Conference napalm::guitar

    Free Ride is an awesome song to cover !! ...Unfortunately,
    thats about all I know about this guy...
    
    
    jc (Closet JW fan)

    
    	"Free Ride" will give you a tooth cavity if you listen too closely!
    	Seriously, I would really like to find a cd version of "Still Alive
    	and Well".  That plus "Johnny Winter And Live" does it for me.  OK,
    	I wouldn't "Highway 61" as a bonus track!  

   "Free Ride" is by Johnny's brother, Edgar.  Specifically, from the album
   "They Only Come Out At Night" which gave us that other great hit from the
   early seventies, "Frankenstien".  Edgar was much more a pop/rock/AOR type
   player than Johnny's electric blues style.

   Johnny does a killer version of "Tobacco Road" on some live album.  Good
   stuff.

   -- Sam

On Edger Winter's White Trash's "Roadwork" album, Johnny appears and does a 
great version of "Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo."  Rick Derringer is also on it.  
And it has a 15 minute cut of "Tobacco Road", but Johnny's not on that.

Will

        Oh yeah.  .  .almost forgot  to tell you `Tone Brothers' that
        he  had some screamin' tube distortion !   Couldn't  see  the
        amp, so I couldn't tell exactly what it was, but it had to be
        a tube amp.  He only had a channel switching  stomper  and  a
        flange stomper on the floor.  Hmmm.  .  .nah,  it sounded too
        clean to be a Marshall ! :^)
        
        Matt

       
       
       
       
       
       More recently he's been working with Sonny Terry.  He also did a
       heavily blues-oriented album titled "The Winter of '88".  JW was
       one of my first guitar gods.  Yes, a white man (and I mean
       ALBINO, dude) can play the blues!
       
       
       
       
       

    
    JW's has recorded two great blues albums, "White, Hot, and Blue" amd
    "Nothin' But the Blues". Some really terrifying harp playing by 
    m.....uh...Jerry Portnoy I think. JW always was an outstanding blues
    player.
    
    Phil

    The aforementioned guest spot by Johnny on Edgar Winter's "Roadwork"
    album was Johnny's first appearance after about a year of seclusion
    due to a bad case rock'n roll burnout; as such, it's a pretty
    interesting and significant moment in his career, and it's a great
    cut to boot!
    
    The first two Columbia albums, "Johnny Winter" and "Second Winter"
    are classics, imo.  Second Winter is notable for having exactly three
    sides.
    
    "Johnny Winter And" was JW backed up by the McCoys (of "Hang On Sloopy"
    fame).  This stuff is more rock oriented, as opposed to the bluesier
    early albums, but still worthwhile.  I always liked their version of
    "Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo" much better than Rick Derringers later
    hit.
    
    For most of his career, JW's main axes were reverse bodied Gibson
    Firebird V's (he toured with three of them).  Amplification was
    nothing fancy; usually a straight Fender Super Reverb or Music Man
    4x10 with an MXR phaser or chorus on some tunes.
    
    Funny this topic should come up; just last week I spotted a few used
    albums that were holes in my collection, and have been on a mad JW
    binge ever since.  The guy was and is phenomenal; especially noteworthy
    is his work on slide.  I'd also recommend his recent releases on
    Alligator, "3rd Degree" in particular.
    
    /rick
    
    

    
    
    	re-1 Alligator. Alligator puts out some samplers of various
    	blues players. I just got my hands on the first 3 this weekend. On
    	Genuine Houserockin' Music II, Johhny plays a mean slide on the
    	song Mojo Boogie. 
    
    	Alligator Records 1-800-344-5609.
    
    	Dave.

    
    	Ah, Johnny Winter - my biggest influence!!  I remember when I
    	was maybe 15 or so, listening to some alternative radio station.
    	They put on "Be Careful with a Fool", a slow blues tune from the
    	"Johnny Winter" album.  Wow!!!  What was that??  Talk about a
    	rip thru blues!!!   Now I do the song in my act and love to
    	growl thru the lyrics.
    
