![]() That's why he doesn't play so fast any more. He'd listen not so much for licks, but for what they were doing within the song, how they said what they were saying.įor Robert, successful songs are very much a matter of interpreting the lyrics, with both voice and guitar. Playing with them, he says, helped teach him what to do and what not to do. Their timing was so cool.Īpart from running various incarnations of The Robert Cray Band since 1974, Robert has had the honour and pleasure of playing with several of the most revered bluesmen, including Waters, Hooker, Dixon, and BB King. He cites the Chicago Blues Band with Muddy Waters as the epitome of that, with every little whining lick of Muddy's slide placed in the right place to grab you. Listening to Willie Dixon, John Lee Hooker, and Muddy Waters taught Robert a lot about the smoothness and flow of the blues. Playing them took his hands all over the place, but that was cool, as he found out some things that other players didn't - big stretches. He learnt all Albert Collins' licks in standard tunings, not realising that Albert had been using open tunings. However, he has noticed a growing trend to get away from plectrums. Robert himself uses a pick, but also a couple of fingers as well. there's a whole lot you can do with that percussive sound. Collins plays without a pick, pulling the strings. He likes Albert Collins for his right hand attack. Robert's early heroes were Albert Collins, Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Guy, Willie Dixon. He didn't know there were such things as lighter gauge strings, so he just kept asking for Black Diamond. It had these strings on it called Black Diamond, the heaviest strings Robert ever had. ![]() ![]() His mom bought him a $69 Harmony, sunburst model, shaped kinda like a Stratocaster with one pickup in the centre slanted to one side. He learned to read music really well, and the teacher taught him to have a good ear. So he had general lessons for the first three years, before he started playing around in bands. Beatlemania was sweeping the country, so he asked his mom to get him a guitar, but she said 'you gotta take lessons first'. ROBERT FIRST wanted to get a guitar when the Beatles came out. ![]()
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