DAVID BIANCULLI, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm David Bianculli, professor of television studies at Rowan University. Buddy Guy was one of the first blues guitarists to use electronic feedback and distortion, and his technique is legendary. In 1986, Eric Clapton called him the greatest guitarist of all time. Guy has a cameo in "Sinners," Ryan Coogler's hit movie set in 1932 in the Mississippi Delta during the Jim Crow era. Twins, both played by Michael B. Jordan, open a juke joint and try to keep the business going despite unexpected obstacles, including evil vampires. Buddy Guy plays the older version of blues musician Sammie Moore.
Guy was born in rural Louisiana in 1936, the son of sharecroppers. He set out for Chicago as a young man and quickly became a central part of that city's blues scene. In 1989, he founded his own club there, Buddy Guy's Legends, which is still going strong. Buddy Guy has won eight Grammy awards and a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1985, he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame, and in 2005, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Guy was one of the first guitarists to use electronic feedback and distortion, before Hendrix and other rock guitarists. Terry asked how he developed that technique.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)
BUDDY GUY: Accidentally. Actually, in Chicago then, we didn't have stages. We'd always go in a corner and play. And they had jukeboxes during their breaks, and they would play tunes. And that's how I learnt, by listening to other people, greats - Muddy Water, Wolf and so on. And I forgot to turn my guitar off one day and a lady passed by, and her dress tail hit the G string. And it just stayed there with distortion for about 20 minutes. And I said, I'll never forget that. And I went up, and it worked with me, and I've been doing it ever since.
TERRY GROSS: Explain this again. Her dress touched the G string?
GUY: Yeah, I forgot to cut it off. And it was lying against the amplifier, you know?
GROSS: Oh.
GUY: And as I said, we didn't have a stage. We were just in the corner playing. And she got up from her table to probably go get a drink or use the bathroom or something like that. And I said, wow, I forgot to cut my guitar off. And it was right in tune with the particular tune what was playing on the jukebox.
GROSS: So then, how did you start using that yourself intentionally?
GUY: Well, after I found out it would stay and distort that long, I just went up one day and played and stood right there where it was, and it works.
GROSS: Now, when you were recording for Chess Records back in the first part of the '60s, you were already doing some of this onstage, I think. But you've said that Leonard Chess didn't like that. He wouldn't let you cut loose.
GUY: Well, first of all, you know, Leonard had gotten to the point that, you know, for an example, if you had to went in there and said I want to do some rapping now, they would've shot you with a shotgun, you know?
GROSS: (Laughter).
GUY: But if you was in the streets, you know what the young people was asking for. And they was reacting to what you was playing. And I was, like, throwing the gruitar down, missing notes. And it was ringing out with distortion and stuff. And people were going crazy, saying look at that, listen to that. And I would try to take it back and say this is what's out there. And they would say get out of here, you know? And I'm, like, saying OK.
And later on in his life - I think it was like three, four, six months before he passed away - he called me in and said, I want to talk to you. And he had found out because that was Hendrix, Eric and the Cream and so on playing that. And he looked at me and said, how dumb could I be? You've been trying to give me this stuff for so long and I was calling it noise, and now it's selling in the millions. I said, you're kidding me (laughter), you know? And it was just like a joke to me.
GROSS: Well, Buddy Guy, I want to play one of your first records with Chess recordings. And you were saying that Leonard Chess wouldn't let you do what you really wanted to. But this is a really pretty good recording. It's called "First Time I Met The Blues." It was recorded in 1960. Little Brother Montgomery's at the piano. Do you remember the session?
GUY: Yes, that's Little Brother Montgomery's tune. Him and Willie Dixon got me together on that because I was with Cobra Records before that, and I got with Chess in the '60s, and that's the tune they brought me first. And I was more of a student, a listener, whatever you might say, at that time. And I was doing whatever they thought was best for me in order for me to get a record out with the Chess people, because otherwise, if I'd went in there and said, look, I'm doing it my way, I would've been - you probably wouldn't be talking to me now because that was the company then at the time to try to get recorded with.
