Joe Bonamassa: Guitar Man

(energetic guitar music) - You know, you ever find yourself backstage around 7:25 on a show day?

(energetic guitar continues) We could be discussing collective bargaining agreements or we could be most likely discussing guitars and amps.

(high intensity guitar music) And I always, will politely excuse myself.

(high intensity guitar music) And around 7:25, I always tell people and sometimes they get confused when I say, I go, "Excuse me, I gotta go become the other guy."

(low tempo guitar music) They're always trying to write off the Blues.

Always write off the Blues.

Nobody likes the Blues.

Well, we've proven that there's at least 9000 people tonight that like the Blues.

(crowd cheering) (upbeat instrumental music) ♪ Who killed John Henry, ♪ In the battle of sinners and saints ♪ ♪ Who killed John Henry ♪ In the battle of sinners and saints ♪ - [Kevin] I don't think he wants to be part of the machine.

I don't think he wants to be part of major label corporate America that need to have a pop song to crossover.

I think he is absolutely comfortable and confident in this genre that he has created and sub-genre which, by the way, is almost all him now.

♪ I don't want your cold iron shackles ♪ - Blues rock, blues, rock area that he is number one.

He has more number one Blues albums than anyone else in Blues history more than B.B.

King, more than Stevie Ray Vaughan more then Eric Clapton, more than Buddy Guy.

Joe Bonamassa is the number one Billboard Blues artist and you can't take that away from him.

But ask most people and they'll say, "Bona who?"

♪ In the battle of sinners and saints ♪ ♪ I'm a long way from Colorado ♪ A long way from my home ♪ Gimme the hammer that killed John Henry, ♪ ♪ 'Cause it won't kill no more ♪ ♪ Gimme the hammer that killed John Henry ♪ ♪ Cause it won't kill me ♪ Gimme the hammer that killed John Henry ♪ ♪ Cause it won't kill me - Hi.

Hi.

Okay, so now, (birds chirping) (faintly speaking) An outstanding bill for $100 which I paid even though it (faintly speaking).

On my birth certificate I was born in New Hartford, New York, May 8, 1977 Was reportedly to be a painful birth, because my original due date was May 5, 1977.

And I decided to spend an extra three days inturned and I think they were just about to go in and, manually remove me by force and I decided to come out voluntarily.

So, that's the story like what do they say the old saying - what starts bad ends bad.

(high intensity guitar music) - It's been interesting to watch him with the suit thing because he's also gone through periods and I'm not sure how much he sees it.

But he went through a period when he started getting recognized more and more.

And it took him a minute to learn how to deal with the success that was coming his way.

And he's managed to deal with it by being a sort of bipolar about the thing.

He is Joe, with his baseball cap on and his blue jeans and at 7:25 he puts on the suit for an eight o'clock show.

And he slicks his hair back.

He puts on the sunglasses, and then he has a glass of wine and Joe Bonamassa the recording artist comes out.

And then he's a different guy.

Then he becomes a little bit Howard Hughes.

He becomes a little standoffish, he becomes a little isolated.

And it's great.

We just let him be like that.

(upbeat instrumental music) - The other guy is the guy in the suit and the sunglasses.

and that whole persona, And it's not only just that outfit, it's a stage persona in the sense that like when I suit up and I go out and play, that's a different side of my personality.

That's, that's not, I'm not that outgoing offstage, I'm not that, confident offstage.

- And then at the end of the show, he normally dresses down quickly, puts on in his baseball cap puts a backpack over him, and he walks straight through the crowd that have watched him play all night and they don't know this guy is going out.

And he walks through them and onto his bus and no one stops him.

It's fantastic.

He really is two people.

He's two face.

(crowd cheering) (whimsy music) - My family has been into music for a long time.

My great grandfather played trumpet.

He's very talented young trumpet player who could have done great things, but for the fact that he had a family.

So, in order to make money, he would teach trumpet and play local gigs.

My great grandfather, 'Buddha' Bonamassa, really lived by that, he took care of business, and he took care of his family.

There's also rumor that he ran numbers for the mafia, which being Italian American descent, at the time in the town that I grew up in, makes sense.

(whimsy music) His son Leonard Senior, played trumpet, followed in his footsteps, played big band jazz.

And my father being a product of the 60s, played a Gibson SG.

- And Joe kind of followed in step.

He saw the passion I had for music, wanted to play like dad, it didn't take them too long to learn how to play like dad.

And he walked right by me when he was six and a half years old.

And then I knew that he had an amazing gift, a talent.

(upbeat guitar music) - I blindly followed all three of them into the music business when I was 11 just about to turn 12 I convinced my parents that, I wanted to be in a band being a blues band, play guitar, I just want to make some money so I can buy a Fender amp.

I think I did okay.

(upbeat guitar music) I started playing at the age of four.

My father put a guitar in my hand.

- We got him a Chiquita guitar, which is a short and scaled down model of the solid body electric guitar actually designed for airplane use.

And I think was the perfect guitar for him and he was able to play it.

And by the time he was five, five and a half years old, he was playing chords on a guitar.

and and he never looked back from that point.

- when I was 11 and 12, I was sitting in with a lot of national, internationally well known blues artists.

It's where I met B.B.

King.

This is when I'm I met Albert Collins and Buddy Guy.

Anybody who would have me.

I was a little kid that crashed the party in upstate New York.

"Oh, here comes Joe with his telecaster."

- He was 13 years old what can you expect?

He's fantastic.

He's fantastic.

like to open up for B.B.

Kingd in downtown Rochester.

and there was like 8500 people at the show.

That was his first big show.

And it was the day before his 12th birthday.

And he opened up and he just took the crowd.

It was just amazing to see the response from the crowd.

So after that happened, we get a telephone call from NBC it was the Jane Pauley people.

They wanted to do a segment on him.

There was a show called "Real Life with Jane Pauley."

It's about ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

- The fantasies that 13 year olds have about what they'll do when they grow up, involve everything from playing major league sports to playing in a big time band.

Bill Shatner's has found one young man too busy for fantasy.

He's living it.

(bell ringing) - [Bill] In the hallway crowded school, there is no reason to notice Joe Bonamassa.

He's simply another 13 year old at an awkward stage of life.

- [Young Joe] That could cause a problem.

"X" - - [Bill] Often doing well.

- 100 - [Teacher] Terrific, - Sometimes messing up.

- I had to find my report.

-I had to rummage thru all that -All right Cause I dropped my folder and it does just - [Bill] Just one more kid until he picks up a guitar, and the boy lost in the crowd becomes the performer drawing a crowd Smokin' Joe.

(high intensity guitar music) - I feel secure with a guitar in my hand.

(high intensity guitar music) A lot of people say you have to say something when you play guitar.

And I feel that my hands are doing the talking instead of my mouth.

I feel really comfortable.

'Cause I have something in my hand, you know, Something I've always had in my hands since I can remember.

(high intensity guitar music) - Playing Blues music, it's timing.

You don't always know where the children get this from.

You don't really know.

But all I know is he got it.

I think that the best I can say, he does have it.

(bouncy guitar music) ♪ Thrill is gone ♪ Thrill is gone away from me ♪ - After the Jane Pauley show aired we received many phone calls from a lot of different professional management firms.

We heard from Stevie Ray Vaughn's manager.

The New Kids On The Block's law firm, they were hot at the time in the early 90s.

Columbia Records flew us down to New York and they wanted to talk with Joe, and a lot of things were happening from this little tiny village of Yorkdale, New York.

And my wife and I go, "what do we do here?"

- It was very confusing time to know what to do for him.

And what he wanted to do.

- Yeah, after the Jane Pauley show aired.

This is where the Weisman's came in, Joe's management, and they flew up here and talked with us and they're great people, and Joe was still with Roy Weisman and they've been together ever since.

- They were a family operation and I think we could relate to that and appreciate that.

(bouncy music) - My father was the manager to many of the great stars from the original era of the record business.

