Monday, April 22, 2013

Song of the Week: John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers -- Crawling Up A Hill

John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers get the same bum rap that The Yardbirds suffer through. Specifically, the comments akin to "I only listen to them because [insert famous guitarist name here] was in the band for 5 weeks." Yep, Eric Clapton and Peter Green both did time in the Bluesbreakers. So did John McVie and Mick Fleetwood. But, like The Yardbirds, the Bluesbreakers were better than just being a footnote in some guitar heroes resume. And this song proves it.

This live version of Crawling Up A Hill is the first song off of John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers' first album, John Mayall Plays John Mayall (aka Live at Klooks Kleek). The album came out in December of 1964 and features the aforementioned John McVie on bass and relative unknown Roger Dean on guitar and Hughie Flint on drums. An inferior studio recording was released as Mayall's first single five months prior to this release. 

It's a hell of a two minute song that I never tire of. The musicianship is really quite stellar. All of them, but, in particular, take a listen to Roger Dean's tasteful guitar work. He was months away from being replaced by Eric Clapton and falling into the shadow of obscurity. His work here -- and on the whole album -- is really quite good. Surprising to me that he didn't resurface elsewhere in a more famous band. Of course Mayall, on his own composition, is quite strong vocally, on organ and on harmonica on this song as well.

We'll see you on the Flip-Side!

8 comments:

  1. Hey Flippy, Nice song. I actually used to play this song in a band. I like how the guitar solo comes in on what would be the chorus part of the song ("minute after minute ..."), then finishes on what would be a verse part of the song. It's a brilliant composition. Any idea what kind of guitar he's playing in that pic? I've never seen a head like that.

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  2. I don't know what guitar that is. I've seen him play some pretty goofy stuff before. I looked at his website and it has other pics of it but I still can't tell what it is. Italian made would be my bet.

    And you are right, the song is structured in a way that it is a bit surprising when the guitar comes in.

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  3. Further research suggests that it is one of his many home-made guitars. Goofy.

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  4. I love this song too. Nice of you to recognize Roger Dean. He really was quite good, and well suited to the short and punchy songs like this. The other early Mayall song i really love is "I'm Your Witchdoctor" but i believe Clapton had joined him by then.

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  5. Yeah, Witchdoctor is Clapton. Very cool song! I have a single of an Aussie group covering that. But I can't remember who it is so I can't find it! The other Roger Dean era Mayall song with bitchin' guitar is I Need Your Love, which, I believe, the Canadian group The Ugly Ducklings covered nicely in about '66.

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  6. Are you thinking of Chants R&B? I think they were from New Zealand. Their version of Witchdoctor is pretty cool too.

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  7. Funny, I just published a piece on Mayall and the famous Beano record. With reference to Roger Dean, I always thought the same of Hughie Flint - a great drummer, but I have no idea what happened to him after his stint with Mayall.

    Cheers for the post.

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