Customer Reviews

Can't Quit the Blues (W/Dvd)

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This package is advertised as a Boxed Set that includes a bonus DVD. For casual Buddy fans this may ring true, but for die hard Buddy fans it's all about the DVD. The documentary is the best ever about Buddy and His life. With extensive live footage throughout, you will sit in a state of awe as the "BEST GUITARIST" ever, frantically expels doses of raw emotion both vocally and with his guitar. The collection of songs on the CD's are great,but the price of the box set would be worth it, even if only the DVD was included. He's that moving "LIVE".

This Boxed Set is an excellent overview of Buddy Guy's career. It is well presented and has a comprehensive song selection but the absolute highlight is the DVD. Like Albert King, early B.B. King and just about everyone else, material on these legends is scarce! The DVD contains eleven performances from different stages of Guy's career. The first two are from Montreux in 1974 with Junior Wells, Pinetop Perkins and Bill Wyman on Bass. This is a must because this set is not longer available in the States. Junior also plays his chromatic harp, in the style of Little Walter, on "Ten Years Ago" and they also do a slow version of Junior's "Hoodoo Man Blues" (a title, interestingly which came from a Louis Jordan tune). It is fantastic. Buddy plays through a solid state Japanese-made amp for the first time (they were the Montreux House Amps that year)and it has quite an unsual sound. It is similar to the one he had playing through the Leslie Speakers when his amp blew up while recording on Junior's original "Hoodoo Man" LP(1962). These two numbers remind me of seeing Buddy in NY in 1967 by himself (Jr and the Band didn't show up)he just carried on and played out the door of the Cafe Au GoGo with his long lead, just like in "Drownin' On Dry Land" in this set.

"Messin' with the Kid" and "Come On This House" are also gems from Montreux in 1978. On the first two tunes in 1974 they were essentially backing Muddy Waters (as they did in the 1950s) but here they are stars in their own right after the release of their early 1970s hit LP. It is great and features "Fast Fingers" Jimmy Dawkins on second Guitar (his only ever early video clip as far as I know! He is also featured on the recent Delmark release "Tail Dragger"). He plays a better solo on "Messin' With The Kid" than Buddy!

"Sweet Little Angel", a Robert Nighthawk hit and B.B. King tune recorded many times (B.B.'s most famous version: "Live At The Regal")has been done many times by Buddy too. This one is done at Montreux in 1992. I like his version on the "Real Deal" DVD with the SNL Band. This however, is also a strong version.

"Damn Right, I Got The Blues" is from Buddy's comeback period commencing in the early 1990s when there was a short Blues Revival period following the death of SRV. We are still at Montreux in 1998 and the band cooks for this performance. It is great.

"Drowning On Dry Land", "Tramp",and "Mustang Sally" are from Montreux again in 2002. It is important to note that these are NOT the performances issued last year with the Carlos Santana package. These are good, but in all honesty, the band on the Santana set is much better, for one thing the keyboardist from Otis Rush's band is magnificent. Buddy does the Buddy thing at the end and sings without a mike when it fails.

The final two performances are acoustic, something he has added to his shows since the middle 1990s. The performance of "What I'd Say", since Ray Charles has died, is particularly interesting. The solo acoustic "Louise McGhee" from 2004 closes the set.

The 75 minute documentary with this DVD is also a must to see. OK, most of it we have heard many times over the years on other releases, about going to Chicago (he remembers the day in September), and meeting Muddy Waters who fed him and so on. This is all well done and presented and you can watch this many times. The snippets of performances are what really shines here. "Red House" with Joe Satriani is cool and the clips of him (I think it's at Antones!!! In Dallas!) of "The Things I Used to Do" and others we wish they would release that whole set!!!!

Interesting final note: this DVD like so many Blues DVDs in the last 5 years or so (AFBF 3 Vols; Albert King in Sweden and more)was produced by Janie Hendrix and Experience Hendrix Productions. Janie Hendrix is not Jimi's daughter if you are interested. Jimi's father Al remarried and Janie was his stepdaughter from his second marriage.

First of all, this box set is not perfect, mainly for what was left out of it, but if you judge it for what they did put in it, I think the only conclusion you can come to is that it's a tremendous success.