He managed people like Frank Sinatra, Liza Minnelli and Paul Anka, Sammy Davis.

I got to meet most of those people and spend time with them.

I got to fly on the plane with him.

It was cool.

- Well, I don't know if... he was working for me, or I was working for him.

(Roy laughing) I'm not quite sure.

I mean, that's debatable.

- I saw a lot of shows from the wings, with Sinatra.

And I mean, he was the ultimate professional he loved to start on time.

His show is at eight o'clock, he started eight o'clock and Bonamassa's the same way.

- First of all, I saw the tape from the Jane Pauley Show.

Anybody involved in music, I mean, realized that at 13 years old, Joey could play the guitar better than anybody ever saw at that age.

- If you want to do something big in the music business, you got to get involved with young artists.

And by defacto we ended up with Bloodline, which was Berry Oakley Jr., Waylon Krieger, Erin Davis, Aaron Hagar, Joe Bonamassa and Lou Segreti.

All put together and around for Joe Bonamassa.

- That was another good idea Roy had, is what do we do with Joey in between the time he's trying to develop his voices or for us to find out if he was gonna have one that would be compatible with his guitar player.

And I said to him, "What do we do now?"

And he says "Dad don't worry about it."

- By the way had no idea.

(laughs) - Definitely, he said "Dad don't worry about it".

I got these kids they all have famous parents."

- Anyway that was a chapter in itself that was unbelievable.

I mean the band ended up getting signed to EMI.

It took three years to get the first record out.

(upbeat guitar music) The Bloodline album was released in 1994.

And then record company had Bloodline doing all sorts of promotion all over the country and playing late night television shows like "Conan O'Brien".

- Ladies and Gentlemen carrying on the family business is the name of the game with my next guest, Bloodline features the sons of Miles Davis, Robby Krieger of The Doors and Berry Oakley of the Allman Brothers, as well as teenage guitar wizard Smokin' Joe Bonamassa.

Please welcome, Bloodline!

(high intensity guitar music) - [Kevin] And they even went on Mike and Maty to play the new single - What are we playing today?

- Calling Me Back - [Mike And Maty] Bloodline.

- Fire it up guys.

Here's Smokin' Joe - make us proud.

Here we go.

(crowd applauding) (high strung guitar music) - We made the record.

Phil Ramone attempted to produce the first recording.

Mark Hudson attempted to produce the first recordings.

Finally, the only guy that really kind of tamed the beast and actually get a record out of us was a guy named Joe Hardy, who lives in Houston, who produces a lot of the ZZ Top catalog and Joe was not a diplomat.

He didn't care and he just needed to make the record.

-Joe is, just this incredible guitar player.

I mean, it's it's freakish.

It's sort of like a cat on it's hind legs or something you can't believe that this guy can play, So maturely for a 16 year old.

(high intensity guitar music) During that process, it was a lot of fundamental differences between Joe who was the prodigy, and the "Sons of...".

Everyone was great kids, but the "Sons of" didn't have the work ethic that Joe Bonamassa had.

And that was apparent.

All Joe wanted to do is play guitar and do... make music, do the stuff.

The kids all they wanna do, they were few years older, they want to have fun, and they didn't want to work that hard.

- I think everybody is more conscious of what they do when I'm around.

laughs Yeah, right.

But-- - Yeah, but you're an old man in a kid's body -Oh that's right I think of myself as an old man in a kid's body.

- I understand that some pudgy 18 year old going "Hey guys, let's try to make these tunes something out of these songs.

And by the way, I don't wanna play alternative music.

I don't wanna do this, we should make it... and by the way, I want long guitar solos", I understand how that's a toxic element to the band.

- And then we were about to make the next record and Berry Oakley and Waylon Krieger come to me and say that they don't wanna be in a band with Joe.

And I'm like, "Are you kidding me"?

We just, we have about five years of this thing.

And you guys wanna... we're about to make the second record for EMI and you wanna break this up at this point?

And they're like, "Yeah".

- You know I can tell with my conversations with him he was having a lot of frustration.

Or frustrations with the members, the egos of these kids, and whatever problems they had or whatever medicine they were taking.

And it got to a point where, it was serious money we had invested already.

- And at the end of the day, I let it fall apart, which was, that was a hard moment for me because I had to go back to my boss who was my father at that time and say, "listen, by the way, you know this project that our company has a fortune of money invested into?

we got to write that off."

- And I went to Roy and I said to him, I said, "Listen, you got two choices, okay?

The first choice is okay, you got to tell Bloodline, all those guys to get lost.

And your second choice is whether you want to stick with Joey, which I think you should, and develop him into an artist."

And that basically was our conversation, because he realized at that point that Bloodline was falling apart anyway.

And that, either he went all the way with Joey or forget about it.

- Two things happen when you turn 18, the band breaks up.

Well, that's that's partly my own fault.

Two, nobody cares.

When you're 18.

'Cause now you're just you're gone from chosen one to you're locked into the same pile of guitar players that everybody else is, and I didn't sing.

And I was fat.

Not exactly what you call show business material.

And I have a long last name, which to this day, people can't pronounce.

- My big question, as I said before, that if he could develop a voice around that talent, he had to play the guitar, it would be all over.

- When I was in Bloodline, I had no interest in singing I was just a guitar player.

I loved being the guitar player.

It was cool.

I was living with my parents.

And I was helping dad out with the guitar shop.

And I was making demos at the house, trying to get my voice up.

After bloodline, different set of circumstances came about I was looking into a new musical direction tried to do some stuff.

And I decided well now or never.

I was 18, I was like now or never.

If I don't sing start singing now, I'm never going to do it.

And I'll always go through life wondering if I ever could.

So I just started singing, just belting stuff out in my room.

♪ I miss you ♪ I hate you I did some work with Little Steven.

- Van Zandt from Springsteen's band.

And that was his next little thing because at that point there was like nothing going on.

And Little Steven is interested in making some demos with Joe.

And they go off and they make some demos and Joe's singing.

And it's great to hear him sing.

But he's got Joe in a direction that's kind of like not really where Joe wants to be.

♪ The subway's temporary grace ♪ A pantomime on a cigarette break ♪ ♪ Norton Fibler takes his place ♪ ♪ The politician's got no face ♪ - Kinda, I didn't know what to do, I didn't know what direction I'm in Utica, New York.

Not exactly a place where things are happening.

I'm at home.

It's one of those things where, even though I had nothing going on the pressure of time, felt exhausting.

It felt like I needed to change my trajectory.

Really, really quick.

And Phil Ramone's label signed me to a development deal.

- Prodigies come few and far between.

I saw him take an audience apart.

He's so musical and untrained, which I loved 'cause there was nothing that held him back.

Nothing ever held him back from doing anything - And we were all set to do some demos and make some recordings with Terry Manning in the Bahamas.

And right before I was supposed to get on the plane, The label shut down.

So I was back to square one.

Again now, a year later, and I was just lost.

And I asked Roy to call around and see if there was somebody would hire me just as a guitar player.

You know, to go play with whoever.

- And I said to him, "If you want me to do that, I'm happy to do that.

Look for a gig for you.

But, if you have any desire to be the man and the front man, now's the time to go for it because you're in your early 20's.

And the end if that doesn't work out, you still have plenty of time to find another career."

- So he starts calling A&R people that he knew in New York, one of which be Michael Caplan at Epic.

He sent my little cassette demos around and Michael Caplan hears it.

He goes, "I like it."

And Roy goes so "Oh, so you have one of your, one of your artists needs a guitar player?"

He goes like, "you're not hearing me.

I like it.

I wanna see about signing Joe."

Which completely blindsided me.

So I met with Michael and at that point, and he goes, "Okay, here's what we're gonna do.

You're gonna you're gonna make a demo for me of 'A New Day Yesterday', from Jethro Tull."

He plays me this song.

"A New Day Yesterday".

