JOHNNY WINTER

Neste virtual mundo da internet a gente acaba fazendo amigos que nunca vimos e provavelmente nunca veremos. Entre eles está o Mike que me convidou para fazer parte de um blog fechado (desses só para convidados) aonde encontrei a série Johnny Winter Live Bootleg [2007-08], postado por um cara que atende pelo nick de Jobe, mais um desses amigos virtuais. Caramba!! Ouvir o velho Johnny cantando todos aqueles clássicos, me deixou saudoso e me fez lembrar que ele já está nas últimas, porém ainda consegue fazer algumas apresentações, mas somente sentado e que não vão muito além de 30 minutos. Puxa vida, como eu gostaria de poder assistir a uma delas! Estive bem perto disso quando foram anunciados alguns shows dele no Brasil em 2004, mas acabaram cancelados devido à precária condição de saúde do guitarrista. Seria a primeira vez desse lendário bluesman em solo tupiniquim, infelizmente não aconteceu e tudo indica que não acontecerá. Enfim, esse revival me deu vontade de fazer um post em homenagem ao meu grande ídolo, e nada mais legal do que uma homenagem em vida. No ano passado eu postei aqui o Blues Over San Diego de 1974, até então o único disco do Johnny neste blog, então para fazer valer o tributo, além do fantástico Live Bootleg Series, revirei o baú e saquei algumas preciosidades que deixarão os velhos fãs em polvorosa e aqueles que ainda não tiveram o prazer de conhecê-lo, entenderão finalmente porque John Dawson Winter III, o “Tornado do Texas” é, e sempre será, um dos maiores guitarristas de blues em todos os tempos.

Johnny Winter nasceu em 23 de fevereiro, de 1944, em Beaumont, no Texas, para se tornar um dos maiores guitarristas e cantor branco da história do blues. Filho primogênito de John e Edwina Winter, que foi a principal responsável por Johnny e seu irmão Edgar (ambos albinos) se iniciarem ainda crianças no mundo da música. A carreira musical de Johnny começou a ascender em 1968 quando formou um trio com o baixista Tommy Shannon (futuro integrante do mítico Double Trouble, de Stevie Ray Vaughan) e com o baterista Uncle John Turner (que também tocou com Vaughan, só que antes da fama em um grupo chamado Krackerjack). No ano seguinte, Johnny já era atração nos principais festivais de blues e rock, inclusive o lendário Woodstock. Com a fama, veio o dinheiro, com o dinheiro vieram as drogas e com as drogas, alguns problemas. Em 1973, depois de se livrar do vício, ele retorna a cena musical tendo como parceiro de banda o guitarrista e compositor Rick Derringer que escreveu a música “Still Alive and Well” em homenagem a Winter por superar sua dependência, esta canção também seria o título do disco lançado naquele ano, que ainda trás uma incrível interpretação de “Silver Traim” dos Rolling Stones. Em 1977 ele produziu o álbum Hard Again de Muddy Waters, disco obrigatório aos amantes do blues. A parceria resultaria em várias indicações ao Grammy, e Johhny gravou o álbum Nothing But Blues com os integrantes da banda de Muddy. Seu nome entrou para o "Hall da Fama do Blues" em 1988.

Johnny Winter Live Bootleg Series vol. 1

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Johnny Winter has been flattening audiences since he blew out of Texas like a white tornado in 1968. At the tail end of the blues revival when British blues rockers were co-opting America's only indigenous art form, Johnny staked his claim to the title of reigning blues guitar hero with blinding chops as hot as a jalapeno and authentic blues feel as deep, wide and muddy as the Rio Grande. Johnny's studio releases are an unparalleled record of the evolution of a blues master who has never stopped growing and perfecting his unique artistic vision of the music as a living, breathing entity meant to be expressed with spontaneity and unbounded enthusiasm in concert. To the everlasting gratitude of his fans, he has recorded a tremendous number of his shows, amassing an archive of forty plus years of musical treasures. They are now being carefully and painstakingly mastered and will be released over the next several years as the Live Bootleg Series on Friday Music.

Volume One covers a collection of Johnny's vintage performances featuring bassist Jon Paris and drummer Bobby T, his power trio at the time playing with fiery abandon and thundering drive. From his signature hair-raising scream of A LITTLE ROCK AND ROLL! that introduces Johnny B. Goode to his stomping bonus track cover of Bobby Womack's R&B classic It's All Over Now, this musical journey is one of blues and rock, heart and soul. If there is any doubt that he is the premier interpreter of the Rolling Stones, one need only to listen to his cataclysmic version of Jumpin' Jack Flash, to dispel any rumors. It's no wonder Keith and Mick gladly handed him their Silver Train to cover. Any Texan worth his salt and tequila includes Freddie King's Hide Away in his repertoire, but Johnny knows it from the inside out and makes the well- worn classic his own. Ever conscious of his true roots in country blues, he delivers a Southern fried Rollin' and Tumblin' for the ages, stamping it as bonafide with his slashing slide guitar. Further demonstrating his versatility, his original, brooding Stranger makes a case for this overlooked aspect of his talent. As Johnny is quick to point out when anyone calls his recent resurgence as a comeback, But I never went anywhere! These priceless, previously unreleased live recordings only further serve to fill in the gaps in a legacy that continues to be added to with every passing contemporary show and recording.
Review by Dave Rubin - Guitar Player Magazine

01. Johnny B Goode
02. Messin With The Kid
03. Help Me
04. Hideaway
05. Come On In My Kitchen
06. Rollin' and Tumblin'
07. Stranger
08. Jumpin Jack Flash
09. Boney Maroine
10. It's All Over Now

Johnny Winter Live Bootleg Series Vol. 2

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I always knew I d make it, Johnny Winter, cigarette dangling from his lips, told me after a gig one night in 2007 as his tour bus rolled on through the darkness of rural Virginia. I never doubted it. I always knew that playing music was what I was meant to do, and I never even thought about doing anything else. Live Bootleg Series Volume II the second installment in Friday Music s artist-approved releases displays the same unshakable confidence that made Johnny Winter one of the 20th century s most important and influential guitarists. It also illuminates the native Texan s lifelong love affair with the blues, not to mention his absolute mastery of the guitar. Johnny s own searing Black Cat Bone, a tune he first recorded for 1969 s The Progressive Blues Experiment, kicks things off, and it s followed by a true blues story: a tale of persecution, the Mose Allison-penned Parchman Farm, which Johnny transforms into a heavy, groove-laden rocker.