Buddy Guy's career is going on 50 years, so for there to be only 13 tracks devoted to the first 25 years or so of his career is indeed leaving a lot out, but Silvertone has done a good job of cherry-picking the highlights of that era, including two tracks from Hoodoo Man Blues, on which Guy was a sideman to Junior Wells. Two discs would have been more appropriate for this pre-Silvertone work, but what has been crammed onto one disc does touch on the highlights of that time period.

The remaining two discs cover his Silvertone work, but again, there is nary a scrap of fat to be found. This is all prime Buddy Guy, rippling with electricity and raw emotion. For completists, there are a few unreleased tracks scattered throughout, and you know what? They're all good enough to make you wonder why they weren't released.

The DVD is very well produced, and for those who may have all of Guy's albums, this is what sells the box set. First, you get a 90 minute documentary featuring a very casual and relaxed Buddy Guy talking about everything from growing up in Louisiana, to seeing his first electric guitar, to the sight of a streaking Junior Wells. The interview is intertwined with performance footage (most of which can be seen in total in the concert footage section of the DVD).

In addition, the DVD has a section of complete live performances, the best of which probably being Buddy with Junior Wells at the 1974 Montreux Jazz Festival. Those who have heard the Guy/Wells album "Drinkin' TNT 'n' Smokin' Dynamite" will recognize the performances, and the added visuals only heighten the experience. Again, several phases of Guy's career are touched on, as a sideman with Wells, as a solo electric performer, and even as an acoustic performer.

And presentation-wise, everything is top-notch. The package unfolds to reveal a thick, glossy booklet that features information on all of the tracks included (date it was recorded, date it was released, what album it appeared on, who played on the track, etc.), great photos, and a well-written essay on Mr. Guy.

For a Buddy Guy fan, there's nothing not to like here. Sure, more pre-Silvertone material would have been greatly appreciated, but it's also tough to dismiss the prime material that has been included. Can't Quit the Blues is a fine box set that can be enjoyed by both hardcore fans of Buddy Guy, as well as casual fans of his music.

I usually read reviews on Amazon, but have yet to write one... but I liked this 3 cd and 1 dvd package so much that I had to write my first review! People have to know about this set!

Like a lot of others have said, this is worth it to the huge Buddy Guy fan simply for the amazing dvd. The 80+ minute documentary has great performances and interviews with Buddy... also has 11 concert performances that haven't been available before. My favorite dvd track is Drowning on Dry Land which shows Buddy walking out into the crowd while still playing... this is one of the things I will always remember about watching Buddy live, and it's a nice to finally see a video of this. The dvd has songs that range from 1974 to 2004.... with a few acoustic songs thrown in.

The cds have 47 songs ranging from his first demo in 1957 to a few songs from his latest cd. There aren't really any weak songs on them!

I have 4 other Buddy Guy cds and found that this package gave me about 35 songs that I didn't have on cd already. For those of you who have all his cds, there are 6 songs previously unavailable on cd.

Great album notes, photos, biography are also here... the entire package is so well made!

It seems like there is finally a set that does justice to the legendary career of Mr. Guy!

You better be a big fan of Buddy Guy if you're going to splurge on this one! The set does present some of Buddy's early work but it is a little heavier slanted towards his more recent work. It's all very good and this set certainly makes a strong case for Guy being in the all time top tier of Chicago bluesmen. Because of the blues genre in which he plays, Guy still is an underrated talent that is still deserving of a wider audience. Here's hoping this set will widen that audience a little more.

Can't Quit the Blues is one of the best purchasing experiences I have ever had with a box set. This collection of tracks, performances, extras and supporting materials is both career spanning and eye-opening. And perhaps best of all, it's extremely affordable considering everything that you get. I would venture to say that after listening to all the audio disks several times, this set has changed my mind regarding many aspects of music. There are many box sets that are a treasure for die-hard fans, and you can also find some that are great introductions for beginners. But few box sets can truly be said to be great purchases for both. This is one of them. This is really the total package, and there is simply no way for me to be less enthusiastic about this set, try as I might to play devil's advocate and find something that could have been improved. While nothing is perfect and there are one or two small things I might have done differently, none of those things are significant when compared to the great content, very nice presentation, and tremendous value offered by this set.

