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By: Jarrod Dicker

When Old Man Winter comes to town
He’s got a special way of dropping in
And spreading cheer around
You know [the blues] is around the bend
And he won’t let you down
When Old Man Winter comes to town

-Old Man Winter (Revisited) by The Moffatts

Johnny Winter

It’s been a cold 40 years of Winter.

Since 1969 Johnny Winter has conquered all that there is to seize in the “blues race.” He has been awarded Grammy accolades, performed at the original Woodstock festival, been recognized as one of the supreme guitarists of all time by Rolling Stone, and been inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame. He has collaborated, live and in studio, with myriad musicians of various genres, from Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin to Muddy Waters and B.B. King, even jamming with the young guitar proteges Derek Trucks and a href=”http://www.jambase.com/Artists/Artist.aspx?artistID=7600″>John Mayer. Johnny’s ridden to hell and back, warding off a grave dependence on heroin and booze to continue his journey of manufacturing marvelous blues music. So, what’s left to natter about concerning the fast-fingered blues legend?

Well, it’s been an exceptionally hot year in the 65-year-old’s wonderland. The two-disc The Johnny Winter Anthology, Johnny Winter Live Bootleg Series, Vol. 5, Johnny Winter: The Woodstock Experience, and the Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music Director’s Cut 40th anniversary DVD with never before seen live footage of Winter, were all released in 2009. And at the end of 2008 the DVD Live Through The 70′s was received very well and we can look forward to the upcoming biography, Raisin’ Cain: “The Wild and Raucous Story of Johnny Winter”, expected release around May of 2010, covering anything and everything throughout the guitarist’s entire career.

JamBase sat down with the Texas talent to discuss these recent events and also the nitty and gritty details that have made Old Man Winter the legendary bluesman he is today.

JamBase: It has been 40 years since you signed your first record contract with Columbia Records. Today, your new bootleg CD series, Volumes 1-5, have all charted top ten on the Billboard blues charts. How does it feel that after 40 years people are still listening, and, most importantly, purchasing your material?

Johnny Winter from MySpace

Johnny Winter: It feels great. I’m really pleased with how well my live series has been received. I had so much material from over the years and was very happy to find the right way to distribute it all. Also, it was great finding a label to release it as a series in such a way as it’s being presented.

JamBase: It’s also been 40 years since the original Woodstock festival. What were you able to take away from that experience, and what do you now cherish from it?

Johnny Winter: There is a saying that goes around stating that if you REALLY played Woodstock the memories are forever blurry. Let’s put it this way, I don’t remember a thing! At that time, to me, it was just another gig. But once I saw how it began developing I knew it was going to be a bigger and greater show than the 150,000 seaters we were already frequently playing. I knew then that this was something I had to be a part of. I played Jimi’s original offered time slot on Sunday at around 12:00 midnight. There was no rain and it was absolutely packed. I will tell you that it’s great that after all these years Warner released their Director’s Cut of the 40th anniversary Woodstock DVD. It finally features my performance of “Mean Town Blues.” Also, it’s wonderful that Sony released my whole audio performance [Johnny Winter: The Woodstock Experience]. I guess, like most who were there, I’ll always cherish the time spent and memories.

There is also a book pending publication on May 1, 2010 called Raisin’ Cain: “The Wild and Raucous Story of Johnny Winter”. Are you the writer and what will it cover?

I had a ghostwriter for this. The book covers my whole life, both private and professionally, my dealings with Janis Joplin, time on tour, musicians I’ve spent time playing with, my relationship with Muddy, I mean seriously, my whole life, all the ups and downs, everything! It was very emotional for me to read. The writer really nailed it. It’s right on.

You specialize in American blues and have become a legend amongst both historic musicians in the Delta regime and modern performers such as Eric Clapton and Jack White. Who were your inspirations and encouraging artists while you were steppin’ into the music world?

