Wednesday, June 22nd, 2005
Pete is interviewed by the Daily Times Leader of West Point, Mississippi on Howlin' Wolf and the opening of the new Howlin' Wolf Museum in West Point. Pete is donating a signed guitar to the museum.
Daily Times Leader
Clay County native Howlin' Wolf has influenced the greats in rock 'n'
roll: Eric Clapton, Keith Richards and John Lennon are just a small few
of the lives touched by Wolf. The Who guitarist and accomplished solo
artist Pete Townshend is among those that consider Wolf's influence to
have made a major impact on their lives.
In an exclusive interview with the Daily Times Leader, Townshend
discusses the impact that a bluesman from Clay County and pop
culture-icon had on his life and career.
Daily Times Leader (DTL): As a young man in England, how were you
exposed to the blues music of America?
Pete Townshend (PT): At first it was a gentle thing, skiffle started
here as a craze around 1959. That led to the music of Country Blues
artists like Big Bill Broonzy, Leadbelly, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee
getting some of their records in the shops. I bought those first,
thinking of the music as a kind of exotic 'world' music, enjoying it,
but feeling it was a very long way away from my own world. I learned
quite a few of their pieces. It was hearing Leadbelly that made me
decide my first good acoustic guitar - a Harmony--would be a 12 string.
DTL: How did you obtain your first Howlin' Wolf record and what was it?
PT: This came later. I was at Ealing Art school in 1961 and some time
in the following year I met a young American photography student Tom
Wright. He had a big collection of R&B, including Howling Wolf. I'm
afraid I can't remember the album, but "Smokestack Lightnin'" was one
of the tracks. I have to say that I loved the guitar sound on these
records, and the drummer played in a New Orleans style I was unfamiliar
with until then.
DTL: How did hearing Howlin' Wolf for the first time make you feel?
PT: Chilled. His voice sounded like it travelled across the universe. A
manly, powerful voice, but a true blues voice, from the heart:
vulnerable and appealing.
DTL: How did Wolf influence your early career? Were you,in the
beginning, attempting to mimic American blues?
PT: Yes. Roger (Daltrey) adored Howling Wolf and did a very, very good
impression.
DTL: Did you ever meet Wolf on Shindig or some other venue?
PT: Sadly not. We did "Shindig" here in the Uk where it was filmed.
DTL:Do you feel that it is important for Americans to preserve this
part of their musical heritage?
PT:Of course. It feels quite recent to us, but so is the work of Andy
Warhol and Diane Arbus. Howling Wolf is an American artist, a part of
the internationally recognized cavalcade of authentic American genius.
He is not just some guy with a band, he helped to change our view of
the world and to harden up this new way we have found to express our
deepest feelings. I am 60 years old as I write this: as a musician I
still feel like an ageless artist. When I listen to Howling Wolf I hear
music that will always speak for the late fifties, the sixties and the
years that followed, music that was not designed to sell cokes and
popcorn at drive-ins, but was equally uplifting, joyful and accessible.
Unlike the radio pop of that period Howling Wold had real teeth; he
showed us we could let our music be unapologetically masculine (as much
of British rock turned out to be) without being chauvinistic.
DTL: Why do you feel people like Wolf, and even Hendrix, were more
accepted in the UK than, initially, in the U.S.?
PT: America is huge. It has so much to offer. It is a rich,
cosmopolitan country with people gathered from all over the world. It's
hard to live there and distill everything there is to see and hear.
From the UK we could see your musical heritage a little more
objectively.
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