JOHNNY WINTER - John Dawson Winter III - 12" Vinyl LP Album

Blues guitarist Johnny Winter and his companions Randy Jo Hobbs (bass) and Richard Hughes (drums) present eleven new LP tracks – including five Winter compositions, John Lennon’s "Rock & Roll People," and "Roll With Me" by former Winter band member Rick Derringer. Alongside Rick, Johnny’s brother Edgar was also part of the recording session in the studio.

Once again, a white Winter blues emerged in the force field between rock rhythms and emotionally charged lyrics. Johnny Winter creates an exciting blues-rock sound without elaborate arrangements or complicated technical effects. Eleven tracks with dynamic interplay between guitar, vocals, and bass, mostly in a brisk rhythm. Toward the end of the first side of the LP, Johnny’s passion becomes apparent in three consecutive tracks: long, lively guitar riffs of great intensity.

Source & Original German Article

Rrrrock’n’Rooooll!!! Johnny-Boy, the indestructible guitar albino, has struck again, and not too badly, with this album. Aside from the goosebumps his guitar solos still manage to produce, it’s primarily Johnny’s ferocious voice that is largely responsible for the characteristic Winter sound.

Otherwise, this LP offers almost nothing beyond good old rock. Good old rock , that is—just to be clear!

We already mentioned in the previous issue of ME that John Lennon wrote the song “Rock’n’Roll People.” And if Mr. Winter thinks this is his most successful album so far, I honestly can’t disagree with him.

However, what I don’t quite understand is why such an album would include a Country & Western song, “Love Song To Me.” In America, that might be a gag... but for Europe—I'm not sure.

(lutz)

Source & Original German Article

Well the man's back again with another album – the only time we really get to hear him apart from the old gig and his annual appearance on OGWT. You should know the format by now – hits it straight at you does our Johnny, no back door subtlety here. The second track, Golden Days of Rock and Roll sums up Johnny's attitude exactly, and sums up the album come to that. Johnny couldn't woo a bulldog with that grinding voice of his, but perhaps he isn't trying to, just to get it excited would be enough.

M. T.

Source Article

Once again, the king of riffs turns up his amp and lets rip with volumes of violent, speedy guitar phrases, fronted by blues vocals akin to scraping a hairbrush across your tonsils. The pace is frenetic, the sound weighs tons, and there’s a small gap on the 492nd groove where you can actually stop to breathe.

Comparing the many Winter albums is pointless—each is a further demonstration of fiery finger ability, rather than an attempt to create rock ’n’ roll classics. He is a rock ’n’ roll classic.

Included here is the usual popular clan, featuring Edgar Winter, Randy Jo Hobbs, Richard Hughes, and, of course, organic adviser (and manager) Steve Paul. Songs are by Winter, Lennon, Toussaint, and Barry Mann.

Extremely white lightning.

LG

Source Article

by Charley Walters

Johnny Winter, his brother Edgar and Rick Derringer form an American rock triumvirate that knows little competition.. John Dawson Winter III further refines the oldest's progression from an overanxious white bluesman with a strained voice into a tasteful and raunchy rocker. Winter the guitarist is a constant powerhouse who leaves few spaces in his frequent solos. Delivering cluster after cluster of rapidly picked notes or soaring chords, he has developed a discernible, if not virtuoso, style to replace the awkward pastiches of Chuck Berry and B.B. King that flawed his early work.

Interestingly, Winter opts for less use of distortion than do most guitarists of this like. He composes smartly. Knowing that even the simplest change can revitalize an otherwise staid 12-bar blues, Winter inserts a time-tested ascending chord sequence into the ninth and tenth bars of "Pick Up on My Mojo." Yet he can also succeed with a humorous country/western aside, and the haunting, gently sung "Stranger, a pop piece reminiscent of Edgar. But it's never a one-man show. Randy Hobbs's bass combines treble tones with the mandatory bottom sound, and muscular drum rolls from Richard Hughes ;propel the meatier tracks which dominate the album. Wisely, Winter continues to borrow from other writers: Derringer, John Lennon and Allen Tousraim are all well represented

John Dawson Winter III is not without flaws his vocal on "Sweet,Papa John," a blues patterned after the earliest Muddy Waters sides, returns to the thin huskiness he has mostly mastered, and the horns on two cuts would have been best omitted. Still, Winter displays an unmistakenly maturity that few rock artists reach.