For starters, it certainly helps that Buddy Guy's style of blues is very accessible musically to begin with. Many of Buddy's tracks could easily be played on classic rock stations and few people would blink. In fact, listening to these tracks sequentially a few times really made me appreciate just what a sonic influence Buddy's blues play has had on the world of rock music. There are more than a few instances where some of those chord riffs on recordings from the 50s and early 60s are reminiscent of techniques employed by Jimi Hendrix many years afterwards.

And of course, the box set goes to great lengths, through photos and the narrative of the liner book, to lay out his wide array of famous fans, from Eric Clapton to John Mayer. So there can be no doubt that even those who never even knew they heard a Buddy Guy track before can enjoy these tracks and cast a suspiscious eye towards the large number of classic rock bands that took so much from the Blues without paying the level of hommage that they should have. Granted, a large number of great bands have professed the influence of the Blues on their music, but with the passage of time fewer new artists seem to be aware of where those chords and rhythms came from.

But aside from the music itself is the wealth of information that is presented along with the music. What I am about to say is something that every product manager working in the music business should emulate on every box set that is produced. For every single track on each CD, the liner book includes the production notes including sound engineering and mixing in addtion to the normal writing and producer credits. We also have recording dates and locations for almost all of the performances, though understandably a few of them are not fully vetted out. Having all this information collected in one place is a convenience that even the seasoned blues fanatic will definitely appreciate. Reading the included book cover to cover will thus take a great deal of time. I am one of those who obsessively searches out that kind of information with almost every album purchase, and it is not uncommon for me to have to pour over materials to find out where and when particular live tracks were recorded. So the week it may take you to really read and appreciate each credit and each word of the narrative will indeed be time well spent. I particularly enjoyed this because it allowed me to see how Buddy worked with his many collaborators over his career. Many people are aware of the Willie Dixon connection, but there is so much more to learn when one listens to the tracks and can connect the dots between the tracks, the writers, the producers and the sounds between each recording.

Before I got this set a friend told me he thought they could have included 5 DVDs of additional live footage, but even with what they had it was worth the price of the set. The included extras, like the documentary, and the live festival footage is indeed also a very nice addition.

When you factor in the reasonable price of this set, it's really one of the best values in a box set that I have ever purchased. Definitely give this set a chance and take the time to really look at the liner book and notes on each track. If you weren't a Buddy Guy devotee before, you probably will be after you go through this set.

Enjoy!

We thoroughly enjoyed this 3-CD set with companion DVD.

Enjoyed hearing Buddy's early days, touring with no cash,
and seeing the "Legends" stage in the background.

It's amazing to have a collection of this music, some
not previously available, at a good price, too.

This set is aptly titled. At 70+ years old, he's still going strong - as the cuts from his latest studio album (Bring Em' In) confirm. This is a good introduction for the casual fan, and a must have for the hardcore - due to the cuts that were included here but were left off other studio albums. Now for the less than 5 star rating explaination - 3 audio dics are not enough !!!!! The DVD was nice, but I would have liked to see another audio disc. There were a LOT of good cuts not included because of the 3 disc limit. Buddy guy is one of, if not the BEST, bluesman still alive. This set is worth the cost of admission !!!!!

Now this is what I am talking about!! A quality product that makes everyone happy: both for newbies and long time Buddy fans like me. If you are a Buddy Guy aficionado like me, you probably have already 85% of this material. So the question is: is it worth it? YES!!! Not only because they have included some outsanding never before released outtakes, but mainly because there is a great DVD included that alone makes your money worth. Legacy really went the extra mile to make a great DVD and not just a throwaway like they did with the SRV box. Plus the booklet includes some great photos. Get it, this box is a winner!!

This box set would be good for any casual fan of Guy's. Not a lot of new material here. Any serious fan already has much of the three audio discs. The DVD is good but Guy can be found on other DVD's. Unreleased cuts, alternate versions, rare or unreleased live cuts would have made it better. Buddy Guy is a national treasure and deserves more than this slight overview of his long career.