones in a different way, mostly because he played leads over verses) to an extent. But I love the solos I hear in the Buzzcocks, and the Jam, the Damned, the Replacements, the Dickies, X, etc. The hippies/progsters/jam bands/classic rock dinosaurs rode on other paths. Most of which are a one-way trip to sh*t-town for people like me, though of course not everyone is like me.

No. I can listen to my own personal guitar heroes play for hours, they can wank all they like (though of course they rarely do), and I don't have an issue with that because I consider them the exception to the rule. Clapton isn't so much the problem as all the people who followed him who worshiped him, and the people who followed them. He is the problem in a sense, but what am I going to do, walk around with a sandwich board that says Clapton Sucks? I've made my point a jillion times. But it's far worse because SO MANY of these hackers do little besides imitate him for multiples of twelve excruciating bars. Hence any comparison to bad human beings. My grudge against Clapton is fairly dormant. But it's worth articulating...but I was taken out of context here to an extent. Can you play? Play. Give me SRV. Don't give me this Joe B guy. Give me David Lee Roth-era Eddie Van Halen, but hold up on the Vai & Satriani people, please. Give me my actual heroes, whom I see no need to laud here, and spare me the giants of the guitar rock genre whose work I have little or no interest in. I won't be boxed into a 'overplayers all suck' attitude here. My favorite 'overplayers' I think are fantastic; the rest of them is what ruins it for me & makes me wish even the guys I like wouldn't do it. Especially since they are of the caliber who can say a lot, communicate ideas that connect with me, and execute it well, within shorter parameters.

But then music doesn't exist just to please me. I recognize this. Actually...I sorta like pretending that my opinion's important enough to where music SHOULD exist only to please me. But then I'd probably have to buy Swish a beer more than I feel is necessary just to apologize for the arrogance...


>That's the mistake that so many traditionalists make. You're assuming that Duane Allman didn't understand the beauty of the traditional forms of the blues because if he did he would've played it. Dead wrong. Dr. John doesn't get this either, believe me. The Dylan analysis is interesting in regards to song length. That makes sense to me but you're still back to the "if it ain't song its fluff" argument. It's as if you see no legitimate emotional content to music unless players are serving the song. I completely disagree. But you knew that.

I'm not as much of a traditionalist as you're framing me here (and I disagree on the Dr. John of the late 60s & early 70s, at least, but I can only spend so much time doing this, so we'll have to pick that up at another time). I do like the perfect song, but it's what the people who are capable of THAT do outside those boundaries that interests me most when it comes to experimentation. I don't necessarily need to hear the Cage-like dribblings of some tortured artist whose song length averages 37:53. When the Rolling Stones put a long song like Can't You Hear Me Knocking on a rec in a time when that wasn't a typical move for them, I have no quarrel with that. That's an example of the people who didn't feel it necessary to jam for extended lengths doing it that one time & coming up with something I thought was a damn good piece of work. Ditto the introduction, on and in the album and song Quadrophenia, where the four themes are flawlessly brought into the mix following a knockout prelude, ala SMiLE. Do you really think I'm so beholden to the perfect pop song that I would deny I Am The Walrus or A Day In the Life?

The problem is that too much is done by too many who I make a judgment as not being qualified to make the connection I feel with those experimental songs. Do you think the mall-punk bands could write something like American Idiot? Bands like 999 & the Exploited & even the Sex Pistols could never write a London Calling or even a Sandanista, not in a million years. Of course, if you start injecting drama or theatrics or even bells & whistles into rock music, you won't end up with a Quadrophenia or Tommy (which I'm still not a fan of), you won't have even a Satanic Majesties to peddle...if you don't have the right combination of talent, ideas, and vision, you end up with something more like Kilroy Was Here.

So is experimentation something that should be avoided, in & of itself? No, of course not. Expand a song length--or even write an opus along the lines of the titles 3-Lock listed? Go right ahead. Turn a bunch of blues songs upside down? That's fine, too. Do a 3 hour set that consists of a dozen blues songs? Uh...you'd better deliver.

I'm not saying the Allmans didn't. But I do think they barely skated in trying to do something better left undone, especially given what they could've done with a different vision. Of course, who the hell am I to tell anyone they should've done this or that & what they actually did was no good (and, I repeat, I do kinda like their early stuff, I just don't think it's all that & never did). But there is such a thing as the individual response of the listener, and mine is ultimately more important than anything else--especially my feelings on destructive musical influence.

