Photo: the legendary Gered Mankowitz
Keith Richards: "Jimmy Reed was a very big model for us. That was always two-guitar stuff. Almost a study in monotony in many ways, unless you got in there. But then Jimmy Reed had something like twenty hits in the charts with basically the same song. He had two tempos. But he understood the magic of repetition, of monotony, transforming itself to become this sort of hypnotic, trancelike thing. We were fascinated by it, Brian and I. We would spend every spare moment trying to get down Jimmy Reed's guitar sounds.
Jimmy Reed was always pissed out of his brain. There was one famous time, he was already like an hour and forty-five minutes late for a show, finally they get him onto the stage and he goes, "This one's called 'Baby What You Want Me to Do?' " And he threw up over the whole first two rows. Probably happened many times. He always had his wife with him, whispering the lyrics in his ear. You can even hear it on the records sometimes: "Going up... going down," but it worked. He was a solid favorite to the black folks in the South, and occasionally in the whole world. It was a fascinating study in restraint.
Minimalism has a certain charm. You say, that's a bit monotonous, but by the time it's finished, you're wishing it hadn't. There's nothing bad about monotony; everyone's got to live with it. Great titles--"Take Out Some Insurance." This is not your everyday song title. And it would always come down to him and his old lady having a fight or something. "Bright Lights, Big City," "Baby What You Want Me to Do?" "String to Your Heart," wicked songs. One of Jimmy's lines was "Don't pull no subway, I rather see you pull a train." Which actually means don't go on the dope, don't go underground, I'd rather see you either drunk or on cocaine. Took me years and years to decipher this.
And I was heavily into Muddy Waters's guitarist Jimmy Rogers, and the guys that played behind Little Walter, the Myers brothers. Talk about an ancient form of weaving, they were the masters. Half of the band was the Muddy Waters band, which included Little Walter as well. But while he was making these records, he had another little team, Louis Myers and his brother David, founders of the Aces. Two great guitar players. Pat Hare used to play with Muddy Waters and also did a few tracks with Chuck Berry. One of his unreleased numbers was called "I'm Gonna Murder My Baby," dug up from the Sun vaults after he did just that, and then killed the policeman sent to investigate. He went in for life in the early '60s and died in a Minnesota jail. There was Matt Murphy and Hubert Sumlin. They were all Chicago blues players, some more solo than others. But as teams, if we keep it down to that, the Myers brothers definitely go way up to the top of the list. Jimmy Rogers with Muddy Waters, an amazing pair of weavers. Chuck Berry is fantastic, but he would weave by himself, with himself. He did great overdubs with his own guitar because he was too cheap to hire another guy most of the time. But that's just on records; you can't re-create that live. But his "Memphis, Tennessee" is probably one of the most incredible little bits of overdubbing and tinkering that I've ever heard. Let alone a sweet song. I could never overstress how important he was in my development. It still fascinates me how this one guy could come up with so many songs and sling it so gracefully and elegantly."
Source: Keith Richards | Life
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