had no idea what to listen for at the beginning of your article. Just went to Apple Music and started playing "Don't Worry," and then as I was reading about this weird fuzz, it hit on the song, and... well, that was pretty cool. Thank you for this!
Great article, fascinating. I'm a British Rock 'n Roll boomer; Stones (my favourites), Beatles (my younger brother), drenched in the rock 'n roll and (real) R & B pouring out of my older brother's bedroom
Chuck
Buddyd
Bo
Bill Haley
Muddy Waters
At the same time, many country songs made the charts - I can still picture me and my mate from next door singing "Singing The Blues" together. 5? 6?
And many of our 50s "Skiffle Bands" played a lot of old time American music - John Henry, Spike Island Line, Battle of New Orleans.
My first single, 1957 I think, was "Tom Dooley" by Lonnie Donegan (he had a Skiffle band), which I was to find out when I started to dive deeper into old time music, was a traditional murder ballad.
The Grateful Dead played it once. By chance heard them at 15 and captured for life; they of course played many old folk ballads, and beautifully. Check out any Peggy-O on YouTube.
We all grabbed the Basement Tapes bootleg when that hit these shores. Vinyl of course. I just love that slbum, it digs way back and many of the songs are parables.
Then when many years ago I read Greil Marcus wonderful work on the Basement Tapes, "Invisible Republic" which picks up many of the old time musicians who clearly grabbed Dylan (did me too).
Dock Boggs. Marcus says of Dock
"He sings as if his bones were poking through his skin". Yup. You got it.
Enough but one more old old song dragged into the glorious chaos that was (and is, and ever more shall be so) the Grateful Dead...
I heard Little Steven describe this moment on a session on Underground Garage. What a serendipitous discovery! And what an impact that had! Most of my teenaged friends were musicians and I remember when ALL the guitar players bought little "fuzz boxes" that plugged into their guitars.
This is great story man. All through out that song there something buzzy and thumpy in the tone. Sounds cool. Maybe the 6 string bass is what I’m hearing under the beat?
This metal always thanks country a bit. As I know some of the greats were raised on this music (Hetfield on Waylon as much as Sabbath for example).
I was not familiar with Mr. Grady but Marty Robbins has been with me all my life as country was the dominant form on the home stereo and car radio much of my formative years. And in the movies having seen Coal Miners Daughter in the theatre.
Great article that fills in the blanks. I first heard this story from Geddy Lee's Big Beautiful Book of Bass (every word in that title is true by the way) which has a short description of it on page 144.
Love the content, I learned new things today, and for that I am grateful you put this out; but the obvious AI writing and formatting bugged me. We want to hear your voice, Malachi, not the machine.
I free write everything I post after I pull from several sources - some including books I have on the shelf and then reformat it to help with structure, flow and grammar with the help of Claude.
That's done for the sake of the reader because of how my writing process is when it comes to long form essays. If you saw my song and lyric books, you'd get how much of a scatter-brained musician I can be.
But I appreciate what you said! And let me know how I should be looking at formatting.
You'll be hearing plenty of me on here as soon as I get some more time on my hands.
had no idea what to listen for at the beginning of your article. Just went to Apple Music and started playing "Don't Worry," and then as I was reading about this weird fuzz, it hit on the song, and... well, that was pretty cool. Thank you for this!
That is quite a phenomenon, ain’t it? Love when those things happen. Something in the ethos!
Great. I live in Nashville now. Great history
Don't Worry About Me is an imprint song. Dad played Marty Robbins records when I was little. Thanks for the history lesson. Good stuff.
Great article, fascinating. I'm a British Rock 'n Roll boomer; Stones (my favourites), Beatles (my younger brother), drenched in the rock 'n roll and (real) R & B pouring out of my older brother's bedroom
Chuck
Buddyd
Bo
Bill Haley
Muddy Waters
At the same time, many country songs made the charts - I can still picture me and my mate from next door singing "Singing The Blues" together. 5? 6?
And many of our 50s "Skiffle Bands" played a lot of old time American music - John Henry, Spike Island Line, Battle of New Orleans.
My first single, 1957 I think, was "Tom Dooley" by Lonnie Donegan (he had a Skiffle band), which I was to find out when I started to dive deeper into old time music, was a traditional murder ballad.
The Grateful Dead played it once. By chance heard them at 15 and captured for life; they of course played many old folk ballads, and beautifully. Check out any Peggy-O on YouTube.
We all grabbed the Basement Tapes bootleg when that hit these shores. Vinyl of course. I just love that slbum, it digs way back and many of the songs are parables.
Then when many years ago I read Greil Marcus wonderful work on the Basement Tapes, "Invisible Republic" which picks up many of the old time musicians who clearly grabbed Dylan (did me too).
Dock Boggs. Marcus says of Dock
"He sings as if his bones were poking through his skin". Yup. You got it.
Enough but one more old old song dragged into the glorious chaos that was (and is, and ever more shall be so) the Grateful Dead...
Viola Lee Blues
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0RxcJg5Bja4&list=RD0RxcJg5Bja4&start_radio=1&pp=ygUidmlvbGEgbGVlIGJsdWVzIGdyYXRlZnVsIGRlYWQgbGl2ZaAHAQ%3D%3D
Good article. Subscribed.
I heard Little Steven describe this moment on a session on Underground Garage. What a serendipitous discovery! And what an impact that had! Most of my teenaged friends were musicians and I remember when ALL the guitar players bought little "fuzz boxes" that plugged into their guitars.
Nailed it on that piece, keeping me on the edge of my seat, waiting for the full story.
Excellent write
Great read. Thanks for the history lesson.
Excellent history. Thanks for that tidbit👍🏻
On Rubber Soul, Paul McCartney played fuzz bass on Harrison's Think for Yourself. It was a Vox device.
I don't think the sound worked well on the Marty Robbins song. Maybe if it were attenuated a bit.
I love the name of your Substack, too!
This is great story man. All through out that song there something buzzy and thumpy in the tone. Sounds cool. Maybe the 6 string bass is what I’m hearing under the beat?
This metal always thanks country a bit. As I know some of the greats were raised on this music (Hetfield on Waylon as much as Sabbath for example).
I was not familiar with Mr. Grady but Marty Robbins has been with me all my life as country was the dominant form on the home stereo and car radio much of my formative years. And in the movies having seen Coal Miners Daughter in the theatre.
Great article that fills in the blanks. I first heard this story from Geddy Lee's Big Beautiful Book of Bass (every word in that title is true by the way) which has a short description of it on page 144.
Ditto "Our Winter Love"; Bill Purcell; 1963; deliberately used the effect starting at the 0:57
mark:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jUD8OlTqQVk
Ahhhhhhh there it is, "Grady Martin"
Our Winter Love (Cowell) by Bill Pursell, arranged by Bill Justis, conducted by Grady Martin.
Love the content, I learned new things today, and for that I am grateful you put this out; but the obvious AI writing and formatting bugged me. We want to hear your voice, Malachi, not the machine.
I free write everything I post after I pull from several sources - some including books I have on the shelf and then reformat it to help with structure, flow and grammar with the help of Claude.
That's done for the sake of the reader because of how my writing process is when it comes to long form essays. If you saw my song and lyric books, you'd get how much of a scatter-brained musician I can be.
But I appreciate what you said! And let me know how I should be looking at formatting.
You'll be hearing plenty of me on here as soon as I get some more time on my hands.