Johnny Winter in an interview with Allan Jones: So what about the new album, which you've recently completed and which includes a new John Lennon song: "Rock and Roll people"?

I was really glad to get that song, because John's been one of my favourite people for a long time. And I've been hustling for a song from him for three or four albums. When I did the "Still Alive and well" album we called him up and asked if he had any extra rock 'n' roll songs. And he said that if he did have any, he was keeping them for himself because he was just as short of material. Then he was recording at the same studio as us and my producer talked to him and mentioned that I was recording there, and asked again if he had any songs we could use.

"Rock 'n' roll people" he'd written for himself, and had done it. But it hadn't come together right, and he didn't like it for himself, so he gave me the tape and it was just perfect for me.

Synopsis: As Johnny Winter gears up for his long-awaited European tour, he shares insights on rehearsing with his new band, crafting his upcoming album John Dawson Winter III, and the unique pressures of performing live. Reflecting on the changes in his music, Winter reveals his desire to transcend genre labels, balancing between rock, blues, and unexpected new directions. Despite fame’s difficulties, from fan encounters to the chaos of concert culture, Johnny remains focused on delivering music that resonates across generations.

Full Article:

JOHNNY WINTER was in a very good mood. He'd been rehearsing with his new band for the European trip, the new album was about to be mastered and, aside from the fact that he wasn't yet sure what he would wear onstage in England, everything was going smoothly.

Everything, that is, except this interview. One day the reporter was ill, another day the snarling New York traffic prevented our date with destiny — finally after several attempts, Johnny Winter and your reporter managed to converse.

Anyway, he was pretty excited about the trip to London. "I was supposed to have gone there twice before but both times something came up. I think this trip is going to be real nice. I was kinda worried at first because it was said over there that we were strange over there because the audiences were quieter and more subdued, but I didn't find it that way at all. They are exactly the same as American audiences if you do a good job and play good rock and roll, and if you played quiet music they would sit there and listen."

They don't toss as many firecrackers.

"No... that would be nice," he laughed. "You know, that never really happened at all until last year or so. It seems as though every concert that I've done, or every concert I've gone to, and it's not all the kids — it's just the beer and bottle-throwing crowd. After the first beer's thrown and the first bottle is broken nobody really gives a damn what goes on. If you aren't drunk you don't care. But all that fire-throwing and bottle-throwing stuff seems to happen when something really gets you worse and worse. At first it's a good thing, then they get all fired up because I was talking about — but my road manager told me if I change my act up, I could die or something. I'm not scared of anything that happens in life with that stuff.

"Like, when I throw it, I'll have to throw it back at you. But I'm afraid of that. Because it's really scary, you could get hurt real bad.

"We had a bottle thrown at the drums once and it put a dent in the drum set — you can imagine what would happen if that hit someone in the head."

"And when the spotlights are on you you can't see anybody. I don't think they really want to hurt you, they just want to show themselves. Maybe they are bored and sick of scratching and not to let into concerts with firecrackers. ... it's not the kids, it's the energy music that brings them back into the early 1950's when they all used to pan rock and roll because it had more energetic parts — good rock and roll."

"Like, we just want people to have a good time. Like a party and want to do anything when they get all keyed up, which makes people do things they don't want to do normally. I just consider it good-time music."

AS FAR as the new album is concerned, it's interesting. Johnny Winter has recorded other more songs for this reason album. Five of them. Three are pretty blues based, he says, some of them are blues/rock and some of them are blues the way he used to do it a long time ago.