I was like, "Oh, that's cool."

So I had this idea of making it a two-four feel and make him a demo.

And I sent him the song two days later, and he called me up he goes, "Have you ever heard of Tom Dowd?"

I'm like, "Yeah, I know who Tom Dowd is."

- Tom Dowd was a legendary record producer who had produced everyone from Aretha Franklin to Ray Charles, The Allman Brothers Eric Clapton and Rod Stewart, - My father graduated at Stuyvesant High School, which was the Math and Science High School in New York City.

And he was a sergeant in the US Army.

And he was working with the cyclotrons.

(cyclotron blasts) - [Reporter] The energy that generates the heat of the sun and operates the solar system comes under the will of humankind.

The blast changes the atomic structure of everything it hits.

Stone and steel are turned into gas.

- The Manhattan Project was a web of universities who the government had harnessed together and so it was all very top secret.

After the United States dropped bombs in Japan, he goes back to Community College in New York, and he has to take a couple of more physics and chemistry classes in order to graduate.

So he walks into the first day of class and there's the periodic table on the wall.

- [Reporter] For years scientists have tried to break up this atom by shooting neutrons at it's core.

But the whirling electrons seemed impenetrable.

Then finally scientists broke through those walls with a slow neutron, releasing 500 million volts of energy and forming two new atoms, Barium and Krypton.

- And he knows that there's more elements that exists because he had just helped discover them.

So he dropped out of school.

And there was a newspaper article, probably in the New York Times, and it's Fischer studios, and they were looking for engineers.

And he was like, "Well, hold on a second.

I'm the new kind of physicists and the chemist and I play 10 instruments.

I think I could probably fill this role."

- Just about every record that I've grown up with and just love.

He's been involved.

And when I found out I had the opportunity to work with him on "A New Day Yesterday", I was like, "This is gonna be like, an opportunity of a lifetime".

- Joey has no telltale weakness or ballistic as a guitarist.

He can play blues, he can play jazz, he is fast.

- Next thing you know, we get signed to Epic, make a record with Tom Dowd, which was a legendary experience for Joe to make a record with somebody like that as his first record.

♪ Cause I feel you ♪ I don't want to but I but I need you baby ♪ (upbeat guitar music) - He took a real interest in my life and my career.

He took a real interest in me personally.

'Cause he saw that unbridled enthusiasm and he knew, If I kept singing and writing, I would do good things and he was he was right, I just I've always kept that notion in the back of my mind.

Just keep improving yourself.

(upbeat guitar music) ♪ I miss you, I hate you 'cause I feel you ♪ ♪ I don't want to but I need you ♪ ♪ I miss you, I hate you ♪ - That Classic Sony style, the record gets made.

And by the way, the record was supposed to be a record of no pressure.

We're now looking to get on radio, Joe will sing his songs, and that's the end of it.

That was in the year 1999.

And Sony has its first bad reporting, Quarter, six months, whatever you want to call it.

And all of a sudden, everything dried up and went from everyone's excited to promoting this thing to nobody's interested in anything.

So they dropped Joe.

We decided to pick up the pieces as Joe and Roy and put these records out ourselves.

And from that moment forward, we started to make our own records and own our own records.

♪ Woke up dreaming I was gonna die ♪ ♪ Woke up dreaming I was gonna die ♪ ♪ Cause my baby said her ♪ ♪ Said her last goodbyes - You know,I'm in the music business and I'm running like a loser and the business is crashing.

I mean, the industry is falling apart.

It's now the year 2001.

I mean, Napster's just obliterated the industry.

♪ Reached out for her and she was not there ♪ - And I ain't playin' this pop sááá anymore.

I don't wanna hear about radio.

It was a knee jerk reaction to this being told that I have to be, fit into a certain mold, have to be a certain type of artist.

I'm gonna make a fáááááá blues record start to finish.

- And from that, the idea of Blues Deluxe was born.

- And I felt home when I did it.

And I felt like this is how I wanted to make music.

You have to go through the bad experiences to get to that point.

But once you have the "I got nothing to lose" That's when you're the most dangerous.

(upbeat guitar music) We did "Blues Deluxe" and we did a record called "Had To Cry Today" which is kind of like in the same vein, they were both produced by a guy named Bob Held who did a very good job on those records.

And it started to feel like we had some traction.

We're still in the van.

And we're still struggling.

- Along the way.

while Joe is evolving, I wasn't able to make any money from the project.

So it's the first time I ever got paid from the Joe Bonamassa project was in the year 2007.

I think at that point I was, I had met Joe in 1991.

So, we're looking at, it was the year 16.

- Roy began to feel I was kind of stagnating as an artist, like just we're still "barroom" at this point, - And I was thinking about changing producers and trying to get - introduce maybe another influence to Joe.

And this friend of mine suggested to me did I know this producer Kevin Shirley.

And I said, I did not.

And he showed me his discography.

And when I looked at Kevin's discography, and I saw the kind of records that he was making, I'm like, "that is exactly the kind of producer I need to put with the Joe".

Somebody that understands Mainstream Rock from like the 70s, like real, rock like Led Zeppelin kinda rock.

And also can maybe take Joe's blues influence and bring it together as well.

So lo and behold, I get Kevin's number and I gave Kevin a call and introduce myself.

And he's at a place in his career where he's looking to make an album with somebody that was also more organic than he had been working with at that time.

With the major labels, he was doing a lot of acts, and we had a conversation, I said, "Well, if you want something more organic, you've come to the right place.

As a matter of fact, it's so organic we don't have money to pay you."

(laughs) (upbeat bouncy guitar music) (audience screams) ♪ Ain't no heaven or burning hell ♪ ♪ Ain't no heaven or burning hell ♪ ♪ When I die where I go ♪ Ain't nobody know ♪ Ain't no heaven or burning hell ♪ We have a decent three piece band that we've put together with Kenny Kramme on drums and Eric Czar, we kind of set sail with that.

That was our power trio and it was we were able to get in a van, go out, couple crew guys maybe one guy or two guys, it was lean and mean.

They had to load our own gear, set up own gear turn down our own gear and sell CDs and you know, that's honest work.

(upbeat guitar music) Roy would mention that we were kind of looking for a change in the production and we needed somebody that worked on the big stage.

My initial reaction was, why would Kevin Shirley want to produce me?

Like Kevin does big time records, you know, like Zeppelin and Black Crowes and Iron Maiden.

Why the hell was he... My opinion was Kevin was gonna listen to the work up and to that point.

Go, there's no way that I'm gonna do this under any foreseeable circumstances, whatsoever.

(upbeat guitar music) ♪ I'm takin' the hit ♪ Paying the price Anyway, to my surprise, I find myself being visited by Mr. Shirley in St. Charles, Illinois.

A random spot for him for our first encounter but, we needed, we had a show there at Chord on Blues.

Kevin sees the show comes on the tour bus he goes basically, paraphrasing this, "I dig the playing, the tone's good songs are bad, bands gotta go."

Those were the magic words because I had seen the limitations of my group.

- So he said okay and then we made a plan to go into the studio to do the first album and then I brought Jason Bonham in.

- And then called me in 2005 to play on "You and Me" album for Joe.

The first album he produced for Joe.

- Carmine Rojas - You know, we all have history of all kinds of music, similar music, cause we all have done blues, we have done rock we have done jazz.

We have done country - And Rick Melick and all players at the top of the game, at the top of their field.

Triple A Session players, amazing Live players, incredible pedigrees, all of them.

David Bowie, Rod Stewart, I mean, the top of the top.

So when we got to the studio, he finally got to see how it was having a band of incredible musicians support him.

- And I remember thinking that the guy was setting up these guitars and I remember going, "Excuse me, when does Joe get here?"

And he looked around went "I'm Joe".

(laughs) I was like, "Oh!

Hi, I'm Jason nice to meet you."

- Joe really got to experience for the first time a producer that was hands on musically from what he told me that he could relate to.

somebody that could also get him to do something that he wasn't comfortable doing.

