HISTORY

Muddy Waters

WHAT WAS MUDDY WATERS LIKE?

Blues fans and interviewers ask me this almost every day. For your convenience, here’s my answer, in the form of a long article I wrote for Blues Revue Magazine #20, in 1994. If you’re looking for a short answer, it’s in the first few paragraphs. After that, I reveal all my thoughts on the matter, which haven’t changed since I wrote the article. He was a special person and one of the greatest musicians ever and I’m happy to share my times with him. It keeps Muddy alive for both of us.You’ll notice that my article has the same title as Robert Gordon’s recent Muddy biography. This article was written and titled three years before Robert started his book, and this article is listed as a reference in his book – but Robert didn’t take the title from me. It’s the title of Muddy’s “breakthrough” song, and the feelings behind these words seemed to be the source of Muddy’s personal blues. It’s a good title for both my article and Robert’s book.  Thanks, Bob Margolin (July 2003)

See the full Blues Revue article here - MUDDY WATERS — CAN’T BE SATISFIED by Bob Margolin

The Last Waltz

It was certainly an honor to be in Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz, which was historical both for music and film. A couple of times a year it runs on PBS or a movie channel and my friends and folks at my gigs say, “I saw you on TV!” Then, they tell me that I looked… happy, nervous, angry, calm – however they would have felt. I wrote this story for Blues Revue magazine in 2002. Since I always get asked “What was it like to be in…?”, here’s the long answer. The short answer is: “There were so many rock stars around, it was like walking through a living Rolling Stone magazine.”

See the full Blues Revue article here  - THE LAST WALTZ BLUES JAM  by Bob Margolin