GROSS: OK, well let's hear it. Recorded in 1960, my guest Buddy Guy on guitar and vocals.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FIRST TIME I MET THE BLUES")
GUY: (Singing) The first time I met the blues, people, I was walking, I was walking down through the woods. Yeah, the first time, the first time I met you, blue - blues, you know I was walking. I was walking down through the woods. Yeah, I've watched my house burning blues. Blues, you know you've done me, you've done me all the harm that you could. The blues got after me. People, you know they ran me from tree to tree.
GROSS: Let's go back to your very early years. Your father was a sharecropper. Did your parents want you to get off the plantation? Were you brought up with the sense of, when you get old enough, you should really get out of here?
GUY: My parents was like - I got two sisters and two brothers, five of us. And they was, like, sharecroppers. And they would teach us all that when we got grown, if you go away - I want you to go away. Do better than we did. And if you marry a elephant, if you love him, we have to like him. And that's just the way they was until they passed away. They never was the type of people that tried to choose what we should do or what not. They just told me, Son, don't be the best in town, just be the best until the best come around.
GROSS: (Laughter) Were there any musicians on the plantation where you grew up?
GUY: Not really. Was a distant guy my dad brought the first guitar for me from and his mother, my grandmother. And if she was living - I was talking to you today, and you'd - 10 minutes conversation with her, she would figure out that we was related in some kind of way or another. But...
(LAUGHTER)
GUY: ...Sooner or later, if you think back real deep, religious-wise, I guess we are in a way of speaking. But she could figure that out, and this guy was supposed to be some kind of distant relative of ours.
GROSS: (Laughter).
GUY: And that's just the way they had me feeling. And I kind of feel that way now with the music I'm playing and going and traveling around the world. Everybody I see looks and smiles the same, you know? I just see you're big or tall or small or different colors, but we still walking around on two legs, drinking water and eating food and sleeping and talking.
GROSS: So she got this guy to give you a guitar or teach you guitar?
GUY: No. My dad paid two bucks for it, and it had two strings on it. Now, first electric guitar I saw was Lightnin' Slim, and I give him my weekly allowances, which is 35 cents.
GROSS: Oh, you heard him playing and you...
GUY: No. He came through on a Sunday evening and plugged up on the storefront porch and played "Boogie Chillen."
GROSS: So how did you get your first amplifier?
GUY: A stranger bought my first real guitar and my first real amplifier. He bought it for me. Actually, I was sitting...
GROSS: Oh.
GUY: ...On my sister's porch with the two strings, trying to get - my first year in a high school. My mother had had a stroke. And a stranger passed and said, son, I bet if you had a guitar, you would learn how to play. And this is a Thursday evening. And I said, probably so. And he said, what are you doing tomorrow? I said, I sit here every evening. And the next evening, he came by. He said, let's go. And I said, where? He said, I'm going to buy you a guitar. And he went - took me downtown and bought the guitar. And my sister came in, and we was laughing, and he was drinking a quarter beer. And he said, well, let's go in the country where my mom and dad at, in a country bar with a country guitar. And the guy followed us out. Then, strangely enough, him and my dad talked for 10 minutes, and they had grew up together as boys.
GROSS: So who was he?
GUY: The guy's name was Mitchell. He grew up as a boy with my dad. And after he bought the guitar, my dad tried to trace him down, which - he moved to Chicago and became a preacher. And we never did - could track him down because I still owed him the money for the guitar. Still do.
GROSS: So do you feel like you still owe him a lot of thanks? Do you feel like you...
GUY: A lot.
GROSS: ...weren't able to express...
GUY: A lot. A lot. And I'm sure, wherever he is at this point, if there's any way that he should know, he should know I want to thank him, and I owe my whole career to him.
GROSS: You left the plantation when you were 21. You went to Chicago?
GUY: No, no, no, no.
GROSS: Not 21?
GUY: I left the plantation trying to get the one year of high school and went into Baton Rouge.
GROSS: Oh. Oh, I see.
GUY: And then I left Baton Rouge September 25, 1957, 8:40 a.m. in the morning.
GROSS: Wow, you really remember...
GUY: (Laughter).
GROSS: ...Exactly the moment.
GUY: I can't forget that.
GROSS: Tell me about that moment.
GUY: My mother was sick. And she had had a stroke, and she kept telling me, if you don't - don't live my life around her. Because we was very close, and I figured that, you know, I should stay. And she said, no. And she learned how to make us understand some of the things she was saying, because it affects your speech, and she said, go. You know, and I said, OK. If you happy, I'm going. And she smiled and said, go. And when she heard the first record I made, they tell me she gave them a big smile.