"This album is really strange because it's got some of the really old Johnny Winter stuff that I haven't done in a long time and it's got some very different things that people are not going to expect at all. It's some of the songs I wrote: one of them is a country tune and western tune about myself called 'Love Song to Me' — just about how screwed my life is and write another really pretty ballad. And some of the tunes have really funky grooves which are more complicated things with horn arrangements and some real basic three-piece tunes. It's the whole extreme from the old Johnny Winter to the new. I don't know if you would call it the new Johnny Winter, but it's sure different.

"But I'm trying to get to the point of being beyond categorization, you know. People are always saying, well, what are you, what are you? Are you a rock and roll player or a blues player? And you're really — what you want to do? What direction do you want to go in? I want to go in every direction that I am capable of. I don't want to quit doing what I've been doing, like the show, and I don't want to feel confined. Whether if I do a song one day, a ballad, or a country song, or use a hundred piece orchestra or even weird disco boogie or you could think — 'Well, Johnny Winter is like that, that's not so much' but if you don't limit yourself to a form or direction. I just want to be able to please people in some way and have people accept the things that I do well."

THE ACTUAL recording part didn't take too long — but Johnny said he'd been working on the record for the last four months, writing three songs first, and then recording them — then doing some more songs and coming back into the Record Plant and recording them. "Usually our albums take us about two weeks to do," Johnny laughed, "because I hadn't been writing that many songs, we had been doing older things — like old rock and roll standards. It took a lot more time to try and be more creative this time."

The title will be "John Dawson Winter III," taking his real name. "I'm using that because we had fun. It's the picture of the country, the design sounds like a John Dawson Winter to the third."

How I feel about music, Winter continued, "because if you do a good record and give people a good time they will have a good record anyway because you get a good review and then you get a good hit and on to sell 100,000 copies. It's like your best five years if you're on top. It gets kind of scary when you can't create another hit after five years. But I'm lucky so I work on creating them, and I have to tell what they like right then. And you know when they're turned on, and that turns me on. It's harder in the studio, it doesn't build back the same.

"I like to listen to my albums again and again. ... but not my old ones; I might not listen to some of them for years and years, but I have to go home and listen to my albums all the time ..."

What he does listen to, he says, is a lot of old stuff; even from the thirties and the forties. ... "even the fifties and sixties. The last few years have been kind of barren musically as far as I'm concerned," he said. "I don't buy that much new stuff and don't listen to the radio much."

One of the songs on "John Dawson" will have a special John Lennon contribution. "I didn't ask John, really for anything. I think we said that he would play, he did it much. ... he will say — he had always been one of my favorites when he came up to Record Plant, and he was working on that and we said, yeah we do a demo of the song and I liked it so we did." It's called "Rock & Roll People" and it's kind of a cool studio.

Rick Derringer also wrote a song for this album with Winter, the last couple of days that we were in the studio. And they recorded it called "Slide Over Matter". We approached him for people for songs and management people listened to the songs. He was the selected song.

I asked him if there was anything that he hadn't done. Winter says he didn't have a secret fantasy about that. "Well, there are a lot of things that I'd like to do and one of them is to put out a record in the next two years.

"I'd like to record when I'm in the mood for it I'd like to go back and do an album of nothing but blues. I wouldn't like to do either of them right now, but sometimes to figure I'd like to do two of those things."

With Johnny on his European tour will be Randy Jo Hobbs on bass, Richard Hughes on drums, and Floyd Radford on rhythm guitar. (Floyd previously played with Tin House and White Trash ... it's all sort of in the Blue Sky/Silver Paul/Winter family). Winter said that was the way he was situating the player in the new group player, but actually we kept everything the same because I hadn't been doing what we couldn't do with the band. I hadn't seen him before and wasn't sure how they would mix. Radford is a different kind of style than Derringer and practised it and it just worked out very well. Plus Floyd is just a very tightly involved writer, which I do get involved in, and I feel he might roll out a songwriter eventually."

For guitar aficionados, Johnny takes two instruments with him when he travels, and they’re both the same kind — Gibson Firebirds. “I take one that I play all the time, and the other in case anything happens.

If it gets stolen, or a string breaks during the show I can just change it without wasting time. Once I get used to one guitar it’s really hard for me to play another one. I’ve been with this one for four years — probably won’t ever change.”

