The August 21, 1994 Rory Gallagher performance at the SDR3 Festival (Reitstadion) in Stuttgart, Germany is a legendary live recording. The show features a high-energy, electrifying closing performance of the classic "Bullfrog Blues”.
The 1994 Stuttgart Performance This concert was one of the last major European festival appearances of Gallagher's career, recorded by SDR3. The band backed him with a powerful ensemble that included David Levy (bass) and Richard Newman (drums)
10 months later he was dead. . . . .
Heavy Bootz has posted three audience recordings of Rory live from the late seventies to the early eighties
check ‘em out here
Rory Gallagher ‘When I Was A Cowboy Out On The Western Plains’ - The Late Late Show with Gaye Byrne 12 February 1988
Rory Gallagher with his 1960 Silvertone 1323. He used this guitar in the studio a lot in 1973 while recording the Blueprint and Tattoo albums.
“In America, if you looked in the old pawnshops in the old days… I found a fifteen dollar guitar, a Silvertone, which is a Danelectro, and I recorded “A Million Miles Away” and “Cradle Rock” on that guitar.
So I spotted these things earlier than others. Now it’s different, because everyone’s sharp: they see you coming! When you say; ‘Can I have a look at that Danelectro?’, they think: ‘Oh, this guy is from Europe, he can afford to pay a thousand dollars or something.”
Morning all! Still here and alive and kicking out the jams . . . . .
Playlist this morning . . . for some reason (sic) I was playing this . . . tell me sugar mama where in the world do you get your sugar from!?
Someone posted on Facebook a particularly poor vid of Rory at the Marquee Club playing Pistol Slapper Blues and I thought it deserved better . . . . . here he is at Beat Club in 1972 recorded better
Rory Gallagher: It is, indeed. There’s also a terrible danger – between travel and other things and getting to the gigs and so on, you get little time to play on your own in the hotel, and you can get lazy about playing. So I make a point of playing every day in the hotel room and bring a little cassette player and record what I’m doing, and try and write songs as well, just as a by-product of that. But to keep your sanity, I don’t know, it takes you about twenty years to find out. You know what all the ABC’s are to begin with, but there’s an awful lot of time to wear down the nerves of a musician. It’s just your attitude, really, in terms of traveling and flying, for hotels, for remembering where you are, and trying to keep all that group feeling every night to put on a good show. I mean, every musician has to go through that. You just have to develop a sense of humor and patience and just keep it cool, you know. I think the old cliché of deal with tonight’s gig and not worry about the one next Tuesday or the end of the tour or anything like that.Jas: One day at a time.Rory: Yeah. It’s a classic, but it’s true.Jas: If someone was overhearing what you’re playing in the hotel room, would they be surprised? Are you a closet country player or a bluegrass guy or a flamenco player?Rory: Flamenco, definitely. No, I do actually do some country licks. I’m quite keen on the playing of Roy Nichols, who used to be on Merle Haggard’s records, and some of the players that have worked with Waylon Jennings and Johnny Paycheck.Jas Obrecht Interview
Rory Gallagher - I Can’t Be Satisfied (archives)
Ray Davies of The Kinks introduces Rory Gallagher from this rare footage from Midnight Special ‘Hands Off’ 1974 . . . . .this might help slough off the mid Season torpor!
Walkin’ Blues
I have been taken to task by some about my dislike of lots of ‘heavier' guitarists not just American as some have suggested [it really isn’t just the Joe Bonamassa’s, the Derk Trucks’ of this world. I don’t care for Jimmy Page (riff based rhythm guitarist maybe only), nor many others but if you really want to know who I rate RIGHT UP THEREIt’s this manRory!This is how you play the slide acoustic guitar and then plug in and rock it to boot!
Rory Gallagher Stage fright at the Royal Albert Hall and why . . . . . GUITAR WORLD
"In the years that have passed since Rory Gallagher’s death, aged 47 on June 14 1995, his true stature has become ever more clear. This soft spoken Irishman, characterized by his flowing locks and trademark working man stage clothes, was far from ordinary. Gallagher was a self taught virtuoso who forged a musical revolution in his native land, shunned the traps of fame and stardom yet became a universally acclaimed international folk hero.
Rory’s rock solid devotion to his calling never wavered and the respect of his musical peers was universal. Eric Clapton credited Gallagher with “getting me back into the blues”, The Rolling Stones tried to get him to replace Mick Taylor.
Rory’s influence spread through the generations – from Slash to Johnny Marr, from U2’s The Edge to Queen’s Brian May, and onto The Manics’ James Dean Bradfield – any aspiring player who encountered him was bound to be energised or transformed.
Gallagher is commemorated throughout Ireland, a bronze statue in Ballyshannon, a sculpture in Cork where the local theatre is named after him, a mounted guitar in Dublin, a plaque in Belfast and his famously battered paint stripped Sunburst strat has been marketed by Fender in a tribute model. There’s a Rue Rory Gallagher in Paris, an annual festival in Ireland and tribute concerts held each year in his honour around the world. Rory’s story, it seems, will not end. Readily accessible on awe inspiring live performances preserved on a wealth of DVDs, a comprehensively curated official website and remastered recordings – a legacy lovingly maintained by his family, brother Donal and nephew Daniel, his music remains ready to inspire and thrill generations old and new.
