KING OF THE BOYS' ROOM

Johnny Winter died yesterday. It hits kind of hard around here, because he was my biggest musical influence from the age of 13 to about 18. Yeah, those years. I'll spare you the personal sobbing (if you're curious, here's a couple posts about growing up as a Johhny Winter freak, here and here).

He was a blues man, capable of rocking, and a freakishly good guitarist. By that I mean at times fast, really fast, but always fluid. Sometimes just on the cusp of overplaying. By rotating styles (acoustic bottleneck, electric blues and rock 'n' roll, oft times on the same record), he always sort of directed the focus to the center of the Venn diagram, the blues.

Here's a smattering. Keep in mind when listening to his chops, he was born in 1944. So, for instance, on the Johnny and the Jammers tune, he's fifteen years old. On "Dallas" he's twenty five. How many twenty five year olds can play like that?

I may add blurbs about each song, and I know I'll add some videos. I just wanted to hep you to these right now. A little something to help you contemplate the loss of one of the greats, because that's what Johnny Winter most assuredly was, one of the greats.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Listen:
Johnny and the Jammers - School Say Blues (streaming) at YouTube 1959
The Insight featuring Johnny and Edgar Winter - Please Come Home For Christmas mp3 at Cloudfront (?) 1966
Johnny Winter with the Traits - Parchman Farm mp3 at Lake Tahoe Real Estate (?) 1967
Johnny Winter - Meantown Blues (streaming) at Hell Hound on My Tail 1967
Johnny Winter -Be Careful With a Fool mp3 at Smokestack Lightning 1969
Johnny Winter - When You Got A Good Friend mp3 at Cover Me 1969
Johnny Winter - Dallas mp3 at David Fulmer 1969
Johnny Winter - Hustled Down In Texas mp3 at Review Stalker 1969
Johnny Winter And - Johnny B. Goode (live) mp3 at Ghost Whisperer 1971
Johnny Winter - Still Alive and Well (full LP), streaming) at YouTube 1973
Johnny Winter - Ain't Nothing to Me (streaming) at YouTube 1973
Muddy Waters with Johnny Winter - Mannish Boy (streaming) at YouTube 1977, Produced by Johnny Winter
Johnny Winter - Trick Bag mp3 at David Fulmer 1984
Video:
Johnny Winter - Full set, Copenhagen at YouTube 1970, 23 minutes