As musicians of any stripe, the music we listen to matters. What goes in is what comes out. It’s a cliché for a reason.
When I ask my students why they listen to a particular band or songwriter, I rarely get a satisfactory answer. I just don’t think it’s important to most of them why they like something. That’s deeply troubling to me. When I was young and first getting into music, those patches on my jean jacket, the concert t-shirts I wore, the logos on my book covers: these were BADGES. They were my identity. A way I communicated to the outside world the things that were important to me.
It’s no accident that the current climate of the music industry is less than inspiring. And here I could go into a lengthy rant on culture and celebrity and advertising and all of the other reasons I believe we’ve come to this point, but it gets tiring always railing against. So instead I’m going to offer up some inspiration.
Below you’ll find a list of records that I find personally inspiring. Some for the guitar or bass playing, some for the singing or songwriting. Some just for the shear beauty of the music. In part one I’ll lay out some of my classics. In part two we’ll look at some of the best in recent memory.
I’m not trying to be cool or eccentric here. These are records I think you’d benefit from having as part of your musical vocabulary. But this is just a taste. Investigate.
Lastly, you don’t need me to tell you why these records are great. Many other people have written much more eloquently about them than I ever will. Just seek them out and listen. I think they’ll speak to you like they’ve spoken to me. Peace –Ben
Stevie Wonder – Singed, Sealed, Delivered
Aretha Franklin
Jimi Hendrix – Band Of Gypsies
Beatles – Let It Be
Bob Dylan – Blood On The Tracks
Herbie Hancock – Empyrian Isles
Miles Davis – Kind of Blue
Bill Withers – Live At Carnegie Hall
John Coltrane – Blue Train
Donny Hathaway – Live
James Brown – Sex Machine
Allman Brothers – Live At Fillmore East
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin III
Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers
Neil Young - Harvest
Otis Redding – Otis Blue
Marvin Gaye – What’s going on?
B.B King – Live At The Regal
Albert King – Live Wire/Blues Power
Buddy Guy – Stone Crazy
Cream – Disraeli Gears
Deep Purple – Machine Head
The Who – Live At Leeds
Black Sabbath – Heaven & Hell
Sly And The Family Stone – Fresh
Santana – Abraxas
Luther Allison – Bad News Is Coming
The Doors – L.A.
Funkadelic – Free Your Mind
Van Morrison - Moondance
And on and on and on…