Johnny Winter

I’ve always loved the blues since I was a child. Listening to musicians like Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Jimmy Reed, Lightnin’ Slim, Gatemouth Brown, Elmore James, Chuck Berry, T-Bone Walker, and B.B. King all influenced my playing from the start. To me, the blues is such a strong musical style that I don’t feel it will ever go away. The blues adds to every musical style. That’s why it’s necessary to have a blues background in whatever style of music you play.

I’ve read that your parents pushed you and Edgar [Winter, Johnny's keyboard/sax playing younger brother] to participate in music. What did they casually play around the house? How else were they motivating to yourself and Edgar?

They didn’t exactly push us. We just really wanted to play music and they were very supportive. Daddy played sax and banjo in college. He taught me my first chords on a ukulele when I was young. Momma played piano. So, they were both very musical. Secretively, I think they really wanted me to be a lawyer [chuckle].

How is your current relationship with Edgar? Do you two still collaborate musically?

Our relationship is great! We’re good friends. We still do shows together from time to time. I just recorded on the song “Rockin’ the Blues” on his latest album, Rebel Road.

One of your first big breaks was when Mike Bloomfield invited you to sing and engage in the Super Session jam at the Fillmore East in New York. What was this experience like for you? Did you maintain a relationship with Mike Bloomfield?

Continue reading for more on Johnny Winter…

I am and forever will always be on the road. -Johnny Winter

Photo by: Rod Snyder

It was a lot of fun. I don’t remember who the other musicians were other than Mike and Al [Kooper]. Like I said, my early introduction to the blues was through listening to Muddy Waters, and this was primarily one of the main reasons why I eventually made the trek to Chicago. I only stayed there for about a year, and that’s where I first met Mike Bloomfield at a club called The Fickle Pickle. I wasn’t too happy there in Chicago, so I soon went back to Texas. But yes, through meeting Mike it later led to him also helping to officially launch my career.

After that you signed what was then the largest advance in the history of the recording industry at Columbia Records, $600,000, did this unlock an overwhelming amount of musical opportunities for you?

Johnny Winter

Oh yes, for sure it was nonstop from there. Sadly, this also led to many of the problems I dealt with with drugs. I’m happy to say I’m all over with that now. The credit is all thanks to my other guitarist Paul Nelson. He is an amazing player and is the one who helped me guide my career back on track. It’s all good now and I feel great!

You are notorious for your cover of Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited.” Why this specific song and have you ever had the opportunity to play it with its creator?

I just simply liked the song and wanted to do a cover of it. I never actually played it with Dylan, but I did perform my rendition of “Highway 61 Revisited” at the Madison Square Garden party for him. Of course, he was there. There is a video of me playing it floating all around the Internet on YouTube and other such video sites.

Tell me a little bit about Muddy Waters, specifically, what he meant to you and how it felt to finally record with him? I mean, you got him a Grammy award. It must have been one hell of a solid relationship. [Editor's note: Johnny Winter produced a trio of brilliant Muddy albums - Hard Again (1977), I'm Ready (1978), and King Bee (1981), as well playing on Grammy winning live album Muddy "Mississippi" Waters - Live (1979)].

It was three to be exact. I produced and performed on four of his albums. Working with Muddy was the absolute high point of my career. Throughout that and after we became great friends. He was an excellent person and above that, an honest and real gentleman. He would always drink champagne; Dom Perignon was all he drank. He had a ton of class and a lot of true, real dignity. He’d been through a lot of ups and downs. I miss Muddy. If he were alive, we’d still be recording together.

You’re currently on tour. I heard through various media outlets that you are strictly playing the blues and no more R&R. Is this correct?

Warren Haynes & Johnny Winter by Dino Perrucci

Yes. I am and forever will always be on the road. Actually, my show is now more like 80-percent blues and the rest is rock & roll. I’ve been changing my set more and more so it’s different every time. But, as I said before, my true love is the blues.

Where do you enjoy playing most on tour?

Amsterdam is one of my favorites [winks].

In 1988 you were inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame among the all time legends in that genre. Is it comforting to know that your music was and will forever be respected as some of the all time best in blues?

Of course! It’s an extremely great and exciting honor. I’m at the point in my career where I love receiving awards [laughs].