And, I remember after the first record, after that record was made, Kevin told me we had a lot of work to do, but I think I can, over time, take Joe to a place that would be a place he could have a very long term and successful career.

♪ They said you wouldn't believe ♪ ♪ What a paradise this was ♪ Til every Adam and Eve, Tom, Dick and Harry ♪ ♪ Started fighting for what he loved ♪ ♪ So, we fortified the ramparts ♪ ♪ And we built the mighty towers ♪ ♪ But it was plain to see, we never were free ♪ ♪ From the tyranny of the hour - And so then we got asked to do a second album.

And that's what's all good and well, except that I think we've got about two days into the first session.

And I got a call from Roy, who asked me to wrap up the session cause we were gonna call it it wasn't working for Joe.

He'd apparently got very upset when I had asked him to do a harmony vocal on top of the lead vocal, and he was very uncomfortable with it.

- We started doing the second album in Malibu, California.

And what I loved about the first album so much was it was like we played the song and it was done.

And then the second album, it turned out is like, because of the nature of the material, it was requiring more overdubs.

♪ You'd better stop ♪ Before ♪ You tear me all apart ♪ You'd better stop ♪ Before ♪ You go and break my heart ♪ ♪ Oh whoa ♪ You better stop It was kind of fighting me.

And I was like, I don't know, I really freaked out in the sense that I'm not sure if this is the right idea.

So we did some acoustic tracks and then we did another session.

On that other session, we caught a song that I've played literally every show since that day.

And it's one of my big, you know, show stopping songs that Kevin had heard when he was in South Africa.

♪ People would tell me ♪ As they pass me by ♪ No matter if I live ♪ No matter if I die ♪ (upbeat music) - I brought the song to him, song that I used to play in a band back in the 80's in South Africa.

A song called "Sloe Gin," which was a song that Tim Curry and Michael Kaman had written.

And it was one of those desperate blues that I thought somebody could cover really well.

And Joe seemed to be the perfect person to do it.

It wasn't it Traditional 12 bar blues structure, but it was a very down, desperate, dark, slow bluesy song with quite involved changes.

The chorus had the lyric.

"I'm so fáááááá lonely."

- At that point in time.

We were still trying to get our records in Walmart, and we run a family show so the song was so strong, I knew where this was gonna be a live staple for forever.

So we kind of compromised and we did "I'm so dááá lonely".

And that became the version.

And that was pretty much the first really big song I had.

It wasn't a radio hit, but it was for the fans.

It was something that anchored the ship.

(upbeat guitar music) (upbeat guitar music) After "Sloe Gin" we had toured extensively, comes time to make another album.

I'm living in California and I met a girl in Georgia, who I loved dearly, so much so that I decided blindly, that I was going to move to Georgia.

I wrote this song because when I was moving to Georgia, there was a new thing called Google Earth that Kevin had on his computer and he goes, "Look I just looked up the address of the house that you rented.

You live in a stone quarry."

(Joe laughs softly) And I wrote the song "Story Of A Quarryman".

During that week of being "Dear John'd" at the airport in mourning, but, it's... forever be known as the Quarry Man.

(laughs) (upbeat guitar music) ♪ Gonna buy me a bucket and a hammer and nails ♪ ♪ Board up the windows and head for the trails ♪ ♪ And that's what I get for sticking my chin out ♪ ♪ Well a kick in the teeth and a mind full of doubt ♪ ♪ I brought this on with my own hands ♪ ♪ Precious disgrace from my own hands ♪ ♪ If I could freeze time in my own hands ♪ ♪ Story of a Quarryman (upbeat guitar music) And I remember she dropped me off at the airport because I needed to come back to California to finish the album which would become "The Ballad of John Henry."

And I remember getting a text message on the plane basically confirming what I knew was coming that she was showing me the door.

And it was one of the few times in my life that I was truly heartbroken.

In the sense that I went from the happiest guy in the world to a hot mess.

- It was one of these stories, he just got swept off his feet.

Next you know, he's moving to Georgia.

And before you know it, he's moving back to LA.

And it's like, what happened?

It's like, he got it.

And he's in love with a woman who's in love with a woman.

It was not pretty and I shouldn't laugh, but nevertheless, it was a hell of a story.

And he came out...

I remember starting the record, he was in love.

Ending the record, he was broken-hearted.

And at the end, this record represents I think, both that.

- And I remember the cast of characters in the studio, we're all living in this big house and the console and the room is downstairs.

And it was probably some of the most laughs and the most tears at the same time.

Because we had Anton Fig, Blondie Chaplin, Carmen Rojas, Rick Melick.

And at one point in time 12 bottles of wine wasn't enough for the household.

And this is in a day!

And it was just this inspired, heartbroken session that I wish I could bottle that series of events and that type of emotion because some of my most emotive playing some of my best songs came from this heartbreak.

And that record in particular is punctuated by the happiest I've ever been, and the saddest I've ever been in two halves.

(soft guitar music) ♪ Shape, that I'm in ♪ Never let her down a day in my life ♪ ♪ Dreams ♪ All around me ♪ As I see the time pass me by ♪ Never trade you for the world ♪ ♪ Never do the things I used to ♪ ♪ I guess I'm not good enough ♪ This I see ♪ ♪ And I'll remember happier times ♪ - And Joe was so distraught.

And we'd been working on "Happier Times."

And I came into the room and he was crying, he was so unhappy.

♪ Life, It hits me And I remember coming up to him and saying to him "Everything that you feel, I want you to put in this guitar.

And I'm gonna make a long loop of the guitar solo.

♪ Not a place I wanna be And just play it, try and tap into what you have, and just play it over these changes.

Just play it and play it and play it.

I won't stop anything.

It'll just go for five minutes and just play it."

And, you know to this day, that's one of his most amazing guitar solos I think.

And he doesn't remember cutting it.

- That also was the record that went boom.

It was like, Okay, now we have something and that material, that tour, that band, those songs.

That was what would have been now leading us up to May 4, 2009 when we first played the Royal Albert Hall.

That's when we arrived on the big stage and that's what I knew I was arriving on the big stage whether I could stay there or not.

That was another question.

(upbeat music) (high strung guitar music) ♪ Tell me how high ♪ Cotton has to grow ♪ Tell me how high ♪ Cotton has to grow - Here we are now and we've been touring for four or five, six years in Europe and Joe is really starting to generate some traction with the audiences.

He's moved from clubs to small theaters.

We just played Shepherd's Bush Empire in London.

And the opportunity to book Royal Albert Hall presents itself.

And of course, we were gonna take that opportunity.

How could we not?

If I'm gonna honest, I had no idea if we could fill that place, - And we had to record it.

You just can't, can't just get a gig like that.

You never know if you're ever gonna get back to it.

But it's also a quarter of a million dollars.

At that point in time, we were all in.

We had just that amount of money to keep our company running for the year.

And we went to a bank and we asked for a loan.

We were declined.

- This moment was the biggest risk that Joe and I were ever gonna take in our career.

We literally put the house up.

- So on one hand, you're on top of the world, you're at the Royal Albert Hall on paper, then life is grand, but behind the scenes, we could have went out of business.

So we were really at a crossroads with our company and we were playing in the big sandbox, but we didn't have big sandbox money.

I remember when I was four, like really taking an interest in it and my dad would sit me down and you know play me records.

He brought home one day, the video cassette "Farewell Cream Concert" recorded at the Albert Hall.

And I remember so clearly, watching everything that Eric Clapton played, and going, "I don't know what that is.

But that's really cool."

I asked my parents for a guitar, and I would sit in my room for hours and hours and hours, my parents would have to kick me out, "Go outside, play basketball, go ride your bike, do something, get some exercise", 'cause I would just be fixated on trying to recreate the sounds and I made a decision right then and there.

I said, this is what you need to do.

I don't want a real job.