Do his fans get close to him at all? Lately he’s been out a lot in New York City at a variety of clubs and concerts. “It depends on where you go. Most clubs aren’t too bad, people are older, and they’ll come over and say ‘Hi, I like your music,’ and stuff like that. I just don’t go to places like teenage hangouts where the kids are fifteen and sixteen ... forget it. Or go to a concert and sit in the audience.

You really can’t talk to anybody because you get pencils shoved in your face or kids saying ‘can I have some hair? How about a finger?’ or ‘Is this the hand you play guitar with? I’ll take that.’ So I just don’t do that anymore. I try and stay away from places like that because you can’t really get close to the fans in that kind of a situation, or be friends with them.

“It’s too bad, I used to really try — you know, people would ask me ‘Do you think being big is going to change your head?’ and I was determined that I wouldn’t change, and I would go out and be the same as I was. But it’s just impossible. You can’t do that, and it’s too bad.

“But things aren’t the same. Things that were fun — just aren’t anymore. If you go to a concert and try to listen — you know, somebody you really want to hear — there’s people shoving pencils and papers at you from the time you come in until the time that you leave. Well, you don’t get to hear the band, so what’s the use of going? You really have to change your lifestyle and just not do some of the things that you used to like. That really bothered me at first, and I finally had to accept it.”

AS FAR as his image is concerned — the blues/freak/superstar discovered by Steve Paul in Texas and then all that bit with Kicking the Heroin Habit — Johnny would rather that, when he returns to England, people talk to him about Now. “I’m so tired of talking about all of that. I guess people over there will ask me about some of it, but I never tried to hide anything that was happening to me, any of the things I was going through. So I’m pretty sure that everyone over there knows what was going on. I guess I’d talk about it some, but I’d really rather talk about what’s going on now than things that are past. It’s hard to talk about something with any feeling after you’ve said it a thousand times.”

Original Source

AT LEAST it’s better than “Saints And Sinners.”

Come to that, 35 minutes of belching and farting would have been better than “Saints And Sinners,” but the replacement of Rick Derringer by Shelly Yakus as co-producer has wrought some significant, if minor, improvements.

Most noticeable to these is the ditching of the cluttered, overproduced feel of the last opus in favour of a simpler and more open feel, though the dull, undynamic sound isn’t overly appealing.

Since most of you are dead anxious to hear about the album’s new Lennon song, “Rock’n Roll People,” and since Winter and Yakus stuck it right up front where we can all get at it, let us do so.

Actually, it’s dreadful, and it’s quite obvious why Lennon was not particularly anxious to record it himself. The “my father was a fishmonger/my mother was a whore” text seems even worse than it seemed when Lennon first sang it, but Winter’s friends seem particularly thrilled with it.

Things have come to a sorry pass when John Lennon gives his best songs to Ringo Starr.

The magic invocation of “Rock’n Roll People” zooms in again on the period known as “The Golden Olden Days Of Rock and Roll,” when people knocked out three-chord wonders one after another — two of which these are back-to-when-men-were-men-and-girls-were-fit-for-heroes type efforts. It’d be okay on a 45, but box it’s devoid of any other lustre.

Winter’s guitar playing is pretty sluggish throughout, actually. On “Self-Destructive Blues” (great title, though) he runs through one of those patented medium 12-bar shuffles he’s been knocking out ever since they first allowed him into a studio, but that blazing edge seems to have dulled and he just sounds like any other fast-fingered white blues guitarist.

Only four tracks have anything real to commend them.

“Stranger” is a rather nondescript ballad, but Winter uses a very tasty soft rippling rhythm guitar against a Leslie speaker lead guitar sound, similar to the treatment of “No Time To Live” on the “Johnny Winter And” album.

“Love Song To Me” is a sloppy piece of country hokum with mindless love lyrics about how anybody would be proud to be the friend of his fans, and there’s great interplay with another aged “Roll With Me”.