Rolling Stone ranked you 74th on the list of all time greatest guitarist, which is a remarkable feat. Do you think this ranking is accurate?

To be absolutely honest, I haven’t talked to ONE person that has had anything good to say about that poll.

You grew up in Texas during a time of excessive racial tension. Was it difficult to go to the predominately black blues clubs at that time? Were establishments judging and/or rejecting your admittance?

Johnny Winter by Mick Rock

No, not at all. It was in an all black club in 1962 that my brother Edgar and I went to see B.B. King at a Beaumont club called The Raven. We were the only white guys in the crowd, and there was no doubt that we clearly stood out. I was about 17 and B.B. didn’t want to let me onstage at first. I kept asking and asking and asking. He asked me for a union card, and I had one. Also, I kept sending people over to ask him to let me play. Finally, he decided that there were enough people who wanted to hear me that no matter if I was good or not it would be worth it for him to let me onstage. He gave me his guitar and let me play. I got a standing ovation! After that, he took his guitar back [laughs].

Another Texas legend was the late great Stevie Ray Vaughan. How did you feel about his hard rock blues infiltrating the Austin city scene, as well as other Texas great such as Billy Gibbons [ZZ Top]?

Stevie was a great player as is Billy. They both have added so much in keeping the blues alive. Great guitarists, the two of ‘em.

Who was the most pleasurable artist that you’ve ever collaborated with live besides Muddy Waters?

Hmmm, I’d have to say John Lee Hooker and Sonny Terry. Sonny Terry and I did an album called Whoopin’ on my label, Mad Albino Records. It was a great moment that I will never forget.

What are your sentiments on modern music today?

I am not a fan of it that much at all. I enjoy listening to artists and music of the past, which helps me keep my current playing fresh. I have over 14,000 songs on my iPod. I do like some [contemporary artists], of course. Well, Derek Trucks for instance. He’s an absolutely great and skilled guitar player.

What should we expect from Johnny Winter in the near and far future?

More music, more shows, and more blues guitar.

Do you really plan to stay on the road forever?

Son, I’ll be playing the blues on the open road ’til the day I die.

Johnny Winter tour dates available here.

JamBase | Crossroads
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Gregg Allman

After closing out the current and final leg of The Allman Brothers Band year-long 40th Anniversary celebratory U.S. tour, Gregg Allman will head back out on the road for an array of solo dates this winter. The iconic singer, songwriter, keyboardist, and guitarist begins his traditional fall tour November 11 in Salamanca, NY, followed by a select run of shows that will include a New Year’s Eve show in Rhode Island.

Joining Gregg on the tour will be Bruce Katz (keyboard), Jerry Jemmott (bass), Steve Potts (drums), Scott Sharrard (guitar), Jay Collins (sax) and Floyd Miles (percussion).

“The Brothers had a great run this summer. I’m gonna stretch these solo shows out a bit, try some new material and just do what I do,” says Gregg.

In other news, Gregg Allman will join country star Tim McGraw for a performance on The Jay Leno Show on Tuesday, October 27. The two will perform McGraw’s new single “Southern Voice” (from his new album of the same title), which name-checks the Allman Brothers Band in the lyrics.

Gregg Allman Tour Dates

Wed 11/11 Salamanca, NY Seneca Allegany Casino & Hotel
Thu 11/12 Verona, NY Turning Stone Casino
Sat 11/14 Peekskill, NY Paramount Center for the Arts
Thu 11/19 Englewood, NJ Bergen Performing Arts Center
Sat 11/21 New York, NY Michael J Fox Foundation Benefit
Wed 12/30 Jim Thorpe, PA Penn’s Peak
Thu 12/31 Lincoln, RI Twin River Casino
Sat 1/2 Westhampton Beach, NY Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center
Sun 1/3 Albany, NY Empire State Plaza Performing Arts
Center
Tue 1/5 Montclair, NJ Wellmont Theatre
Wed 1/6 Annapolis, MD Rams Head On Stage
Fri 1/8 Richmond, VA The National
Sat 1/9 Atlantic City, NJ Harrah’s Atlantic City
Tue 1/12 Fairfield, CT Ridgefield Playhouse
Wed 1/13 Fairfield, CT Ridgefield Playhouse

By: Mike Bookey

The Low Anthem

Jeff Prystowsky is on his way to the airport to catch a flight to Dublin, but it’s not his band, The Low Anthem, or that band’s month-long tour of Europe that he’s talking about. The multi-instrumentalist is discussing baseball. And he knows a thing or two about the game.

