The Day I Ditched Stevie Ray Vaughan (SRV)
Regretting the time I left watching one of the greatest blues guitarist ever
[Photo: Texas Flood album release show, 1983 from Tracy Anne Hart, www.heightsgallery.com]
There are two guitarists that live in my personal pantheon of reverence. They attained that status by infusing their instrument into their soul. There was no buffer zone between man and music. It wasn’t magic. It was pure, unadulterated sonic vibration.
These two artists are Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan.
As a 15-year old, I grew up on an Air Force base outside Knob Noster, Missouri. It was small, secluded and smack dab in middle America. For weekend entertainment, we hit the base bowling alley for a plate of french fries, while waiting for the last movie to end at the base theater across the street.
It was 1973. No MTV (Music TeleVision). No YouTube. No Netflix. No chance of getting to Kansas City for a live concert. The only music experiences available on the menu were concert movies, inside the base theater, after 10 pm, when the moviegoers emptied out.
When the lights dimmed and the volume rose, the music transported us to a different world. On the screen, we watched musicians, dancers and the crowd turn our senses to wonderment. It was electric, it was artistry and it was enthralling for teenage boys with fresh rock ‘n’ roll blood in their veins.
Two concert movies stood out from the rest: Monterey Pop and Soul to Soul.
At the Monterey (California) Pop Festival in 1967, America was first introduced to the Jimi Hendrix Experience. In 1968, a documentary was released. In 1973, I sat mesmerized. Soul to Soul was filmed in Ghana in 1971 and released the same year. That concert solidified Santana’s Latin rock sound in my mind forever.
In the late 1970s, I attended college in Nacogdoches, Texas. Punk rock, from the second British invasion, saved rock music when it finally kicked Disco off the charts. By 1980, rock and pop climbed back with Blondie, Pink Floyd, Michael Jackson and Queen.
But Texas always had Blues & Rock. A style that accentuates heavy guitar solos and slides to carry the melody and take it home sweet and nasty. Some of the practitioners of note include, Albert Collins, Billy Gibbons and Freddie King.
The 1980 spring semester at college was winding down by late May. Most of the students had already packed and gone home for the summer. My dorm roommate hauled his Supertramp albums back to Houston. The campus was deserted.
I still had a few days to go before driving the six hours home, where I’d spend the summer painting public school classrooms in the ‘hotter ‘n hell’ heat of North Texas. Luckily I bumped into Ann on campus and we agreed to meet up for drinks later. I’d met her earlier that semester on a fluke happenstance and she asked me to go to a Heart concert. Ann and Nancy Wilson? Barracuda? Sure!
At twilight, we walked over to the Split Rail, a basic hole-in-the-wall bar on main street. It had a few square tables, a bar and a makeshift stage that ate up a third of the room. I remember going inside and seeing a band already playing hard and loud. That seemed odd because it wasn’t even dark yet. But the whole town was in exodus, so nothing was set in normal time anyway.
I had no idea who was playing. I don’t even recall a poster board at the entrance. I do remember stepping inside and zooming straight in on the lead guitarist. He wore a white jumpsuit, a head-to-toe rainbow bandana with a wide headband and a Stratocaster. He shredded lightning licks and bluesy grooves without a single glance towards the audience.
I sat just twelve feet away. I saw Jimi Hendrix reincarnate.
For the next hour, the guitar player captured my attention as much as Ann. He did everything like Hendrix. He strummed the guitar behind his back, he twanged it with his teeth and he poured his soul out in front of thirty-odd listeners for a cover charge.
The Stevie Ray Vaughan I saw was not yet “Stevie Ray Vaughan”. He was a clone. A damn good one. He was quiet without singing much and without much of a persona. He was just another musician riding the circuit from Austin to Houston to Nacognowhere (as we called it). No signature hat, no hits and no national recognition.
I’m not sure anyone else in the bar knew who he was. But there was no way to forget his furious riffs and distinctive Texas Blues sound. The guy was good. As good as anyone playing in a concert movie.
Ann finally reeled me back into reality and we chatted about college stuff. The whole atmosphere was odd with a semi-sedated air. It’s like the end of the semester pulled the plug on the vibe. When the band took a break, I put Ann back in the spotlight.
She was a sweetheart. She took me to a concert! Truth be told, I’m a music lover, more than a lover. I didn’t normally just go out for drinks. I didn’t really date much. But this was not an ordinary day.
Outside, the streets emptied out and left a peculiar calm over the campus. Inside the Split Rail, the music ramped up the joint and set sunken spirits back into place. Ann and I clicked and revved up the cylinders. The mood was heading into terra incognita for both of us.
The band came back on stage. I wanted to hear one more set. I thought, this guitarist is just too good to not stay a bit longer. After one more song, the hormones kicked in and we left the bar. We strolled back to an empty dormitory, where the entire strange day culminated into the simple bliss of finding companionship in a sea of unexpected emptiness.
Little did I know at the time that I left a legend behind. I ditched SRV.
It’s the only time I ever saw Stevie Ray play live. It’s a memory that never goes away. It’s still as raw and loud as that rare day in East Texas. Ann and I didn’t really keep up with each other afterwards. I think we both knew that we’d had our best moment.
Stevie Ray hit stardom in 1982. People magazine reviewed his coming out party at the Montreux Festival in Switzerland:
He seemed to come out of nowhere, a Zorro-type figure in a riverboat gambler's hat, … with a '59 Stratocaster at his hip and two flame-throwing sidekicks he called Double Trouble. He had no album, no record contract, no name, but he reduced the stage to a pile of smoking cinders and, afterward, everyone wanted to know who he was.
Now that’s SRV, not a Hendrix clone anymore. A phenomenally pure artist that came out of his rainbow bandana-clad shell and blossomed into a Blues master.
Reverence is a rare state. It is not fandom. It is reserved for those who make a mark on your life that lasts long after the guitars are unstrapped.
My appreciation to you for taking the time to read these selections and essays. I hope you find some enjoyment and insights about the world we live in. Thanks for supporting and sharing Continental Drift.
— Rick Scobi (@rickscobi)