Funny how I feel like I have to qualify certain things in this discussion because although we've had it before, probably more than once, there might be people reading this who haven't seen it, and therefore we can't really yell 'NO! You're WRONG! You're full of SH*T!' because someone might actually think we mean it.

For the record, while this board sorely misses Darius, Brad is the guy I've discussed & argued most & best with, and I think we challenge each other pretty well. I'm a long-winded writer, and that ain't gonna change. But I won't make a point unless I think I can back it up, even if I take a long time to establish where I'm coming from & why.

Hat's off to Swish for inspiring a discussion that is a welcome reminder of old times. I'll enjoy this list whether it's hipster irony, boilerplate Rolling Stone canon, or Onion-esque satire.

[3-LockBox]

Next thing you're going to tell me is that I can't hear Jimi.

Yes, we agree that jamming gets out of hand, just as over-playing in prog gets out of hand. There's nothing wrong with catching hold of a groove and letting it ride, which is the one aspect of jam bands that I like, because if I really dig a song, the longer the better. Its the free form thing that kills it for me. It wouldn be different if the band was really good at it, but by and large, it tests the patience of the listener, that is, the sober listener. I can remember revelling in Live At Filmore East, as well as other long-winded jam bands' live releases, but when I'd revisit them sober or straight, I wondered where the party went.

I do agree with you that too much emphasis is put upon the playing, rather than the song in most jam prone bands, but that's just my own personal taste. I never listened to music because of the artist, I listen for the music, and if my favorite bands makes a crappy album, I move on. But there are some guys who like it when a song stretches out and and the guitarist/s starts playing excerpts from Brahams or Gershwin, just to show that he can. I think these guys are usually musicians themselves who appreciate this sort of diversionary interlude tucked inside an all too familiar song. I guess that sort of jamming breaks up the monotony of seeing a band for the 50th time in 7 or 8 years (can you say Deadhead?), not that that level of fandom could exist these days.

I realize that using a Prog band's song referring to a jamming is an apples to oranges comparison, but my point was that if an artist has got 20 minutes worth of something to say and I like what he's got to say, then timeframes be damned, as long as it isn't the same idea over and over. Even classical music has its share of wankery, what with composers that took their sweet-assed time to get their song in gear. Prog though, can be similar to jam bands in that they squeeze together too many random ideas in an attempt to make those epic length songs, because their fans expect it, but a lot of times the effort is terribly contrived, just like some long jams are.

When the Allman's recorded Live at Filmore East, many of the bands from that era were flirting with genre bending ideas (like progressive rock), borrowing from jazz and classical, and that included emphasis on playing as much as the song. It just so happened that in the Allman's case, their bag was musician interaction, something that had been around long before the Allmans; something that was an intregal part of jazz, as well as bluegrass, which would have also had some influence the Allmans, being that they were from the south. I don't know if soloing was much a part of blues in its purest form, but soloing was/is an important aspect of bluegrass and jazz. As much as jamming can be long in the tooth for some folks, other eat it up.

Of course most all of this is behind us, because when the jam bands were in their heyday, concerts and festivals were many, and relatively cheap. This allowed fans to obcess the musicians as much or more than the music. Jam bands were popular because fans felt they really got their 15 dollars' worth, and it took a while for the acid to kick in anyway. There was no hurry. As far as time goes, I'll bet the Allman didn't play any longer than anyone else, whether they played 7 songs in two hours to someone else's 15/16 songs in two hours. I doubt that in today's economy, anyone can see a band more than a few times in one lifetime, much less follow a band around a large geographic area, seeing them 5 or 6 times a year, and appreciating that the band injected a long, jazzy interlude into a well worn song.

I don't see how jamming could be appreciated today like it was years ago, considering that for a lot of people there would be, in my estimation, a real lack of familiarity and intimacy with a modern jam band compared to "the good ole days", unless of course you live in close proximity to a jam band. Like Bobsticks eluded to, people are/were fans of jamming because it was an "in the moment thang", not because there is necessarily a right or wrong way to do it, or a right time to to do it for that matter. Jam happens. I can see how you might approve or disapprove one artist's approach over another, but all that means is that the two artists are different, not right or wrong.

Anyhoo, who jams anymore to the degree that the Allmans do/did? (excluding prog)