I want to be a guitar player.

And I want to play the Royal Albert Hall.

(tense guitar music) - This has been 20 years in the making.

And this is sort of not graduation, but accumulation of you know all these years of hard work and you know, day after day, and so we're all very excited.

- He's been performing for the people since he's been five years old.

He has more miles on a guitar than most 60 year olds do, that played all their life.

(upbeat instrumental music) - So here we are, at age 32 and 20 years in the music business professionally and I'm about to do this.

It is as daunting as it is exciting.

And it's as scared I've ever been really because we can only get one shot at it to make it right.

And I really wanted to make it right.

(high intensity guitar music) We have the date 2009, May 4, and we had to fill it.

- So at the end, we had the whole house of cards on it.

And we didn't know what was gonna happen.

- It weighed heavily on, 'cause I had to be good.

Well, you could wake up with a head cold, I mean, I can list 10,000 things that could go wrong and one thing they can go right.

And it was really, really critical that not only we perform but perform well.

(crowd cheering) (slow faint music) (high strung guitar music) (introductory instrumental music) I'd written Eric Clapton a letter that Paul Stewart had hand delivered.

And I gave Eric my email.

And it took a few months, but I got an email from a very strange email address.

And I was like, "I don't know who this is, but I think I know who this is."

And I replied, and it was Eric, and we'd come up with the idea of doing "Further On Up The road".

And nobody knew about it.

The only tell was, there was a small Tweed amp on stage.

And it was the sixth song.

And I remember very vividly when we were playing, and I stopped after the fifth song, and I go "Ladies and gentlemen, Eric Clapton", and he walks out.

And I go I can't believe I pulled this off, right?

I mean, this is like, if it all ended that day.

You've been like "Man, this is like, I did it."

Thank you and good evening London.

(crowd cheering) Good evening, thank you very much.

My family's here, my mom and dad are here.

This is the greatest honor of my life to play this building.

I set out 20 years ago to, you know play the guitar and I said, "One day if I could ever make it to the Albert Hall, that would be the coolest thing in the world."

And here I am so, thank you very much!

(crowd cheering) And the first song I ever, ever learned how to play on electric guitar was "Further On Up The Road" and we've been playing that on our tours in celebration of the Albert Hall.

So, I'm very proud to say, the first song and the man is here tonight, Mr. Eric Clapton is gonna come out and play and sing with us.

(crowd cheering) It was all so full circle.

It just was a lifelong dream.

And it really meant the world to me that Mr. Clapton came and I can never repay him.

(crowd cheering) (joyous instrumental music) ♪ Further on up the road ♪ Someone's gonna hurt you like you hurt me ♪ ♪ Further on up the road ♪ Someone's gonna hurt you like you hurt me ♪ ♪ Further on up the road ♪ You just wait and see ♪ Gotta reap just what you sow ♪ That old saying is true ♪You gotta reap just what you sow ♪ ♪ That old saying is true ♪ Just like you mistreat someone ♪ ♪ Someone's gonna mistreat you ♪ You been laughing, pretty baby ♪ ♪ Someday you're gonna be crying ♪ I own a debt of gratitude that I could never repay the fact that he took time out of his busy life to come and play solidified and gave the moment the weight that I was hoping it would get.

It wasn't just the gig that came and went.

It was like the night Eric Clapton came out with me.

- Because when we started this thing, and we took that chance, - You know lot of people say, "Well, you don't really know when your big moment's gonna come a lot of times, you don't even realize it now."

I realized it very, very clearly.

That was the day.

- And it's turned out to be a turning point in his career without question, I mean, after that night, I think the British press saw that as almost like a handing of the baton.

- That was the big moment and then it came out on DVD.

And it just in America, it exploded in the sense where all of a sudden I was playing 500 theaters now I'm playing 5,000 theaters.

That's the story.

But damn, I look like I was having fun on that DVD.

I look back at it thinking, "Man, I was have a lot of fun that night" I wasn't.

(crowd cheering) But it was pedal to the metal and I knew, Thank you I knew that my whole career was on the line.

(crowd cheering loudly) Eric Clapton.

(crowd cheering) (upbeat instrumental music) My name is Joe Bonamassa.

It's been an honor to be in this building.

Thank you very much.

(crowd cheering) (upbeat music continues) (high strung guitar music) One of the great things about working with Kevin Shirley over the years, and I have this genome as well, is every so often, Kevin feels the need and I've also I second that motion, feel the need to throw a Cherry Bomb in the world.

Like just going "Well we've done this let's do something completely different."

We did the Albert Hall, we kept touring.

(playful guitar music) - I had been having long conversations with Joe about embracing world music and incorporating it into blues.

♪ It's been an Athens To Athens kind of day and night ♪ - Kevin had found this studio in Santorini, Greece.

And the idea was to make like more of a world sounding album.

And we're gonna import some musicians from Athens that didn't speak any English and they were gonna play on these tunes that weren't written.

- When language and physical expressions sometimes are at odds, and you can't communicate with somebody, rhythm and tonality all speak to each other.

There is a universal language of music.

You could go in with the juras and the bouzouki and the baglamas, all these Greek instruments that we used.

- And it was great.

And it was really, probably the most fun we've ever had making a record.

- Hello, Japan.

Greetings from Santorini, Greece.

We're just finishing up recording my brand new CD.

(high pitched guitar music) ♪ Don't cry ♪ Don't cry ♪ Anymore (bouncy guitar music) ♪ It's over now baby ♪ Don't cry no more - I was very happy with the results even more so when Claude Nobs heard the record, and was so taken with our approach to this universal language of music.

Which I think he totally got.

And then he invited Joe and bring in the Greek musicians with him.

- You know the first time I heard this I said, one day had to do an acoustic set.

- Well- - And I'm so proud that it will occur.

- Thank you.

It restarted the conversation about this acoustic thing that we wanted to do.

And why don't we put together a group of like world musicians.

And I remember if we worked on "Dust Bowl."

We just kinda huddled in the corner and just went through a couple verses and the band glued itself together in ways I was like, "Oh, this is gonna be great."

♪ Lifting me up ♪ Tearing me down ♪ All you give me is indecision ♪ ♪ The classic run-around ♪ Bringing me higher ♪ Keeping me whole ♪ Now I feel like I'm living ♪ Living in a dust bowl To say we did an acoustic show live at the Vienna Opera House, it just had a nice ring to it.

Going maybe will fall on our face.

You know, maybe this will do it.

Complete and utter disaster.

From the first note.

Or could be one of the coolest things we ever did.

And there's no guarantees in life.

And they could say a lot of things about me.

But they can't say we don't take a risk and we don't put everything out there on the table.

And it's gonna be something else.

♪ Hard to find true within - Rehearsals went really good.

I mean, the foundation of this whole show is Joe playing an acoustic guitar.

And then we have to introduce all these elements to it.

And so that becomes more three dimensional.

- That's the beautiful thing about music is it constantly changing.

It's morphing, it's doing things that it doesn't stay the same.

But it keeps you fresh, it keeps your mind sharp and keeps you young.

- It's about music in general.

It really is a universal language.

Even English changes and German changes and just all the languages change and they develop over time.

Yet somehow the music language is the same.

And it goes across the ages.

The same melodic structure has been around forever.

I mean, It's different from country to country, but they get incorporated going back almost to "Birdsong."

Before music, with the Gregorian chant and all the music through the middle ages through classical, they're all based on the same thing.

That language never changes.

From the beginning of time, there's 12 half steps in the Western scale, there's quarter notes in Indian scales, but these same 12 notes make up the way everything gets played, you know the emotions we get from music, all come from these very basic 12 notes and thumping something to keep the tempo.

It's really... (upbeat music) It's really inexplicably wonderful music (upbeat music) and amazing.

(high strung instrumental music) (music tempo rises, dueling) (music tempo falls) ♪ devil rises you don't have a chance ♪ - Something I've learned traveling the world playing blues rock to everybody from people in the UK to Hong Kong to Australia to Russia, you know to Tel Aviv, Israel and Mumbai, India.