GROSS: Did you see her again after you left?
GUY: Oh, yeah.
GROSS: OK. Yeah.
GUY: I went to see her every year until she passed away. She passed away April 16, 1968. I had been jamming with Hendrix when she passed away. Oh, yeah.
GROSS: So you went to Chicago. Why did you choose Chicago?
GUY: I didn't go to Chicago to be a musician. I went there looking for better common labor employment. And I got there and got stranded and winded up being forced to play guitar, 'cause at one point in my life, I was too shy to even talk. You wouldn't get the answers you're getting now from me when I was about 20 years old, I can tell you that.
GROSS: So were you playing on the street for money?
GUY: No. No, I - this stranger met me on the street and led me - and I played a Jim Reeves song for him, and he led me to this famous club. It was the 708 Club. And that's the address, 708 East 47th Street. And that was Otis Rush on stage. And he led me - went on stage, and I played a song. And somebody went and called Muddy, and he come out. And I was telling him I was trying to get back to Louisiana 'cause I was busted, hungry and hadn't ate on - going on the third day. And he come and brought the salami and a loaf of bread, and said, don't think about going back to Louisiana.
GROSS: Muddy Waters said that?
GUY: Yeah.
GROSS: So what happened next? Then you started getting bookings?
GUY: No. They start coming - yeah, well, at local clubs. Not at - we didn't have - there wasn't no such thing as booking and traveling, but I got to work in that club and a few more. They had a million clubs in Chicago at that time and 2 million musicians. And you had to play the top 10 on the jukebox, or at least some of them, to get in the clubs. And fortunately, I could do that. I had to play the Ray Charles, "What'd I Say." I had to play B.B. King. I had to play Muddy Waters. I had to play Bobby Bland. And I had the advantage of some of the guys, 'cause some of them would just want to be Muddy Waters or Howlin' Wolf or Little Walter. And I didn't stay at that. I tried to learn them all, Lightin' Hopkins and everybody. And so I had a little advantage to that 'cause I learned how to copy all of their music.
GROSS: Tell me more about what the blues scene was like in Chicago when you started playing there.
GUY: (Laughter) For 6 1/2 or seven years, I didn't know what was the weekend. I had to go back and ask somebody when was Sunday because we even had jam sessions start at 7 o'clock on Monday morning, and you couldn't get in the place.
GROSS: (Laughter) Were there, like, blues cutting contests?
GUY: Yes. That's what it was all about. There were so many clubs, tell. After someone decided to hire me in a club, Jr., Otis, Freddie King, Magic Sam, and Earl Hooker, just to name of a few of us - we all had gigs each night. Each club was packed. A lot of people was working at a big stockyard, the steel mill, and the shift was 11 o'clock, 8, 7, 8 o'clock in the morning. That's why the blue Monday could work. And in order for us to get together and play. We had to all say, let's start playing at 7 o'clock on Monday morning. Didn't anybody have a gig that night. And that's how we got to really jam together with Muddy, Wolf, Otis, myself, Jr. and everybody else. And this is why so many people would be there in the morning, because they'd say, man, you go to this club with a blue Monday, and you see Muddy. You see Sonny Boy. You see Little Walter. Man, what a jam.
BIANCULLI: Blues guitarist Buddy Guy speaking to Terry Gross in 1993. More after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to Terry's 1993 interview with legendary blues guitarist Buddy Guy, who has a cameo at age 88 in Ryan Coogler's supernatural horror film "Sinners."
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)
GROSS: I saw you in Buffalo at the state university there. I guess it was the late 1960s. And the way I remember it, you started off on stage, but midway through the concert, you were, like, down the aisles, out the door, through the other end of the student union, and I think you maybe let us all outside and then back in again. I don't remember if I've exaggerated or not over the years, but you led us pretty far on that.
