Guitar World magazine: "The trials of Johnny Winter (blues legend gets a new lease on life)"

[Amerigo Vespucci]

The trials of Johnny Winter
After years of substance abuse and bad business deals, blues legend Johnny Winter gets a new lease on life-and fights to reclaim his lost legacy.

By Sean McDevitt

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It's sometime after midnight on a warm August weekend, and Johnny Winter sits in contemplative silence as the road passes beneath the wheels of his tour bus. Less than an hour ago, he was exiting a Delaware stage, having just completed a simmering 75-minute set that closed out a weekend blues festival in the city of Wilmington, and now is his time to unwind. Music from a 20-gig iPod loaded with more than 4,500 classic blues tunes fills the air, and a pack of Marlboros and Winter's trusty black lighter sit before him, beckoning.

If you'd witnessed the scene immediately after the show, you could forgive the 63-year-old Texan for wanting to quietly decompress. One by one, fans waited in line for a chance to meet their hero, many of whom remembered him not as a bluesman but as an early-Seventies arena-rock favorite. But for most of them, simply meeting Winter wasn't enough. Few could resist the urge to bend his ear about the past. There was the rotund, balding, 50-something man in glasses, tanked but still semi-lucid, who leaned through a window and into the bus where Winter sat, his speech slurred. "Hey Johnny! I saw you in Philadelphia, dude! 1973! You blew the fucking doors off the place…" Not more than two minutes later, a smiling woman took her turn: "Um, Johnny, hi! I doubt you remember me, but one time I met you backstage at a show in New York. It was about '76 or so. Do I look familiar?"

On and on it went. "Johnny! Saw you with Muddy Waters in '77, man! You guys played 'Hoochie Coochie Man!'" Once Winter's window was mercifully closed and the curtain drawn, the bus began to roll. The hordes of people quickly disappeared from view, and the sudden stillness was downright eerie.

"We see this at the autograph signings at the end of every show," explains Paul Nelson, Winter's rhythm guitarist and the man who has guided his career since late 2005. "They want to touch him, talk to him, grab his jewelry, whatever. He sees these people get really intense, and he hears people talk about how, when and where they saw him, or how his music changed their lives. But he's like, 'How can my music do that to somebody?' He just doesn't get the enormity of it all." more...

[Kali]

1. saw him a couple years ago

they pretty much had to prop him up with a stick. He may not be able to control most of his body, but he could still use his arms hands and fingers.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

2. Yes, the abuse has taken its toll...

...the reviews of his last "new" album, "I'm A Bluesman" (2004) basically said "He sounds like Johnny Winter, older and slower."



As far as I'm concerned, Johnny earned his stripes for the Muddy Waters Blue Sky discs. Talk about going out in a blaze of glory.

I was a fan, and continue to be one. I loved all of the "Johnny Winter And" stuff, but the Muddy Waters work is what will get Johnny into R&R Heaven.

:toast:

[Zomby Woof]

3. I saw him in '86

A dive in Norfolk, VA called "The Boathouse". Tight set, solid performance. He was recording on Alligator Records at the time and putting out his best solo albums since the Columbia years.

I haven't picked up any of his albums in recent years, but maybe I will give the new one a listen. I've always loved Winter.

[Bennyboy]

4. One of my favorites.....

Seen him many times. From arenas to little bars and blues fests. Saw him with Muddy "my Son" and with Edgar and Rick Derringer (the Winter Brothers band).

He was freaking awesome this summer at Eric Clapton's Crossroads festival. The webcast may still be up...at&t blueroom. If it is watch it. the whole thing is simply incredible. Johnny, jeff Beck, BB,Robt Randolph, John Mayer, Sonny Landreth and a ton of others.

[mitchum]

5. Winter likes to spend his time on the tour bus naked (honest)...

sorry for putting THAT visual in your head :)

[RetroLounge]

6. Saw Muddy Waters and Clapton in 78

Johnny Winter came out for the encore and the 3 of them WAILED thru an extended version of Kansas City.

Amazing...

RL