You know they clap in the same spots, it's uncanny.

And it blows me away every time.

And you go, "Wow, really music is a universal language."

It's in the DNA.

♪ See that brown-haired woman ♪ Coming back this way ♪ Yeah (playful instrumental music) This is one of the coolest things I've ever done.

And it's one of the coolest things that a musician can do, is to take your basically your strong point, which is basically my guitar playing and reduce it down to the point where you play a little bit, but not all the time.

And now you have to sing.

And I have to rely on the songs.

Thank you very much.

You know I learned that people will still cheer if there's not a form in the guitar solo, at the end of the song.

They actually liked the song.

(gentle guitar music) ♪ Everybody knows you - From the top.

(high strung guitar music) - Since Kevin came in the picture in 2005, it's always been song first.

But this is really now the beginnings of where, you know like, okay, let's try to get the best song.

- Yeah, so solid but we need to go to... it needs to go to a different place.

- I mean- - Is that going to be fun to solo over, at D minor?

- Yeah, you can record that.

You can (faintly speaking).

- I know.

- Just at D minor.

- Before we write it.

Before, you know, I'm not Mozart.

- You know (speaking indistinctly).

We're not going straight to this.

Hold on.

- It's gotta serve the solo, melodic solo.

That's what's going also.

- A D minor is a good choice.

- Yeah beautiful.

- Yeah, I thought it was nice.

(calm guitar music) - [Joe] I can tell you this having a bag full of good songs makes the recording process a lot easier and also makes the process of putting together a live show a lot easier.

(calm guitar music) - Your a hot star you didn't even realize it.

(laughs) - [Kevin] Yeah.

(gentle guitar music) - When you play music it's very difficult to be like objective and subjective all the time.

(gentle guitar music) You can look at it from above or you can be involved in the pieces going together.

So when you're playing sometimes you can be too involved in the pieces to see the big picture.

And that's where a producer comes in 'cause they're able to.

♪ Different shades of blue - By the riff.

- Yeah.

- I think a riff and I don't think do the retard and I think end on the tonic.

Don't leave it hanging there.

(gentle guitar music) - Yeah - [Joe] All right.

- Anton, I think that you want the chorus just to be big.

The solo is gonna be monstrous.

It's gotta be Titanic.

- Second up.

- Titanoboa.

(high strung guitar music) ♪ The sun's been shining ♪ Down on me day and night That was great.

- Well, I mean that's the nature of blues music is to play spontaneous and improvise over changes.

In theory it shouldn't be the same way twice, you know.

I've never engineered a solo.

I never liked that.

I never liked doing it that way.

So you gotta be able to push yourself and try new things and try things that are not in your comfort zone.

♪ Broke your heart - [Kevin] You gotta record the first notes, when he's playing.

- Bonamassa doesn't like to feel safe he likes the challenge.

It's a rock blues album, but curved differently.

So that's Bonamassa 'cause we never do anything traditional.

♪ But it's starting to make you weep ♪ ♪ When you got nothing left to lose ♪ ♪ Might sound good ♪ But I'm not sure that's true ♪ ♪ You carry the pain around ♪ And that's what sees you through ♪ ♪ The different shades of blue Joe, he searches, he wanders.

You know, he tries many different things.

He tries different kinds of music.

He plays in different kinds of bands.

He's always searching, which is actually beautiful.

♪ Tell by the way you hang your head ♪ - I can't keep just using the same playbook And I have to challenge myself.

- If it's your playing can you take it outside?

If you keep doing this and you could do this, if you have different bunch of musicians behind you, how is that challenging?

How is that, you know, are you getting pushed enough?

The better the musicians are that Joe plays with the better he plays.

♪ Every way that's nice you just shows ♪ ♪ You've got a heart that's made of ice ♪ ♪ And I know ♪ Fire and water ♪ Must have made you their daughter ♪ ♪ You've got what it takes ♪ To make a poor man's heart break ♪ - Kevin's great about changing up the band every once in a while.

You know, even the greatest pl if they stare at me long enough, they'd be like, "Arg, he just did this."

♪ Well my trying ain't done no good ♪ ♪ I said my trying ain't done no good ♪ ♪ You don't make no effort ♪ No not like you should (high intensity instrumental music) ♪ Lazy ♪ You just stay in bed ♪ Lazy ♪ You just stay in bed (high intensity instrumental music) ♪ You don't want no money ♪ You don't want no bread (high intensity instrumental music) (high intensity instrumental music) - One of the things that I really wanted to have on this album was I wanted to experiment with two drummers playing.

And I wanted to try and make it a real rhythmical powerhouse behind Joe playing and I wanted to cut everything without keyboard.

So it was really about getting some more aggression out of Joe and having him be quite vital.

♪ On the stone and steel (upbeat rock music) ♪ Done my fair share of ♪ Mountain climbing (upbeat rock music) ♪ Mountain climbing (upbeat rock music) ♪ Whoa, troubles I've got them (upbeat rock music) ♪ Mountain climbing (upbeat rock music) ♪ Mountain climbing (upbeat rock music) ♪ Whoa, it's blues at the bottom ♪ - There's perfect metronomic time.

You know, when you put on a metronome and then there's the human time, which is like your heartbeat, you know and...

But when people play, they tend to kind of push certain sections and pull back on certain sections, you know?

I always say like time and heartbeat equals feel.

(upbeat blues rock music) ♪ Feel like I've been a prisoner ♪ ♪ Of my own design ♪ I've been such a bad listener ♪ ♪ But I hear you tonight ♪ Let's drive (upbeat blues rock music) ♪ Into the night - You know sometimes we're self loathing blues rock people.

We question ourselves a lot.

We question if what we're doing is right.

We question what we've done in the past, has it been right?

Is it right or wrong?

It's all obviously worked out for me.

You know I went to him after we came up with a song that he suggested I write a melody I came up with the melody on the spot.

And we recorded it in like two or three takes.

Song called "No Place For The Lonely."

And we were at dinner afterwards and we were just talking about the day and I go, "You know what, Kevin?

You know, you and I know how to do pretty well, at this point to make blues rock."

♪ Someone to hold me ♪ Like you used to hold me ♪ But there's no good place for the lonely ♪ ♪ 'Cause this place is no good ♪ For the lonely - Sometimes I give him a solo, and I'll key it up and he doesn't even know what key it is.

And so I'll just say, "Alright, here we go, Joe here comes the solo.

It's coming in two bars, and it's about that tempo.

(snapping) And then you're in."

And so he'll sit with the guitar and not know what's coming in, what key is coming in.

And then I get him without thinking too much, then he has to be reactive to what's going on 'cause he has so much that's cerebral.

I need him to be visceral.

When we get those moments, I love those moments.

They're amazing.

Like the solo and "No Good Place For The Lonely."

Was voted in the top 100 guitar solos of all time.

And that was a one take, one performance, unedited take.

And when I heard that I'm like, "We don't have to do that again, we've got that."

And that shows like, true genius.

(energetic instrumental music) - But at the end of the day, I mean, we're talking about music that's 100 years old or more, that everybody's played and perfected and the masters perfected it and the British reinterpreted it and reinvented it and I reinvented or reinterpret what the British did and so on and so on.

And then there's been all these new kids that are doing great.

So at the end of the day what are you gonna do with (plays guitar)?

We can do it one, four, five.

F### it up.

Make it sound... Make it challenging to the listener.

Make it challenging to yourself to play and come up with and make it something that can actually be listened to but they also know that that's you.

It couldn't be anybody else.

Like who's who's that?

"Oh, that's gotta be Joe.

He's at it again.

Messing with tradition and all things that we hold near and dear to our hearts.

Let me give it a one star review on Amazon.com."

(high intensity music) (upbeat rock music) I've always had an affinity for the blues.