My own personal fave is “Sweet Papa John,” a kind of country blues thing with good phrasing and some legitimate solitary bass guitar. Pete Frerske says he likes “Get Back Home”.

I can’t get too enthusiastic about “John Dawson Winter III.” There’s nothing really wrong with it, but it just kind of lies there, ticking over on the tastemometer at inoffensively. Basically, Winter hasn’t made a really fine album since “Still Alive And Well” and his commercial career was only just beginning to show signs of downward curve.

This album improves on the two before it, but except for those folks who automatically love every song that John Lennon ever wrote.

Charles Shaar Murray

Source Article

Jan reflects on the creation of John Dawson III:

It took 4 months to complete this LP. There were tons of tapes, acetate demo recordings and sheet music left from this assignment. Van Morrison submitted 15 songs. Everyone wanted to send Johnny their music. Not everyone receives such a response getting material. Fortunately for us Johnny wrote more songs on this album than he had on any previous records. The five song included 3 blues songs, a ballad, and a country western song (a C&W sound that was a completely new sound from him), a country song with a touch of self mockery.

John Lennon wrote the song that appears on this album. He wrote it for himself but didn't like the way he did it that much. Johnny's producer, Shelly Yakus, was working on the sessions for John's Walls and Bridges LP and told John Johnny was doing a record downstairs and asked if he had anything to contribute. He said, "Year , I do," and gave them a demo of the song. Johnny liked it so it was included. John has always been one of Johnny's favorite people and he was very glad to do the song - "Rock and Roll People," sort of a fast shuffle. Johnny recognized that the song had crazy lyrics.

At the time of John's murder much sadness was felt worldwide, after the initial shock my thoughts turned to this song and I wondered how the news hit Johnny. I am sure he is very honored and proud to have one of John's songs on his album.

Johnny gives us a good example of his past experiences in this album. Songs range from basic three piece tunes to the orchestration pieces. This LP showed the old Johnny Winter we know so well to the Johnny Winter we were unfamiliar with. It is way beyond categorization. It seems he goes in every direction he was capable of. He will always keep doing what he has done in the past but keeps himself free to experiment and broaden. All he has ever wanted musically is to broaden what he has been doing and have people accept the things he does well. Seems a most humble request. I try to keep this in mind.

IMHO I have always felt Johnny's greatest demon has been that struggle of the blues playing the blues he lives for and the rock and roll that is inside him too. For his whole career he has been struggling to please his fans and at the same time satisfy himself. It feels the result we witness today may be because of this internal struggle. We are fortunate he has the strength and courage to keep fighting and winning no matter what physical and mental challenges he has to endure each day, no matter what it takes to do what he was born to do - sing and play guitar - in a way that will never be repeated again, and with this comes that crossroad few are either fortunate or prepared to find.

John Dawson Winter III further refines the oldest's progression from an overanxious white bluesman with a strained voice into a raunchy rocker.

Winter the guitarist is a constant powerhouse who leaves fews spaces in his frequent solos. Delivering cluster after cluster of rapidly picked notes or soaring chords, he has developed a discernible, if not virtuoso style to replace the awkward pastices of Chuck Berry and BB King that flawed his early work. Interestingly Winter opts for less use of distortion than do most guitarists of this ilk.

Johnny Winter, his brother Edgar and Rick Derringer form an American rock triumvirate that knows little competition. John Dawson Winter III further refines the oldest's progression from an overanxious white bluesman with a restrained voice into a tasteful and raunch rocker.

Winter the guitarist is a constant powerhouse who leaves few spaces in his frequent solos. Delivering cluster after cluster of rapidly picked notes or soaring chords, he has developed a discernible, if not virtuoso, style to replace the awkward pastiches of Chuck Berry and B.B. King that flawed his early work. Interestingly, Winter opts for less use of distortion than do most guitarists of this ilk.

He composes smartly. Knowing that even the simplest change can revitalize an otherwise staid 12-bar blues, Winter inserts a time-tested ascending chord sequence into the ninth and tenth bars of "Pick Up on My Mojo." Yet he can also succeed with a haunting, gently sung "Stranger," a pop piece reminiscent of Edgar.