    	I remember my first big concert - Johnny with the James Gang
    	warming him up.  They were good but then the lights went down,
    	a smoke bomb went off on stage, lights were flashing and then
    	this crazed guy with a top hat, tails, and 6" heels comes running
    	out and screams "Rock and Rolllllllllllllllll"!!!  Let me tell you,
    	this 15 year old sh*t in his pants big time!!!
    
    	The story I heard several times about his drug problem (and I saw
    	evidence of it with Derringer at the Rusty Nail - they had to help
    	him at the urinal).  Anyway, they were all into herion and they
    	were out on a boat.  Johnny literally thought he could walk on
    	water and he tried.  Luckily, he didn't drown and he himself
    	checked himself into a clinic for 9 months.  
    
    	Btw, Johnny's bass player, Tommy Shannon was SRV's bass player.
    
    	I agree that Second Winter is a great album.  So is Still Alive
    	and Well.  
    
    	Another tidbit is that Johnny was Columbia records biggest sign
    	up at the time - some sort of record $$$'s.  
    
    	Also, the odds of 2 albino's in one family are incredible.  And
    	check out some of Edgar's stuff for some great tunes with Derringer
    	and Dan Hartman (he wrote "I can Dream about you" and that Rocky
    	tune "Living in America" (SRV played on it).
    
    	Enough useless trivia for today - Rock and Rolllllll!!!!!!
    
    	Tom
    

    Maybe I'm dating myself, but I remember JW+ live at the Worcester
    Aud, and he/they were unbeliveable!!  JW used 6 Twins, with JBL's
    (I looked in them) and he just tore the house down.  IF 1/10 of the
    Guitar Players today played with the reckless madness he does, we
    would not be in the shape, musician wise, that rock is in today.
    
    Also, after the show, he bent down and collected EVERY 'joint' tossed
    onstage, and spent about 90 mins afterwards showing a few folks
    his playing style, till they threw him out, smok'in all the while.
    
    One nice guy.  One bitch'in rocker.
    
    Jay Tashjian
    

    
    	Hey Jay, I was at that show. It was Nov 1970, $5 general
    	admission. He blew up one of the twins and a couple of
    	roadies swapped it out with another. BTW, they yanked the
    	plug on the show when the band lit up and passed around a joint
    	that must have been 6" long. The cops came right on the stage.
    	    My favorite album is the first one he did on Columbia,
    	'Johnny Winter'. His licks on Leland Mississippi Blues floor me.
    
    	Neal
    

just a nit in regards to FREE RIDE from THEY ONLY COME OUT AT NIGHT,,,

	*Ronnie Montrose* did the guitar tracks on that album,,, another
	piece of useless trivia, I think you'll find Sammy Haggar
	may have been playing bass on that album as well.  I could be 
	havin flash backs thou.  Maybe it was Dan Hartman now that I ponder
 	it...  (Haggar was indeed been playing bass thou when Montrose did one
	of his solo albums, [the one with Paper Money and Starstation #5])

Back to J. D. W...  Amazing this guy is still playing --- errr  I mean alive. 

Amazing still, that there are actually some people who, when just hearing him
for the first time, compare him with people who were still in  diapers when
he was in his real prime...  Imagine, if he was this good a few nights ago...

I'm here to tell ya, this guy could boogie..

anyways... 
He was *TOASTED* when I last saw him, had to have been at least 15/16 years 
ago... Could barely stand up...

But he tore up a reverse firebird like nothing I could have imagined. Fingers
about 2 feet long.  Truely a horrifying sight..

Hopefully he'll stick around for a lot longer.  Damn, this world simply
needs as many straight ahead, rip your face off blues players it can
keep.  

I had about four of his albums, "Still Alive and Well"  and the -live-
albums were my favorites.  Then there was the infamous Winter Brothers
White Trash...

