100 Years of the Blues with Johnny Winter on the Front Page
Johnny Winter
This issue features numerous articles about blues players, including a full article on Johnny Winter. It includes recent pictures of him and one from the John Dawson Winter III era (fans will recognize it). There's a great close-up of him smiling, indicating that the interview must have been very recent, as he discusses making Live in NYC "last year." There are also a few brief words from Dick Shurman about the Alligator Records days.
Where Rock & Roll Meets the Blues: At the Crossroads with Johnny Winter
By Robert Santelli
I first met Johnny Winter in the mid-1970s, just as he was shifting from hard blues to hard rock. I was a 20-year-old part-time rhythm guitarist in a Johnny Winter-inspired blues-rock band on the New Jersey shore called Cobalt. While I wasn’t particularly skilled, the band was quite good.
Somehow, Winter heard about Cobalt. He traveled down from New York City one Sunday afternoon in the autumn to hear us rehearse. Apparently, he liked what he heard because, a few weeks later, our lead guitarist Doug Brockie and drummer Richard Hughes were asked to join Johnny’s band.
It didn’t take long for them to accept the offer. Johnny Winter was still a guitar kingpin despite '70s pop music distancing itself from the blues. He could still overwhelm listeners with his blues-driven, fiery solos and power chords, enough to sandblast the soul and send it to kingdom come.
Johnny Winter took the best Cobalt had to offer, and both the band and my budding career as a local star were left in his wake. At the time, I didn’t realize it, but he did me a favor. I pivoted to writing about music instead of playing it, which was the better path for me. My Cobalt colleagues’ experience taught me a crucial lesson.
Brockie
and Winter never quite connected, so Doug left to work with Ginger Baker. Hughes stayed on, playing for Winter on albums like Still Alive and Well and Saints and Sinners. However, the pressures of touring and personal issues took their toll. One day, I received a call informing me that Richard had taken his own life. It was my first real understanding of how success could come at such a high cost in the world of rock and roll—a lesson I've never forgotten.
Johnny Winter understands how unchecked success can rob someone of their good sense and health. It's no secret that Winter has had his battles with drugs and hard times. Remarkably, he not only survived but has continued to master blues guitar and create music that shows just how much Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Jonny Lang, and Mike Welch still need to grow before they can interpret the blues with Winter’s level of command and passion.
Johnny has faced tough times, and he lowers his head when Richard's name is mentioned. "On the outside, he seemed happy and all. But on the inside, he was hurting. I know a lot of people like that," Winter sighs. But these days are better, and Winter has plenty to be happy about, like his latest album, Live in NYC '97. It's a blistering collection of blues-rock from the Bottom Line, where Winter has performed for nearly 20 years.
Backed by bassist Mark Epstein and drummer Tom Compton, Winter delivers a solid blues statement on this release, with exhilarating solos and tributes to Freddie King ("Hideaway," "Sen-Sa-Shun"), Muddy Waters ("Got My Mojo Working"), Elmore James ("The Sky Is Crying"), and Ray Charles ("Black Jack"). When placed next to White Hot Blues, a compilation Sony/Legacy released last year featuring tracks from Winter’s Columbia albums (1969–1980), you get a clear picture of Johnny’s journey and why he remains a dean of American blues-rock guitar.
“Making a live album meant recording the songs we've been playing onstage for a while now,” Winter explains. “Last year, we were making some pretty good music, so a live album seemed right.”
The fact that Live in NYC opens with two Freddie King songs isn’t coincidental. “Freddie is one of my biggest influences,” Winter says. “I got to play with him a few times before he died [in 1976], and those are some of my fondest memories. I think I’ll always play some of Freddie’s music, out of respect for all the inspiration he gave me and because we’re both from Texas.”
Freddie King was born in Gilmer, Texas, in 1934, and Winter was born in Beaumont 10 years later. Johnny picked up the guitar at age 11, and by 14, he was leading his own band, with his brother Edgar on piano. By the mid-'60s, Winter was gaining recognition in Texas as a guitarist who understood the blues and could rock when needed. Fellow musicians saw him as a potential member of a lineage of Lone Star blues legends dating back to Blind Lemon Jefferson and including Lightnin' Hopkins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, and later, Stevie Ray Vaughan.
“There’s very little difference between blues and rock and roll,” Winter muses. “It’s easy to blur the boundary. Back when I got my Columbia deal, I was going back and forth between rock and blues. I did the same in the ‘70s and ‘80s, and I’m still doing it.”
For proof, listen to “Just A Little Bit” from Live in NYC, where Winter merges blues and rock effortlessly. “That’s a boundary crosser,” he laughs. “I put it between blues songs to show how these two kinds of music are like first cousins.”
Winter worked through hard rock in the mid-‘70s only to return to hard blues just as the music world embraced punk, disco, and arena rock. He also produced albums for Muddy Waters (winning two Grammys for Hard Again and I’m Ready) and recorded Nothin' But the Blues, an acoustic masterpiece.
However, Winter believes he shines brighter with electric guitar. “I’m not good enough to play much acoustic guitar onstage,” he laughs. “Man, you’ve got to get everything just right—tones, feel, sound. Acoustic blues guitar is harder on the fingers too.”
By the early ‘80s, Winter’s career stumbled with albums like White, Hot and Blue and Raisin’ Cain, leaving him without a record deal. “It made me realize you can’t take anything for granted. It was a bad time for the blues and for me,” he recalls.
Winter rebounded in 1983 by signing with Alligator Records, producing memorable albums like Guitar Slinger and Serious Business. He became more precise and emotionally intense, his sound aligning with the blues revival sparked by Stevie Ray Vaughan and others.
But Winter saved his best blues for 3rd Degree (1986), earning him a place in the Blues Foundation’s Hall of Fame. “Johnny wanted to be a father figure for younger blues artists,” says producer Dick Shurman.
Now with Point Blank Records, Winter's sound remains fresh and relevant. “Dick understands what I want from my sound, especially my guitar,” says Winter. “I speak through my guitar, and Dick gets the language.”
Despite the blues' resurgence, Winter admits he doesn't listen to much contemporary blues. "I'm still catching up on the old stuff. I don’t know where the blues is going, but I know where it's been—and that’s good enough for me."