I always default to the blues.

I always love the blues.

But I'm not a blues musician in the sense that I'm too musically adventurous to just stick to those paths.

So that's why making records with Black Country Communion were so exciting because it allowed me to play music that was in my wheelhouse but didn't fit in my wheelhouse as a performer.

It allowed me to be unapologetically a rock and roll guitar player.

(energetic rock music) ♪ It's cold on the mountain ♪ It's cold in the wood ♪ My life is a fountain After we worked in Greece, I'd met Glenn Hughes and we had jammed together at this Guitar Center thing.

And Glenn came out and played and we did "Mistreated" and it was fun.

And Glenn was great.

And we figured out real quickly that he and I played off each other very well.

- And in the audience that night, was Joe's manager, Roy Weisman and Kevin Shirley.

I remember coming off into the dressing room and I heard the unmistakable foot stomping of Kevin rushing down into the dressing room to announce, "I got it!

We need Jason Bonham, and we need Derek Sherinian.

Okay?"

And we were like, "Uuh, okay."

- So I saw Glenn and Joe performing on stage and they were really good.

It was actually great.

I was knocked out.

I was like, wow.

There's a rock thing going on with Glenn's voice and Glenn's great bass playing.

And then Joe is such a talented musician.

He could have been playing in a bluegrass band or a soul band or whatever.

I mean, he's really got all of these elements in this guitar playing and they're all in his head.

And that's why I saw him playing this rock stuff and I was like wow!

We have a real opportunity here to open up the fan base.

The English radio and press, I knew would eat him up if he started playing rock.

(energetic rock music) - And before you know it, we did one album in like four days.

Half the time we were waiting for Jason to show up.

(laughs) - It's just my inside joke of always being late.

I'm never on time.

And for a drummer that has bad time, it just shouldn't happen.

- Which actually kinda gave us the opportunity to get our sááá together, song wise.

- Like so many of these bands that are made up, there're four unique characters.

Like Glenn is got this history of classic rock.

But since the 70s, Jason is you know, obviously rooted in Led Zeppelin and has played with them and his great exponent of the kind of style of drumming of his dad.

And then I'd known Derek Sherinian from my days when I produced "Dream Theater."

And I've always been wanting to do something with him because I love the technicality of his playing.

- Well, it's rare that you can find a band, four people that all have that same skill to hear the song, learn it and to not only learn how to play the song, in preparation to record it, but to come up with cool parts.

And the sounds that are gonna be on the record.

- Some of these songs, they just started as little ideas and Glenn did his thing.

He has this great way of words, he's got this great swagger, he's a true rock guy.

It's like I pretend to be that but he is that guy for sure.

- Bro, I don't think I should do this I'll just said it to Kevin.

It's so like seven dwarfs sááá.

It's so metal.

(crowd laughing) ♪ Oooh It's so not me to do that.

(crowd member faintly speaking) I'd rather just let the audience figure it out.

'Cause, ooh, oh, oooh.

Oooh, oh, oooh.

It's the March - the whitest thing in the world.

- We really finished up the first record and it was sort of an experiment to see if it would work.

- It really took me by surprise.

When we first get it, and I saw where it charted on the first album.

- Yeah I think that the band was skeptical until the record came out and did so well.

Especially in England.

It was number one rock record.

And when it did so well, I think they realized that there was a market for it and was something that was serious.

- We did the second one at a studio on Sunset Boulevard called East West and we had a great time.

You know Kevin is the fifth Beatle.

Yeah, he's the fifth Beatle in that band because it really, he helped put it together, and he really is a member of the group.

- They each have their own solo careers.

And this is one of those things where there is, an idea for the band, it's like, let's be a classic rock band.

If you left each of them to make the decisions, it would be a different band and that's where I come in.

I'm sort of a channel all these brilliant musicians into, like a toothpaste tube with the red and the whites and the blue and the green and put them all onto the brush and then it becomes the toothpaste.

To brush the teeth of the rock world.

- And it's a band full of sergeants but we do need a general sometimes to kinda make a decision.

(upbeat drum music) We then tour the following summer in 2011.

And we did nine weeks.

As I put it about seven weeks too many.

The nature of this group is it really is great in small doses.

(upbeat music) For me, after the second week it became hard work.

After the third week, it became really hard work.

After the ninth week, it was like I was ready to go.

There were some great nights in music and then there was some average nights in music and it just couldn't... A lot of factors had to line up for it to be a great night.

So I returned home armed with a high dose of burnout, and a high dose of, I don't wanna even look at the guitar.

So much so that I didn't play the guitar when I got home.

But we had a session booked to finish "Dust Bowl."

And I remember sitting at the village in Santa Monica, blowing takes and blowing solos that I normally could play in my sleep.

It's just because I just...

It wore me down.

That was just the universe telling me I was doing too much.

And that was the universe telling me that I shouldn't be in a band, at that point.

You know there's just the universe telling me a lot of things, that you can't be all things to all people and you have to prioritize and kinda slow it down a little bit.

Shift, down shift a gear and be happy with that.

And I learned a lot of good lessons in the summer of 2011.

And it was very difficult to keep perspective.

♪ I'm looking for redemption ♪ Love's hallowed ground ♪ Yeah, I'm praying for forgiveness ♪ ♪ And I've searched around ♪ But there's none to be found (high strung music) (gentle guitar music) - [Kevin] The history of blues music is very closely associated with the "Crossroads" and Robert Johnson who was a performer in the 1930s.

He used to crash all these juke joints looking for a gig, and mostly people didn't think he was very good.

And then he disappeared for a year or two and no one knows what happened to him.

And he came back and started playing these places with the style and technique that no one had even seen before.

(high strung guitar music) He apparently sold his soul to the devil at the Crossroads for a life as an incredible musician.

(high strung guitar music) (crowd cheering) (high strung guitar music) And these 29 or 30 recordings that we have of him, stand as like the benchmark for all blues music as we know it today.

(high strung guitar music) ♪ I got stones in my passway ♪ And my road seem dark as night ♪ - We went down to the Crossroads, and it was kind of a pilgrimage, to come down to the Mississippi Delta and see where the forefathers of the blues the music that you love so dearly and play every day and listen to, see where it all began.

And you start thinking about in terms of this place and while we're here is Robert Johnson, Mississippi John Hurt, Charlie Patton, Son House.

All these guys, you know, they've been covered and talked about and revered and loved.

All this mystery basically started, basically where I'm standing.

(high intensity guitar music) ♪ I got a good woman that I'm loving hard ♪ ♪ She don't mean a thing Right now I'm looking at Highway 61.

You know, a sign for Highway 61.

And it's like...

I learned how to play slide guitar from listening to Johnny Winter.

And doing the Dylan cover of "Highway 61 Revisited."

I mean, there's something about this part of the world musically that's mystical and the Crossroads represent where blues began.

(car engine roaring) ♪ Stoned all in my past (high intensity guitar music) When you go down to Rosedale, and you go down this one street, a strip of buildings, and then there's levees you go, okay, these where Charlie Patton really wrote about "High Water Everywhere."

This is where it all felt right and it all book-ended from myth to story to music but this feels authentic to me.

This is where they said Robert Johnson sold his soul.

but, you know, in our world Kev, this is where it all started for Robert Johnson who paved the way for guys like Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf the generation later.

(upbeat guitar music) - The story was that if an aspiring blues man waited by the side of a deserted country road in the dark of a moonless night then Satan himself might come and tune his guitar, sealing a pact for the bluesman soul and guaranteeing a lifetime of easy money, women and fame.

And this is where they said Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil right there at the Crossroads.

- Wow.

- Is there anything attractive about fame, women and money that you'd sell your soul for?

(upbeat music) - I mean if you put it in those terms, (Kevin laughs) it doesn't seem like a bad deal.

(upbeat music) - And you get your guitar tuned.

- By the way, I've sold out for much less in my career.

