So what were your earliest musical influences?

Good thread, Jack. It has been dead around here. I thought maybe the forum had disbanded while I was on vacation last week...

I guess I came of age musically in the early 70's, which probably explains why I've always had the sort of acoustic guitar/folksy sort of leanings. Loved Dylan, Jim Croce, James Taylor, Eagles, stuff like that. Never was that much into the metal stuff. On the rock side, more into the Beatles and CCR. Always loved the Motown stuff, who didn't? My brother played trumpet and that kind of got me to listening to jazz back then.

I never really delved into blues until Clapton's "Unplugged". The acoustic blues kind of lead me to the electric blues. I've always kind of found it funny that all this great blues music was going on even back in the 60's and 70's, and it was totally off my radar screen. I remember hearing of SRV because he played on David Bowie's "Let's Dance", and I didn't appreciate the sheer genius of his own recordings until well later (even though I'd heard his stuff). Well, we live and learn, don't we.

Bruce

Jack,  I remember last winter I drove with my father to our skiing lodge in Norway,  which is a long drive.  My father had a compilation of MP3's installed on his car stereo - I wonder how how he actually managed that.  But is sounds like our dads with age have acquired the same taste for elevator music, and in the end I had to put my foot down and refuse to drive any further with that easy-listening crap in background...   I much prefered just listening to my kids fighting in the back seat.

I had a sister 5 years older, and a brother and uncle who lived with us who were 10 years older, so I was exposed to all the Rock n' Roll of the '50s as a little kid. They listened to Rock n' Roll on radio all the time. I also remember albums laying around the house by Bill Haley and the Comets, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers and, of course, lots of Elvis. However, I never saw a Pat Boone record in our house. Apparently his insipid covers of Little Richard and Fats Domino weren't popular with my siblings and uncle, so I got to hear the real thing.

My dad played a bit. He was a strummer and could also sing. In the days before 1,000 TV channels and the Internet, he provided the entertainment in our house and would pull out the guitar at parties. He loved country music. The old stuff - Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, Ray Price, etc. So I was also exposed to country music quite a bit, but I never liked it.

The Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan show when I was 11 or 12. That was a big deal back then. It was the most popular show in the country on Sundays nights.  Soon after the Rolling Stones, the Animals, and others from the British invasion appeared and I was hooked. Although I liked the Beatles, I was really drawn to the more raw, bluesy sounds of the Stones and the Animals. At the time I had no idea of what the Blues was.

After being exposed to all this I wanted to play the guitar. My dad showed me the basic chords. The very first songs I learned on my own were "Mr. Tamborine Man" by the Byrds and "The Last Time" by the Stones. I learned them from the records and slowing down the 45's to 33 1/3. I guess that was good ear training.

My 1st real guitar hero had to have been Jeff Beck when he was with the Yardbirds. When I heard "Heart Full of Soul" and "The Shape of Things" I couldn't believe that he was getting those sounds from a guitar. I also went through a period of liking Soul music. That became the cool music with the crowd I was running with at the time. This was when Sam and Dave, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, the Temptations, Smokey Robinson, etc., were in their heyday. 

After that I got back into Rock - Led Zepplin, Black Sabbath, The Who, Jethro Tull, Ten Years After, Johnny Winter and on and on. The people I hung around with had very eclectic tastes in music. In fact, the concerts were eclectic. I saw Yes open for Black Sabbath, Deep Purple open for Rod Stewart and the Faces, Bad Finger for Jethro Tull. I don't think it's like that today.

I think I got interested in the real Blues after hearing a live album of the Yardbirds that was recorded in '63 when Clapton was still with them. I didn't hear it until the late '60s. It had a great version of "Smokestack Lightening" on it. I also saw groups like early Fleetwood Mack and the Savoy Brown Blues Band in concert in the early '70s which lead me to look more into the actual roots of Blues. That then lead me to Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Willie Dixon, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Lightenin' Hopkins, Furry Lewis, Son House, and others. It's kind of ironic that I grew up in Chicago and was introduced to the Blues by the Brits.

Jack, you opened up this can of worms and got me talking, so don't blame me for this overly long stroll down memory lane.