Hey, great sameyeyam, Tubejunke, and Mystic. Some of you are actually listening to prewar blues. I don't want to knock the modern, electric stuff (cause I love it), but there is a tendency for modern blues to inhabit a sort of blues ghetto. Variations on, or more likely straight ripoffs, of Muddy and electric Chicago blues. The variations in prewar acoustic blues was immense compared to what we have now. Thus you could have guys like Charlie Patton, Skip James, Son House, Mississippi John Hurt (the last three of whom recorded in the 60's, if you just can't stand to listen to their lofi early recordings) who all recorded their classic sides within a few years of each other, lived in the same general area, and often sang the same/similar songs, but sounded nothing like each other. An of course the Piedmont blues (east coast—Blind Willie McTell, Blind Blake, Blind Boy Fuller) was different from the delta blues. And the Texas blues of Blind Lemon Jefferson and Lightin' Hopkins also had a different sound. Not to mention women blues singers (Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, etc) who tended to use small bands, or piano blues (Leroy Carr, Roosevelt Sykes, etc). And I could go on. While Muddy and the Chicago sound popularized the blues, it also lead to virtually killing off many of the alternatives. IMHO, while this may have been inevitable, it has not been for the better.
