Born to boogie

On the 21st June at his home near San Francisco, the great bluesman John Lee Hooker died peacefully in his sleep, at the ripe old age of 83.

Around the world, lovers of his unique sound mourned the passing of a close friend, a musical giant, a larger than life hero of the blues, one of the last of the original Blues Greats.

But the loss was tempered by the knowledge that John Lee Hooker had escaped the awful pitfalls so common to blues musicians of his generation (and to many of those to follow).

He lead a long and eventful life, gaining the recognition he so richly deserved, commanding the respect and reverence of his musical peers, earning not just fame but eventually fortune from a hugely successful career which spanned over six decades.

John Lee Hooker’s compelling music on the 1966 album, Live At The Café Au Go Go, New York, was my introduction to the blues many years ago. The haunting resonances on that album startled me, and John Lee’s evocative voice and guitar have captivated my imagination ever since. His blues are incredibly powerful and passionate, with songs of anger, loneliness, loss and desolation, but also of love, celebration and redemption.

In 1989, John Lee Hooker played his first and only gig in Ireland, and my band and I proudly opened the show for him in the National Stadium. He played an incredible two-hour show that night, surprising even his own musicians with the length and intensity of his performance. When he stood up from his seat to “boogie” towards the end, an ecstatic Irish audience went absolutely wild. Afterwards, the members of his band were still buzzing and joined us for a night on the town. We jammed the blues together until the early hours of the morning.

A few months later while on tour in the USA, we met up once again and were invited to visit with John Lee in his dressing-room before he took the stage. He gently strummed his guitar, tuning and retuning it to suit his unique ear. I chatted with this most extraordinary blues man, sharing stories of musicians we knew in common, listening to his amazing voice as he allowed us into his world.

While engaging us in conversation, John Lee Hooker firmly dismissed everyone else from his dressing-room in a voice not to be ignored, while he continued to joke and laugh with us to our amazement and delight. He was warm, encouraging, funny and ferocious.

Last Sunday, at our usual gig, my band and I paid tribute to John Lee Hooker by playing several of his songs with our deepest feeling and affection, and by drinking a toast to his memory as we each raised, “… one Bourbon, one Scotch and one beer…”.