GUY: Well, that's the same thing was happening in Chicago. I had sense enough to know I couldn't challenge Muddy Waters or Howlin' Wolf or some of those great giants who I was learning from. And I was just trying to get some attention to let someone know that I had something that - they were always sitting in chairs, matter of fact, the blues - B.B. King does it now. He was doing it the other night. He said, we're not tired. We're just sitting down to let you know how blues was played 42 years ago. And I was like, I saw Guitar Slim, which I mentioned earlier. And I said, well, look, they can outplay me, but they can't outdo me. So I just started jumping up, laying out on my back with the guitar under my back, and all you got to do is like an exercise. You know, you raise your back up off it and just pick the strings. If you can find a way to put your fingers in the right place, you can play it anywhere.
GROSS: Did you have to get really, really, really long guitar wires from your guitar to the amplifier in order to walk as far as you did?
GUY: Well, actually, I saw Guitar Slim with that. First of all, when I first got to Chicago, I would go to the shop to have this wire made. They wouldn't make it 'cause they'd tell me it wasn't going to work. I said, well, give me the wire. I'll make it. And I had learned how to solder my own ends on it. And finally, one of the technicians came out. He said, this guy is crazy. I don't believe this thing is coming through. And they used to examine - my one guitar player cut it in half one night 'cause he figured I had somebody else behind the curtain playing.
GROSS: You know, it's funny. You've gone from being, you know, a younger person trying to establish himself and trying to figure out who he is and what makes him different from everybody else to being now, you know, one of the blues legends that everybody wants to emulate. You've talked a lot about how you felt like you really had to, like, work hard and outdo everybody else, you know, to call attention to who you were. Do you still -does that still motivate the kind of show that you do? I mean, 'cause now you're Buddy Guy. I mean, everybody knows who you are.
GUY: Not quite everybody. You know, I'm not as well-known as some people who play the guitar out there. I wish that I were, you know, then maybe I wouldn't have to work so hard. But in another sense, maybe I don't want to be like that. It might stop me from working as hard as I do, because if you come and see me, I want you to have 110-, 20% of Buddy Guy, nothing less, because if I get to the point I start taking that from you, I don't think I want to play anymore.
GROSS: Do you still have the energy to do the kind of show you used to do?
(LAUGHTER)
GUY: I don't know if I have as much as I had. I'm not going to lie to you and tell you I feel like I was when I was 17 years old. But when I pick up my guitar, I feel like I'm 14.
GROSS: Let me ask you about the influence of B.B. King on your playing and what the influence has been, and what - where the point of departure is. You've known him a long time. You've been on stage with him a bunch of times. Tell me a little bit about his influence on you, and also how you feel very different from him.
GUY: Well, let me put it to you like this. His influence should be on every guitar player that picks up a guitar, because he told me when I first met him he didn't learn how to use the slide. And we all - Eric, Stevie, myself, Albert King, Albert Collins - we all squeeze the strings. And I tell him every time I get a chance to talk with him he's the one that invented that, squeezing the string and bending it the way we do. And on tour with him now, it's like Buddy Guy's going to school in his first year in grade school. I'm still learning from him. And as long as he around, I still think his name should be on every guitar that's put out there. Oh, yes.
GROSS: Buddy Guy, I have one last question for you. We started recording this interview at 9:30 in the morning. And there are very, very few musicians who will wake up to do a 9:30 in the morning interview. You're on the road. You're in the middle of a tour. How the heck did you get up this early?
GUY: Well, honestly, I'm a - I'm still a country farm boy, and I don't want to change that in all of my life. I don't care how late I stay up or what. I still get the sleep that I think I need. But it's just the thrill of my life. And I love this as well as I do my guitar, to get up at 5:30, maybe even at 5 in the morning, and go out and take a big, deep breath of fresh air and say, I remember when I had to get up like this and go feed the hogs, chickens and cows. And I still get the fresh air. And I got two little dogs whenever I'm at home, and I don't need alarm clock.
GROSS: Buddy Guy, thank you so much. It's really been such a pleasure to talk with you.
GUY: Well, thank you very much, and I enjoyed every minute of it. Don't wait so long next time.
BIANCULLI: Blues guitarist Buddy Guy speaking to Terry Gross in 1993. He has a cameo in Ryan Coogler's supernatural horror film "Sinners," now streaming on various platforms. His new album, "Ain't Done With The Blues," is scheduled to be released on July 30, Buddy's 89th birthday. Coming up, I review the latest season of "The Bear," now streaming on Hulu. This is FRESH AIR. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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