    
    	And thanks to Johnny for the most bad-assed rendition of Jumpin'
    	Jack Flash!  No time wasted on intros for that tune.  

    
    
    	Still alive and well, still alive and well
    	Every now and then I know it's kinda hard to tell
    	but I'm still alive and well...
    
    	

    As an interesting aside (well, interesting to JW maniacs like myself)
    Rick Derringer wrote "Still Alive and Well" about himself as a kind of
    brag how he had kept his life together while guys like JW and Hendrix
    were losing it to drugs, etc.  Of course, Johnny later made this tune
    his own.
    
    One of JW's more significant contributions to the blues was bringing
    back Muddy Waters for a series of Grammy winning (but they're great
    anyway) albums in the late 70's, starting with the classic "Hard Again"
    (beat that for an album title).  For this act alone, he deserves a spot
    in the Blues Hall of Fame.  Muddy liked to kid Johnny a lot about playing
    "twelve notes to every one of mine", but there was real respect and
    affection between the two of them.
    
    Hey, have I wandered into AFTER_HOURS notes?

    The first big concert I ever went to was Johnny Winter And... with
    Foghat as a backup band (somtime around '74 or '75 at the Boston Music
    Hall). I'd like to say that this first concert affected my musical
    career, but due to certain reality-altering assistance ... well
    you get the idea... I don't have too many coherent memories of this,
    although I do still have the concert ticket stub.
    
    Not too long after that, I saw Johnny and Edgar together at the
    Springfield Civic Center with Lynyrd Skynyrd as a backup band. At the
    time they were promoting an album they did together, naturally called
    "Johnny and Edgar Together" (which has, IMHO, the very best cover of
    "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin"). These guys absolutely blew me away.
    It was a 5 hour, general admission concert and still ranks up there 
    as one of the best rock shows I've ever seen (except maybe for the time
    I had front row seats to Little Feat on the tour where they made the
    "Waiting For Columbus" live album).
    
    It always seemed to me that JW not only played the blues, he lived
    the blues. He never really went commercial (although he could blow
    the doors off of most of the guitar wizards of today, IMHO). I spoke
    with him once at the Paradise in Boston. The guy was so trashed, he 
    made no sense at all (he could barely talk). But man, when he had 
    that guitar on, it did all the talking for him. I glad to hear he's
    got his sh*t together these days. I'd love to go see him again if
    ever plays in the Boston area.
    
    
    /Bill
    Favorite JW tune -  "Bony Maroni" 

    I was at that show too, at the (was then) Music Hall. He was pretty
    wild live. I used to love the way he would yell stuff while he
    was in the middle of leads. Long before I dreamed of playing
    classical guitar I was a Johnny Winter fan. I still have that 
    "Johnny Winter" album and it remains one of my favorite all time 
    records. It's also got Willie Dixon on some tunes as well as
    Tommy Shannon.
    
    Fav song is "Drown in my own tears". I love "Be careful with a fool"
    too. I was blown away the first time I heard that.
    
    His records are really uneven though. Some of the later ones aren't
    so great. 
    I've got an album called "About Blues" (I think, I haven't looked 
    at these for awhile) I think this was before the "Johnny Winter" 
    album. It's got a lot of solo stuff on it, just him and solo
    electric guitar, and it's got funny pictures on the cover. He
    looks really young and he's got goofy hippy-fringe clothes on.
    
    The "Guitarslinger" album is pretty good.
    
    Bob
    of solo stuff on it

    I saw JW at Great Woods with John Mayall and SRV. Man was he loud!
    Of course I was sitting in far right field so I was getting pummmled
    by one speaker. I just stared at his fingers the whole time.
    
    	Watching JW and SRV on the same bill felt like I was watching
    	Jimi in concert as two personas. I won't forget that concert
    	for a long time.
    
    
    			Paul