White Smoke Time. Welcome to My Broad Church.......The Blues

Don't SHOUT at me. I am busy...

 

Although sartorially inclined to black clothes and a Fedora - rather than a full length white gown and a zucchetto skull cap - The Hat really really likes the idea of having A Billion and a Half Blues followers. Also, even though I somehow doubt that the Pope has a cat (Cozy) named after a dead drummer (Tympanistam to you scholars), I can certainly relate to the idea of standing on my balcony at Hat Mansions and having the world hang on my every word. Wow, that would be a good gig and nobody would have the nerve to unplug the mike or leave early. (I know, I can hear you - there are a few singers out there who already carry on like this). But, wouldn't we all love to have that kind of following?  However, I am not sure I could do the language - as Peter Cook once said.."I could have been a Judge – but I never had the Latin.."

Despite the undoubted high he would get, The Hat would be the first to recognise that having that many passionate blues followers would probably be like inhabiting the world of another famous Italian, Dante – and taking up residence on one of the Nine Rings of Hell. It's bad enough being jostled in the pages of the blues magazines and on the airwaves of the radio stations or the hot and humming social media – but can you imagine what it would be like if every time you offered a mild view on one track of one artist on one CD and  - er - Eight Million people noisily disagreed with you....? That might make even the notoriously verbose, thick skinned and opinionated Hat think twice before pronouncing...

Of course, these days everyone is 'A Blogger'. There are probably more blogs out there than there are people to read them. They spring up daily like the litter outside your high street McDonalds. Anyone who can string a stuttery sentence together – and a good few who certainly can't and certainly shouldn't – offer up their opinions on everything on a regular basis, from love to life and back again, often covering on the way every branch of cod philosophy, mysticism and Kant that you can swing a cat at - as well as measuring out their self grandiosity or personal misery like intravenous coffee for their reader. Their mothers, partners and best friends no doubt think they are brilliant.   Ok, I know, I know, pot/kettle.... I'll stop now. Nevertheless, it occurs to The Hat, whilst he sits on The Hat Mansion balcony and ponders the possibility of a Larger Audience, that The Pope does not have access to a Delete Button to drown out the Billions of Experts.

Regular (I am inclined to add Masochistic) readers of The Hat's quaint bluesy world over the last few years will be well aware that He Is Not Inter-Active. This means that you can shout at your screen; you can share him and add a Caustic Comment; you can snort into your tea and cake; you can fill up another glass and sigh in exasperation and you can complain bitterly to anyone who is sitting in the same room – but – the one thing you cannot do is immediately type in your highly original and brilliant 'hey, hang on there, that's utter unmitigated rubbish, you stupid idiot/expletive deleted' outburst and hit the Send button. Crikey, even football crowds get the chance to shout 'You don't know what you're doing'... However, all I can say to that is "For This Relief, Much Thanks" (Hamlet).

There are many reasons why The Hat chooses to stay safe in his non-active Blues Eyrie, despite requests to get out there and mix it. Naturally, one of these is that he has absolutely no wish to descend down that troll-inhabited hole, where strange dis-affected people who have nothing to say, spend a lot of time SHOUTING at each other – but the main motivation is much simpler. Having been around and involved in the blues world for too long to remember, The Hat is the first to recognise that he writes about a subject that brings together an extraordinarily Broad Church. Indeed, when I am talking to you, I know that you are not only passionate and interested but you are all Different.

The Blues is a truly wonderful and life-enhancing genre embracing a world of instruments, singers, song-writers, styles, colours, ages and passions. It spans countries and generations, local pubs and arenas. For example, forget the massive out-pourings of new American releases and re-releases and the Bonamassas and Devon Allmans, in barely half a dozen months past in the UK, a whole rainbow tapestry of new music has emerged  - from the show-stopping Jo Harman, the stunning Ben Poole, the mellifluous and talented Lucy Zirins, the magnificent and exciting Matt Taylor, the pulse-raisingly original Rabbit Foot, the wonderful Wooden Horse and the forever fabulous Otis Grand - just to pick a handful at random. All So Very Different. All part of our world. There are dozens more that should be mentioned. The amazing range of talent and style on show is phenomenal and of course, every reader, listener, blogger, and all their peers, friends and fans will have a favourite – and an opinion. Oh, yes, Lots of Opinions...

It has never been The Hat's intention to fill three shouty pages of a spirited 'Comments Column' by mischievously offering a view that Clapton Was Not God; SRV was good but Hendrix was better; Rory Gallagher did not invent Blues Rock and a whole genre of guitarists would not exist had not Elmore James or Taj Mahal got there before them. The Hat is definitely not reponsible for the coffee now being spluttered into keyboards. What the blues world demonstrates, over and over again, not just through the paid for music, but with thanks to those dedicated radio station heroes, on air, on-line, week in, week out, the club organisers, the festivals (thank you Hebden), the devoted fanzines, the magazines – is that it has room for everyone. Sometimes, you can phone in and have a shout. Sometimes you can rapidly type and Send an erudite witticism. Sometimes you'll just have to sit back, turn up the virtual volume and listen to The Hat orating from his virtual balcony - and, for a change, wearing black.....

EXTRA OMNES! (As they say in The Vatican...)

EVERYBODY OUT! (As they say down my way....)

Pip Pip!

The Man In the Hat