Bluesman Walter Trout talks about his long career playing guitar

Bluesman Walter Trout talks about his long career playing guitar
July 21, 2010
By MARIO TARRADELL
Dallas News

What becomes this New Jersey musician most? For Walter Trout it may be his playing of scorching blues-rock mixed with singer-songwriter soul.

Trout, a 59-year-old ax man with a stinging voice, merges those styles on his latest disc, Common Ground , which features his ode to '70s So-Cal tunesmiths ("Open Book") and a paean to his six-string ("Song for My Guitar"). We caught up with Trout by phone from his home in Huntington Beach, Calif. He'll make his Granada Theater debut tonight.

What made you write "Song for My Guitar"?

That song started off being about one particular guitar, the old Strat [a Fender Stratocaster] that I played for 36 years. But I think it ended up more about what it means to me in my life to be able to play guitar for people all these years. I've been at it a long time now. I started playing professionally in '69 or '70. I have 40 years of this as my job, my passion in life. It's more about when I sat down and thought about it, what it has meant to me. It's a sanctuary, therapy, a lover, sometimes it's an adversary, too. Sometimes it doesn't go like I want it to. Sometimes I get up to play and I'm the most at home and natural that I can be in my life.

Your sound is blues-rock. Do you consider yourself a blues traditionalist?

I believe you need to be aware of tradition and respect it, but it's not a chain around your neck. I played with John Lee Hooker, Big Mama Thornton, Bo Diddley , Pee Wee Crayton, Canned Heat. You had to immerse yourself in the tradition and be fluent in it. But to me, I use that as a springboard to create my individual approach in this. I am just as influenced by Crosby, Stills & Nash and Joni Mitchell as B.B. King. I love it all. I wanted to play it all. If you listen to "Open Book," the second song on Common Ground , you tell me what genre that is. I don't know. That's a combination of Joni Mitchell and Stevie Ray Vaughan. I tried to put it all together, and that's part of the fun for me. I like to push the envelope.

What did you learn from your years as part of bluesman John Mayall's band?

The first tour I did with him was in '82, with Mick Taylor and John McVie in his band. I joined him permanently in early '85 until '89. That's a university right there. If you gotta be a sideman guitar player in the blues, John Mayall is as high up as you're gonna go. The only place to go from there is to go solo or come back down and take a side gig with somebody less-featured and known. Mayall takes guitar players and makes stars out of them. He is not only a musician but he has a talent, which is very unique, as a bandleader. He is right in there with Count Basie and Duke Ellington. He is the ultimate bandleader of this kind of music. I emulate and imitate his style of being a bandleader with my own band. I learned an unbelievable amount from that guy. I also learned to play spontaneously onstage.

How receptive is Dallas to the blues?

I've played there twice with my own band. Both gigs were good gigs. I used to play there much more often with Mayall and with Canned Heat. I'm excited to get into a really cool venue in Dallas. It's in Texas, man. This is the state that gave us so many blues greats, from Albert Collins to Stevie Ray. That is a bastion of this music. It's an awesome thing. Plan your life