Re: [Harp-L] Butter TV spot

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ev630 wrote:
<Sorry, I meant: So far, no one has been able to elucidate in what way
<Butterfield was INNOVATIVE.

Have a listen to East/West, both the album and the song.  How many of the blues bands working at the time would have taken that music on?  

Butterfield was not an innovator on his instrument to the extent that Jimi Hendrix was; Butterfield's innovation was about the kind of music he played, not the way he played the instrument per se.  Butterfield's innovation was about bringing multiple musical streams together in his work. This is in fact the strongest evidence of his "Rock sensibility", because it's utterly characteristic of rock from the 60s (the Beatles, anyone?) to today.

But in most other musical respects, Butterfield and Hendrix are precisely comparable.  They both brought something new to the blues--and they both got castigated for it.  I remember very clearly an article from Jet magazine in the early 1970s--a publication then as now aimed at a black audience--that stated in no uncertain terms that Jimi Hendrix was NOT a "black musician".  Why?  Because he wore freaky clothes, took LSD, and played electronic music with white guys, I guess.  

Innovators have it tough.  Remember the definition of a pioneer: it's the guy ahead of you on the trail who's lying face down with arrows in his back.

Thanks, Richard Hunter


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