But it's never a one-man show. Randy Jo Hobbs's bass combines treble tones with the mandatory bottom sound, and muscular drum rolls from Richard Hughes propel the meatier tracks which dominate the album. Wisely, Winter continues to borrow from other writers: Derringer, John Lennon and Allen Toussaint are all well represented. Shelly Yackus's crisp production shows the proper measure of control.

John Dawson Winter III is not without flaws -- his vocal on "Sweet Papa John," a blues patterned after the earliest Muddy Waters sides, returns to the thin huskiness he has mostly mastered, and the horns on two cuts would have been best omitted. Still, Winter displays an unmistakable maturity that few rock artists achieve.

Johnny Winter is back, and that is something to be happy about. The now thirty-year-old Texan first attracted worldwide attention in 1969—not initially for his music, but for the record deal offered to the newcomer, praised by the trade magazine Rolling Stone: $300,000 for an unknown artist. Such a gamble on an entirely uncertain future had never been seen before.

Aside from how he sang and played, Johnny Winter brought a lot to the sensation-hungry pop business: a spindly albino with flowing strands of hair had never graced the rock stage—especially not with such stiff, crazy movements. The fact that, in private, he was a shy, sweet boy without any star-like airs didn’t get around. His success with records and performances at concerts and festivals (including Woodstock) was interrupted when he became addicted to drugs.

Winter now sees the alienation that almost inevitably occurred during the (manager-driven) chase for publicity as the reason for this. (“I couldn’t be friends with anyone anymore.”) He spent two years in rehab facilities, and in 1973 he recorded another album. Now, for the first time since his recovery, he has reintroduced himself to the public in Germany with two (sold-out) concerts.

However, Johnny Winter does not come with the tragic image of someone like James Taylor, who has “seen fire and rain.” Instead, he presents himself as a joyous, exuberantly vital rock and blues musician at the height of his craft. Winter performs rock music with infectious cheerfulness and an especially effective use of his voice’s rough texture, which can musicalize screams like only the best Black singers can. In slow blues pieces, his singing is not quite as convincing, with his voice occasionally sounding a bit brittle when holding long notes. Still, the blues is his true strength—particularly as a guitarist. The way he builds his improvisations on the unshakable 12-bar blues structure, and the technique he employs, is unique. Every run through the 12-bar harmony sequence (chorus) is a small, self-contained masterpiece, where faster movements are used as a refined means of building intensity.

Even his improvisation over the course of an entire piece is crafted with structural development in mind, creating a great sense of progression. On top of that, he has Floyd Radford as a second guitarist in the band, who is in no way inferior to him. When the two play duos with equal voices at the end of a song, abandoning the division between melody and chord guitar after long solos, an electrifying spontaneity emerges that makes one forget all blues jam sessions by the likes of Mike Bloomfield, Al Kooper, and Eric Clapton.

Johnny Winter’s guitar artistry can be described as a blend of B.B. King’s “feeling” and Jimi Hendrix’s electro-intense technique (he has played with both). His connection to the blues did not come through intellectual reflection but through a youth that was far from sunny. Though he never faced financial struggles—his father was a cotton plantation owner—he was always the target of ridicule and teasing because of his eye condition and outsider appearance.

He couldn’t participate in sports, was called by feminine nicknames, and had to sit isolated in class at a short distance from the blackboard to compensate for his near-blindness (a common side effect of albinism). Music as a form of compensation—Johnny Winter himself knows this psychological framework applies to him. Identifying with the socially underprivileged Black creators of the blues was not difficult for him.

One critic expressed it this way: “Perhaps the alienation resulting from being doubly white caused him to grow up Black.”

— Ulrich Olshausen

Johnny Winter
JOHN DAWSON WINTER III
CBS 80 586
By Jogi

It’s forty degrees below zero, the snow is piled up as high as the window cross. In the distance, a wolf howls eerily, the sled dogs bark anxiously and tug at their leashes. Grandma is sitting in front of the big tile stove, making sure the baked apples don’t burn. — So, it’s winter, but something is missing.