Up next is Rock Me Baby, a hit for B.B. King. To this day, Johnny fondly recalls the night in 1962 in his native Beaumont when B.B., playing a local blues club called The Raven, hesitantly allowed a young Johnny Winter after first checking to see if he had a union card to sit in with his band. (Johnny did, in fact, take the stage that night, and he earned a standing ovation for his efforts.) This riff-heavy reading of B.B. s classic is vintage Johnny, sporting his deep-throated growl and soaring, overdriven blues-rock guitar lines. An undeniable highlight of this collection is the jaw-dropping, 15-minute reading of Willie Brown s Mississippi Blues. Alongside a wailing harmonica, Johnny expertly builds the tune from the bottom up, each turnaround giving way to yet another verse that seems to up the ante even more. By the time the tune concludes its sixth minute and the entire band kicks in, the guitar lines have become simply torrid and there s still a lot more ahead. It sets the table beautifully for what comes next, Johnny s incendiary take on Robert Johnson s Crossroads, which rocks firmly in the spirit of Cream. Closing this collection is a simply unforgettable Red House, in which Winter dedicates the tune to Al Hendrix in memory of his late son Jimi.
Review by Sean McDevitt

01. Black Cat Bone
02. Parchman Farm
03. Rock Me Baby
04. Mississippi Blues
05. Crossroads
06. Red House (Bonus Live Recording)

Johnny Winter Live Bootleg Series vol. 3

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Like any life-changing, chromosome-rearranging event, all guitar fans remember their first time seeing Johnny Winter perform live. For me, the year was 1973, at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Johnny was then embarking on his Still Alive and Well comeback tour. Appearing onstage all in white, his platinum-white hair flowing down to his elbows and playing a blinding white Gibson Firebird V, Johnny beamed with the unbridled energy of a force from some distant galaxy. His performance a combination of earth-shattering guitar playing, searing vocals and wildly energetic stage presence--was nothing short of brilliant. He rocked the Garden so hard that night, the entire building shook in rhythm with the music. During the barn-burning boogie track Rock & Roll, I literally believed that the Garden was going to blast apart at the seams. In the ensuing years, I have seen Johnny perform countless times in arenas, amphitheaters, 1200-seaters, sardine-canned packed clubs (such as NYC s legendary Lone Star Café), rehearsal studios, and even Johnny s own living room. Seeing and hearing Johnny Winter play live is an experience like no other, because, simply stated, no other guitar player has ever entwined raw power, pure emotion, conviction, and virtuosity more effectively than he has.

Live Bootleg Series: Vol. 3 opens with Mojo Boogie. Johnny leads off the tune with some unaccompanied virtuoso slide work, his guitar tuned to open D (one of his favorite tunings for slide), before the band kicks in for a blazing extended intro solo, with bassist Paris offering some double duty by coping Johnny s slide melodies note-for-note on harmonica. The second cut, Stranger Blues, is a killer Elmore James boogaloo that Johnny rips apart with more slide work in open D. This is the type of hard-rockin blues Johnny first introduced to the world back in 1969 with his seminal release, The Progressive Blues Experiment. On the third track, I Smell Trouble Johnny displays the kind of mind-blowing speed and virtuosity that he usually reserves for long workouts over slow blues, while Boot Hill is a hard-driving mid-tempo shuffle on which Johnny effortlessly combines slide guitar with some of the fastest single-note work he s ever recorded.

Next up is a very rare live take of Robert Johnson s Stones in My Pass Way, played in front of a small but appreciative audience. Johnny performs the song unaccompanied with a slide on a National steel guitar tuned to open G. I learned about open tunings from listening to Robert Johnson's King of the Delta Blues, Johnny told me back in 1989. I picked up the concept of using open tunings just by using my own ears, and when I discovered how the open tunings worked with the slide, it was quite a revelation. I m Gonna Murder My Baby, was written by one of Johnny s big guitar influences, Pat Hare. Says Johnny, I m Gonna Murder My Baby is the heaviest blues song ever written! This collection rounds out with a smoldering version of Johnny s most well known track, his slide guitar tour-de-force arrangement of Bob Dylan s Highway 61 Revisited. Johnny Winter is regarded as one of the greatest, most original and most influential slide guitarists ever, and this track offers ample testament to that fact. Today, Johnny Winter is still touring steadily all over the globe, playing and singing as only he can and bringing audiences to their feet wherever he goes. Until the next time you get to see him perform live, Live Bootleg Vol. 3 will keep you covered.
Review by Andy Aledort


1.Mojo Boogie
2.Stranger Blues
3.I Smell Trouble
4.Boot Hill
5.Stones In My Pass Way
6.I'm Gonna Murder My Baby
7.Highway 61 Revisited

Johnny Winter - No Time To Live [2001]

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Live At The Texas Opry House [1997]

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Live In Houston [1993]

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White Lightning [1996]

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