Skibbereen & District Historical Society
Photo: RTÉ Archives
P.S. let’s all go to Skibbereen!!! Just a thought . . . . .
Rory GallagherInterceltic Festival, Lorient, France1994-10-20sbd (DVDrip-audio)mp3 @ 320 [227 mb]sq: A+Celtic Festival 1994 (DVD - promo)DVD artwork included01 The Continental Op02 Moonchild03 I Wonder Who04 The Loop05 Tattoo'd Lady06 I Could Have Had Religion07 Ghost Blues08 Out On The Western Plain->She Moved Thro' The Fair09 Walkin' Blues10 Don't Think Twice, It's All Right11 A Million Miles Away12 Shadow Play13 Don't Start Me Talking->Revolition-> Dust My Broom14 Messing With The Kid->La Bambatt: 1:39:13Rory Gallagher - Guitar, VocalsDavid Levy - BassRichard Neumann - DrumsMark Feltham - HarmonicaJohn Cooke - Keyboards
Have you encountered many of the old bluesmen in America? Like, as a bonus of playing there have you caught up on any of the legends?
Rory Gallagher: Yeah! For the likes of me it’s a holiday, because I was on the same bill as Freddie King, and John Hammond. On nights off I’ve seen, let’s see, Albert King, Muddy Waters, Juke Boy Bonner — we shared a bill down in Texas. He’s dead now. Albert Collins, Fred McDowell — I saw him in New York before he died. But I’ve seen more of the old acoustic blues fellas at the Folk-Blues Festival in London! I saw Hound Dog Taylor in Chicago in a black club. He called us up to play on stage. I played his guitar. He had it tuned to E minor! A Japanese Star guitar!! Out of Woolworths — the neck was like on a saw, it was so bent! But it was... an experience!
Since we’re talking about these fellows: you recorded with a number of seminal influences, didn’t you?
Muddy Waters, Albert King and Jerry Lee Lewis were the ones, and a Lonnie Donegan album later. I did most of the Muddy tracks in London, and in fact a second album came out with the out-takes. The Albert King one was live at Montreux, where I was asked to sit in, without rehearsal. It was alright. But the Muddy Waters one was more enjoyable. We did it in three nights in London with Mitch Mitchell, Georgie Fame, all those fellas. But I was doing gigs at the same time, so they had to hold the sessions till I’d fly back from Birmingham or somewhere!! With my Vox and the Strat in the back! It was great because I hit it off well with Muddy on the first night, and they were supposed to start at ten or so, but they’d hold it up; and he’d be sitting there holding a paper cup with a drink in it when I’d come in the door panting! Good for the morale! But I learned from Muddy just tuning his guitar, sitting there with his cigar in his mouth — the whole calm vibe off him. But he could really switch on the menace when he played. Great for a man — he was in his late 50s then. The controlled power! Jerry Lee was a madder thing. That was all in one afternoon, and... Well, Muddy didn’t rehearse, but he’d know the key, and he’d run through the riff, but Jerry Lee would just shout out the key and start! 'Whole Lotta Shakin’ on the album — just... started!! Literally from the key. In the studio he’s worse then he is on stage. Lifting up the piano and all the rest. Bottle of Bourbon in a brown paper bag next to him at the piano. He’s no fake! Good session! Good laugh!
This article originally appeared in Hot Press Vol.3 No.23, under the headline Unravelling The Rory Story.
Photo: NEIL ZLOZOWER
"Even though I grew up in Ireland, where there’s a lot of folk music and traditional music is very close at hand, it didn’t initially appeal to me, even though I can see traces of it creeping in over the years in my songwriting and some chord patterns and some kinds of solos I do. But I wasn’t really turned on until I heard American music via Lonnie Donegan. You know, I heard him doing Woody Guthrie songs, Lead Belly songs. And of course, I heard Elvis Presley, Eddie Cochrane, the early rockers, Chuck Berry. So it was a mixture of folk, blues, and rock from America. I was only six, seven, eight, nine, at that age, and then I just followed it through and learned about all these artists. And I’m still discovering undiscovered people and learning. But it took me about a good ten or fifteen years to find out who was who in the whole spectrum of things – who were the originators or the prime movers, and who were the followers and copyists.
"I’d like to have seen Django Reinhart live – I believe that was scary. Obviously I’d like to have seen Robert Johnson – who wouldn’t? Oh, I don’t know. I’d like to have seen the first Sonny Boy Williamson. There are so many people. I’d like to have seen Buddy Holly live, as well, for that matter. I didn’t see Son House live. I was lucky enough in the ’60s I saw a lot of the main people. I saw Muddy, I saw John Lee Hooker, Big Joe Williams. I saw T-Bone Walker. And we were lucky enough touring the States we played with Freddie King, we played with Juke Boy Bonner. I’d like to have seen Blind Boy Fuller live, mind you, although he was in the line of Blind Boy Blake. And I saw Gary Davis. I’m pretty lucky, really. But certainly some of the early people I’d like to have seen."
Interview: 1991, Jas Obrecht's Music Magazine