Then the doorbell rings, and our old mailman, half-frozen, leans at the door and hands me a record package with trembling fingers. — Woohoo, Winter! John Dawson Winter, to be exact. The Third, mind you. And as if that weren’t enough, to celebrate the album cover, he’s donned a tuxedo and is cheekily peeking over a velvet bowtie. Johnny, how you’ve changed!

But once you put the record on, despite all the disguise, he’s still the same old rock ‘n’ roll/blues beast, capable of screaming so beautifully in anguish and torturing the guitar at ear-splitting volume. This time, he seems to be especially into rock ‘n’ roll: the LP kicks off with John Lennon’s “Rock ‘n’ Roll People.” Johnny, or rather, John Dawson III, rasps out his “Sweet, sweet rock ‘n’ roll,” launches into a marathon solo, and suddenly we’re back in the “Golden Olden Days of Rock ‘n’ Roll.” A clean number that you have to play loud so the backing vocals and brass (including the Brecker Brothers) can really shine.

As for the next track, “Self-Destructive Blues,” I don’t have much to say. And when I say “Blues a la Winter,” I think everyone knows what it sounds like. “Raised on Rock” is more interesting. Over an old Deep Purple riff, Johnny thunders about how great it is to grow up with rock ‘n’ roll. Well, after all, he earns his money with music—and not badly at that. (Jealous, Jogi? You bet!)

With “Stranger,” old Johnny’s got the blues again. But this one sounds more interesting, as he seems to be playing his guitar through a Leslie speaker. It whirls and swirls nicely, and the string accompaniment gives it the final touch.

Now on to side two. It kicks off with “Mind Over Matter,” a funky track by Allen Toussaint. Then comes “Roll With Me,” a simple but peppy rock piece by Johnny’s sidekick Rick Derringer. My favorite is Johnny’s next track, “Love Song to Me.” No one has ever dared something so bold. To a lively country tune (Rick Derringer on pedal steel), Johnny unabashedly sings: “Keep on rockin’ and a rollin’ don’t you never settle down Keep my records playin’ all the time Spend your money on my concerts every time I come to town And baby, you can be a friend of mine.” Well baby, that’s how it is—so cheeky, so true, so honest, and so deceitful…

Let’s wrap it up: “Pick Up on My Mojo,” a blues à la Winter. See above. Then, “Lay Down Your Sorrows,” a ballad with his brother Edgar on the organ, brass sections, and the obligatory backing vocals. The finale is “Sweet Papa John,” an excursion into slide guitar technique.

When Johnny refers to himself as Sweet Papa John and sings, “They call me sweet papa ’cause my candy is so strong. Eat it!” then I guess all the ladies, should they meet Johnny, will know exactly what they’re in for, right? Otherwise, happy wintering with Winter!

JOHNNY WINTER «John Dawson Winter III» (CBS 80 586)

Blues-Gitarrist Johnny Winter und seine Begleiter Randy Jo Hobbs (Bass) und Richard Hughes (Schlagzeug) steilen elf neue LP-Tracks vor - darunter fünf Winter-Kompositio- nen, John Lennons «Rock & Roll People» und «Roll With Me» von Ex-Winter-Bandmitglied Rick Derringer.

Neben Rick war auch Johnnys Bruder Edgar bei den Plattenaufnahmen mit von der Studio-Partie. Dabei entstand wieder ein weisser Winter-Blues im Kraftfeld zwischen Rock-Rhythmus und gefühlsbetonten Texten. Johnny Winter entwickelt einen mitreissenden Blues-Rock - ganz ohne grossangelegte Arrangements oder komplizierte technische Effekte.

Elf Stücke mit dynamischem Zusammen-spiel von Gitarre, Gesang und Bass in meist zügigem Rhythmus. Gegen Ende der ersten LP-Seite kommt Johnnys Leidenschaft gleich bei drei aufeinanderfolgenden Stücken zum Ausdruck: Lange, schwungvolle Gitarrenfiguren von starker Intensität.