SRV RIP

Stevie Ray Vaughn died 20 years ago.
One of the greatest guitar slinger ever.
I saw him 1986 live in Berlin and we all were totally impressed.
We miss you.


edit: i remember a posting by Rickabilly about Brian Setzer playing with Stevies Strat during a show.
Would like to read it again.

Here are a couple of versions of the story - in Brian's words:



"That photo was taken on a night when we (Stray Cats) were opening for Stevie Ray on a summer tour. I was watching the show from the side of the stage...he was brilliant as usual! I was standing there, when he suddenly called me up to play. Funny thing was that I didn't have my glasses or contact lenses in so, I really couldn't see that well. (laughing) He actually had to grab my hand and pull me up on stage with him. I remember thinking, this is great, I'm finally going to be able to hear what this amazing guitar sounds like! He had amps all over the place! He hands me his Strat and just kind of stood there watching me. I think we did The House Is Rockin. The weirdest thing was that it sounded just like my guitar! It was so strange. When I played his Strat through all those amps, it sounded just like me, playing my Gretsch through a Fender Bassman, same volume, everything. So it just kind of proved a point to me, if I play Stevie Ray's Strat through his wall of amps and he makes it sound so different....it's in your hands, the sound comes from you! That's what really got me, it was his gear and it sounded nothing like him.
Stevie Ray was a great guy. He would get barbecue or his favorite foods flown if and he'd invite me back to have a meal with him. He was battling some demons at the time, like we all do, but he was a brilliant guitar player and I love listening to him."

Q: I read that one time in Memphis, you played with Stevie Ray Vaughan. Is that true and what did you think about him? (Mark Elan - Memphis TN & Chris - Crawfordsville IL).

A: Yes, that's true, I did play with him. First of all, Stevie Ray was magic. It's funny because people always want to know about his guitars and his amps but what I want to tell you is that it was in his fingers. It had nothing to do with his guitar and amp. I think he could have been playing a Silvertone guitar through a transistor radio. That night at "Mud Island" in Memphis I was watching him from the side and he called me up on stage and he handed me his guitar and he said, "Play!". I didn't know what to expect. I thought it would be really loud and just, you know, all over the stage. It wasn't though, it was about as loud as I set my guitars. It even kind of sounded like mine. I was so surprised. He stood there in front of the pedal board with his arms crossed just hitting different pedals. At that moment I realized...jeez, it's all about what's in this guy's fingers. What can I say? He was one of the truly great guitar players. We never played together, at the same time but I'll never forget that night.

I miss Stevie all the time, not just today. I can barely find anything about the 20th anniversary of his passing this week. There's a lot of stuff about the 40th anniversary of Jimi Hendrix's passing, but all that does is make me miss Stevie more.

I turned on the radio this morning - something I rarely do these days, and the first thing I heard was David Bowie's "Let's Dance." That was the first thing I ever heard SRV on, and I didn't even know it. Such great guitar work on songs like "Let's Dance," "China Girl," and my favorite cut from the album, "Cat People." Bowie anthologies always use the soundtrack version of that song, but the album version, with Stevie Ray Vaughan, is miles ahead of that. It was the early days of MTV (1983) and I remember thinking "that guy in Bowie's band and whoever the guitar player is in Stray Cats are amazing!" About a week later I bought both "Let's Dance" and "Built for Speed."

The House is a-Rockin'-billy

Fantastic stories. Thank you

my 1st memory is a visit to an old friend who was a manic Hendrix fan.
I came in and listen to some music. And i said "Oh, new Hendrix recording?" It was a SRV recording.
But he never was an Hendrix copy. He was one of a kind.

One of my all-time favorite SRV clips, with his brother Jimmie:





And one I've never seen before, with Jeff Healey, RIP.




Damn, that YouTube is addicting!

Life By the Drop-a-billy