(both laugh) (both speak faintly) (bouncy music) - And so the idea came up to celebrate the music of Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.

- I was born in a little town called Rolling Fork.

I was raised up in Clarksdale.

raised up on the Stovall Plantation.

And finally in 1943 I brought it to Chicago.

- The first concert, we pay tribute to two of the seminal figures in Chicago blues.

Two huge influences on me and, really my conduit into the British blues, which I really got into when I was a kid.

- The program begins with Muddy Waters.

(lighthearted music) ♪ I put a tiger in your tank - [Joe] One of the things I've always noticed about the blues forefathers, our heroes, there's a dignity to their life, it wasn't that they were rich men they were destitute and poor but there was a dignity, it was a quiet dignity that they all carry themselves with.

♪ I put a tiger in your tank ♪ (lighthearted music) ♪ I like the way you're looking ♪ ♪ Love your little car (lighthearted instrumental music) ♪ But the tires are too slow ♪ They can't go very far I found with the tribute shows in the last three years.

My limitations as an artist and singer especially have given the music a different twist.

You know, I can't walk up there and sing "Spoonful" like Howlin' Wolf.

I can't walk up there and sing "Spoonful" like Jack Bruce.

But I can sing it like myself and do it with my utmost conviction.

♪ Want you to feel good ♪ So you jump and you shout (upbeat music) - Yeah, we were actually on the bus kinda studying some of the old tapes and it's just classic and they such style and grace, a way, Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf and a lot of the other guys who were playing.

It's just so beautiful and so it's kinda really like an honor to be playing the music.

You know, the thing about Joe is that he has been able to take the blues and put it on a stadium level.

So it's like really, like huge.

It's almost like arena blues.

♪ I would rather be dead ♪ Sleeping six feet in the ground ♪ (gloomy music) (upbeat instrumental music) ♪ How many more years - That's a big opportunity for Joe and for us in general, to be able to celebrate other people's music, do it in a way that supports a whole category of music known as the blues.

- And ultimately it is a tribute to my influences, but it's also done under the Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation.

And the idea is to not only bring the blues to another generation, but it also is to raise money so we can get kids some instruments in schools.

And if you give one kid the seed and it grows and it comes out to be the next big blues rock star.

Then I go, you know what I've done my job.

I've done what I set out to do so many years ago.

Not only like I've developed a little career for myself, but I've also helped others the same way B.B.

King helped me when I was 12 years old.

So that's kind of full circle.

Unfortunately, the funding for that stuff is really dried up.

And if you don't keep the blues somewhat in people's minds and in their hearts, it could easily fade away.

♪ Don't you know we're riding with the kings ♪ - And consequently from that, The Three Kings was born.

And you know, this is a really interesting opportunity for Joe because talk about three artists that really meant something to him.

In that at the soul of who he is.

(high strung guitar music) ♪ When your down and out ♪ And you feel real hurt (high strung guitar music) ♪ Come on over ♪ To the place where I work (high strung guitar music) ♪ And all your loneliness (high strung guitar music) ♪ I'll try to soothe (drum beats) ♪ I'll play the blues for you (high strung guitar music) (bouncy instrumental music) ♪ If you're down and out ♪ And you feel real hurt ♪ Come on over Freddie, Albert and of course, a mentor of mine, Mr. B.B.

King and by paying tribute to them is not saying I'm one of them.

It's music that I've adored and loved and worshiped and to get the opportunity to play in front of people with these great giant bands, 7 piece, 8 piece, 11 piece.

(upbeat music) ♪ Just come on in (high strung guitar music) ♪ You might run across ♪ Some of your old friends ♪ All your loneliness (drum beats) And the third concert we paid tribute to more on the guitar side, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck.

Bookending it the difference being the people that Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page learned for we were tributing at the front and by the time three years later, we got to the students.

And I'm a student of the students.

And that's one of the biggest things that's not lost on me is the fact that this music is passed down.

Almost, you know it takes on a different form every time it's passed down.

(upbeat instrumental music) And every so often, you kinda have to shuffle the deck of cards and bring the blues back into the forefront or at least least attempt to do that.

And that's what the whole Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation is designed to do.

Is designed to giveaway instruments and money and promote all things blues in whatever, what style of blues you like or what background or culture you're from.

I mean, it's like that music moves people for a reason.

It has been for 100 years.

And it's all done without the help of computers and it's honest, and it's honest music.

Yeah and whether it stacks up to what it sounds, stacks supposed to sound like today, I don't care.

(high strung guitar music) ♪ I get lost in alibis ♪ Sadness can't prevail ♪ ♪ Everyone knows strong love can't fail ♪ ♪ Don't be pretending ♪ About how you feel ♪ Don't be pretending ♪ That your love is real ♪ Don't be pretending - You know I sometimes wonder myself how hard is it to do this day in and day out and there's nobody more passionate than Joe Bonamassa.

When it comes to playing an instrument as a living.

There's no question in my mind that he loves what he does.

But you gotta wonder, how hard is it to do that day in and day out.

To pick up an instrument, and to give yourself to an audience in a way where you're leaving every bit of emotional and soul that you have on the stage when you walk off.

I mean, I don't think most people understand how hard that is.

♪ Pretending (high strung guitar music) ♪ Pretending (high strung guitar music) - The next generation of the blues is gonna look completely different than what it does now.

And what it did in the 60s, and certainly what it sounded like in the 20s.

The youth of this generation has access to an infinite amount of information, an infinite amount of music, an infinite amount of influences that will be mixed up and it's gonna sound completely different than how people like myself and my contemporaries who are now in their early 40s listen to it.

(high strung guitar music) I can say I played slide at the Crossroads there I go, there's a bucket list thing.

So I'm very interested to see where the influences are gonna come from, and how the blues is going to be interpreted in the next 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years.

After I'm dead, I don't care.

(man laughs) (upbeat instrumental music) (high intensity guitar music) ♪ Who draws the crowd and plays so loud ♪ ♪ Baby it's the guitar man ♪ Who's gonna steal the show, you know baby ♪ ♪ It's the guitar man ♪ He can make you love ♪ And he can make you cry ♪ He will bring you down and then he'll get you high ♪ ♪ Something keeps him going miles and miles a day ♪ ♪ To find another place to play ♪ ♪ Night after night, who treats you right ♪ ♪ Baby it's the guitar man ♪ Who's on the radio ♪ You go and listen to the guitar man ♪ ♪ Then he comes to town and you see his face ♪ ♪ And you think you might like to take his place ♪ ♪ Something keeps him drifting ♪ - [Joe's Mom] So if you wanna get it out.

- That was in that photo.

It's what?

Four?

Four generations.

- Four generations.

- That trumpet is from about probably the mid 1920 to early 1930.

- But it started the whole- - Yeah it started it.

- The whole musical thing.

♪ You want to get the meaning out of each and every song ♪ ♪ So you find yourself a message and the words ♪ ♪ To call your own ♪ You take them home - But you can't be in Rosedale, Mississippi without stopping here.

One of my favorite Robert Johnson songs is a song called "Hot Tamales."

Here is most likely the inspiration for that song.

And oddly enough it says Joe's.

So, White Front Cafe, Joe's Hot Tamale place.

So there you go.

You can't come all this way not say a little something about that.

And it's a Mississippi historical preservation site as it should be.

See, just a gem.

There you go.

♪ Something keeps him moving ♪ ♪ But no one seems to know ♪ ♪ What it is that makes him go ♪ ♪ Then the lights begin to flicker ♪ ♪ And the sound is getting dim ♪ ♪ The voice begins to falter and the crowds are getting thin ♪ ♪ But he never seems to notice ♪ ♪ He's just got to find another place to play ♪ (gloomy instrumental music) ♪ Fade away (gloomy instrumental music) ♪ He's got to play (gloomy instrumental music) ♪ Fade away (high strung instrumental music) ♪ Got to play (high strung instrumental music) ♪ Fade away (high strung guitar music)