Before founding The Low Anthem while a student at Brown University, Prystowsky played baseball along with the band’s other founder, Ben Knox Miller. Also, Prystowsky is a legitimate baseball scholar and taught baseball history at the high school level. He’s still very much a student of the game, watching as much as he can while on the road and monitoring his fantasy team. After discussing the fact that Miller is an unapologetic Baltimore Orioles fan, Prystowsky offers a correlation to the position of his band and the life of a professional baseball player.

“What we’re doing is similar to what minor league baseball players go through: trying to make the big leagues, travelling around, playing for scouts, trying to get their average up, hitting for power, working on their base running,” says Prystowsky before slowly trailing off. It’s plain to see that he’s thought about this analogy before, but it’s also clear that he’s continually realizing the connection.

If The Low Anthem was a ball player, it probably wouldn’t be a minor leaguer. It’s more a rookie pitcher who’s been called up toward the end of the season and catches the attention of everyone from opposing hitters, scouts and sportswriters right before the playoffs roll around. The music world has come to know The Low Anthem recently and there seems to be a great deal of curiosity about the band and its album Oh My God, Charlie Darwin.

It’s been a year in which they’ve gone from a band with so much buzz surrounding it as to be dubbed the best unsigned band in America from Rolling Stone to taking the stage at high-profile music festivals. The trio has become a rock & roll powerhouse on the touring scene, despite the fact that they are not, and probably never will be, an actual rock band. The Low Anthem, rather, is a folk collective comprised of 25-year-old Ivy League grads that seem to care little about the aforementioned buzz but care a whole hell of a lot about making good music.

The Low Anthem

Since graduating from Providence, R.I.’s Brown University three years ago, The Low Anthem has lived on the road, putting together two records, 2007′s What the Crow Brings and Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, which was actually recorded in January of 2008 but gained national and international acclaim this summer when it was re-released on Nonesuch Records.

The band was the product of Miller and Prystowsky’s friendship (and the two’s mutual love for baseball, of course) and initially included another friend, Dan Lefkowitz, a founding member who left the band to live in a yurt in rural Arkansas, where he’s been, according to Prystowsky, blacksmithing and making wooden spoons, among other things. The band recently announced that Lefkowitz was joining the band for its current European tour and may contribute to the band’s next record.

Rounding out the lineup is Jocie Adams, who can play a clarinet like nobody’s business but shifts to any number of other instruments when needed. She’s a science major who spent a stint as a NASA researcher before coming on board full time with The Low Anthem. Prystowsky seems grateful of her decision to join the band.

“She was a friend of ours from the music department and knew the band pretty well. She graduated and was thinking about what to do and we put out an offer and she took it and she’s been playing with us for a few years now,” he says.

The Low Anthem

On Charlie Darwin, The Low Anthem rolls out a scattered array of choral tunes, raucous folk rockers, and solid Americana ballads that somehow fit well together. The throwback vibe of The Low Anthem rings loud, but Prystowsky insists that his band isn’t a folk revival act. “We’re not revivalists! We’re writing our own songs” he says, “we’re just using older instruments.” And he’s right about this. The band does, in fact, write masterful songs, many of which are quintessentially modern, it just so happens that the trio of multi-instrumentalists has a hankering for old gear and the old-timey sounds that come along with them.

“We play instruments that might even be relics or museum instruments now, but we’re bringing them back slowly. Who knows what we’ll do next. Maybe we’ll ride out onstage in a wagon with horses or make music with butter churners and things of that sort,” says Prystowsky, laughing his way through that last sentence.

