The Jimmy Reed Highway

The

Jimmy

Reed

Highway

…that’s where I play…

A tribute to the blues genius of Jimmy Reed at last!

PBS…Austin City Limits…Friday nights at 11:30 pm on normal TV WNED (it’s on WNED-HD Saturdays nights)…the November 2 show …Jimmy Vaughn & Omar Kent Dykes...a tribute to Jimmy Reed…what a treat for an old Jimmy Reed fan like me…the people’s choice…he influenced so many of his contemporaries as well as generations to come.

What a trio of harp players doin’ the Jimmy Reed harmonica stuff…Kim Wilson, Delbert McClinton & the still totally awesome James Cotton…he can’t sing no more but he sure can still play.

The drummer Wes Star was blues old school perfect…no over playing…not a beat out of place…& lots of the right kind of ‘tin’ when it was needed.

…you got me runnin’ you got me hidin’…bright lights big city…take out some insurance…you got me dizzy… natural born lover…I ain’t got you…come love …cowboys did Jimmy Reed…soul guys did Jimmy Reed…Brit-rockers did Jimmy Reed…Elvis did Jimmy Reed…everybody did Jimmy Reed maybe even Wayne Newton who knows!…big boss man!

Vaughn was playing two real old early 50’s guitars…one was a Kay & the other who knows…Gary Clark Jr. who did a nice version of Shame Shame Shame was also playing something real old & early electric. Vaughn pays big tribute to the fabulous guitar behind Reed, Eddie Taylor, who taught Jimmy Reed to play…& I guess Mr. Bob Dylan must’ve dug the harmonica in the holder style Mr. Reed popularized.

Vaughn says on a short interview during the program that the first thing he learned to play was the basic Jimmy Reed groove…didn’t we all…& that he was still playing that groove to this day…yeah me too, it’s still the best groove to make you get up & dance.

Somewhere out there there’s a tribute to Jimmy Reed by Vaughn & Dykes CD…I went to jimmievaughn.com & the CD, the Jimmy Reed Highway, is featured on the home page but it fails to mention what label it’s on.

To get a taste of the show go to PBS.org  & search ‘programs’ in the upper task bar & scroll down to Austin City Limits…at the moment there’s a video clip from the show on the Austin City Limits home page that says it all & when the home page changes it looks like they archive all their video clips…& you can go to YouTube  & see some live clips some dude made that are pretty good. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJz_UNYf6io

…keep on dancin’ to the blues…

 

Comments

[Meredith]

It seems as if you failed to mention Omar....I recently saw Omar at the Saxon Pub in Austin...what a treat and deal...he was amazing....I heard about him appearing there on KGSR radio...107.1 FM Austin. I overheard someone say they could have sold tickets to this at some kind of venue. He is the real deal!! Amazing!