Funny thing, though, give a listen to Charlie Darwin and there are a couple occasions during which you just might think about horses or wagons or both, but you’ll probably, or at least you should, forget about this when you remember that these musicians were born in the mid-1980s. Not to hang up on their age, but the musical sensibilities of Prystowsky, Miller, and Adams are beyond what we’ve come to expect out of most young bands. The song “Charlie Darwin,” which kicks off the album, is a delightfully haunting number that relishes in its own simplicity, reminding us that there are still good songs being made. There are several videos of the three singing this cut that will make your scalp tingle. The track is also reprised at the end of the album, and that, too, might produce the same effect.

Continue reading for more on The Low Anthem…

What we’re doing is similar to what minor league baseball players go through: trying to make the big leagues, travelling around, playing for scouts, trying to get their average up, hitting for power, working on their base running. -Jeff Prystowsky

The Low Anthem isn’t really a rock band, but they can and do rock. “The Horizon is a Beltway” is a surging, almost-punk romp that brings to mind the sound of Low Anthem friend Langhorne Slim or perhaps The Avett Brothers. When they choose to rock, they do it masterfully with the power of Miller’s voice shifting from sailboat to steamroller. The band is versatile yet thematic on their albums and engaging onstage. Yes, the band loves folk but their show is hardly a sit-down affair.

The Low Anthem

Prystowsky rattles off a few of the band’s influences, and also a list of the music they’ve been listening to on tour and, not surprisingly, the list doesn’t include many buzz indie rock bands. Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen top the list, joined soon after by Joe Pug, the Chicago folkie that opened shows for The Low Anthem this spring.

“[Dylan and Cohen] are the guys we’ve been listening to a bunch right now. I thought I was really on top of things a few months ago and we come back and our manager is talking about all these new bands and I’d never heard of them,” says Prystowsky.

This unawareness of the “next big thing” doesn’t seem to result from arrogance, it’s just that Prystowsky and company are students of their craft and are continually studying, without getting distracted by buzz bands. Maybe that’s the sort of intellectual curiosity a musician gleans from an Ivy League education, who knows. But it’s also worth noting that these guys and gal have been busy this year. They went from a much-talked-about unsigned act that hit some big festival stages and opened for the likes of Ray LaMontagne to one with a wide-released album that will almost certainly end up on some “Best of 2009″ lists come year’s end.

“We were trying to tour and make a living, and to make a living you have to be able to play however many shows and draw enough people and sell enough merchandise that you can go home and pay your rent. We weren’t really interested in a label because at the time we were making enough money,” says Prystowsky of the band’s time as a happily unsigned act.

The Low Anthem

Nonesuch Records has allowed for Charlie Darwin to reach the masses, but doesn’t seem to have hampered the band’s autonomy. The Low Anthem is preparing to record its next album this winter and think they just might do it in Amsterdam, a city they’ve visited with their tours and have fallen increasingly in love with. The out-of-the-way location is nothing new for the band – they recorded Charlie Darwin in a cabin on Block Island, RI. They might produce the new effort themselves, Prystowsky says, or they might bring on some help. They might include some friends they’ve met on the road to play on the album, and they might just try to tie the new record to the themes in Charlie Darwin.

“We’re not planning to make an electronica record completely out of left field. It will be relevant,” says Prystowsky, laughing again.

The world seems to be The Low Anthem’s oyster, if you’ll pardon the cliche. But such is the life of a rookie ace. (Side note: The Low Anthem wouldn’t be a flamethrower, but rather a Jamie Moyer-style finesse pitcher, or maybe a knuckleballer effective, fundamentally sound, but not flashy.) The league is chatting about you and all you can do is do things the way you know how, and in the case of The Low Anthem, it’s make folk music.

Prystowsky doesn’t go too crazy on the baseball analogy, but defends he and Miller’s love for the game – a love that bandmate Adams, and likely some reading this, might not fully understand.

“No, it makes total sense,” Prystowsky says. “We’re a couple of American boys and we grew up with it and we played it all through our lives.”

The Low Anthem is on tour now; dates available here.

JamBase | Batter Up

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