The Reason They Call It The Rhythm 'Section'

Yes, I'm blogging the original performance, like an old person. And why? There are more current clips, after all. Somehow, though, those current clips just don't have it, so I decided to go back to the original to see what it really is. For comparison, check out this clip of Jeff Beck and Rod Stewart from a 2009 show at the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles. They're in fine form, right? So what's missing?

It's the rhythm section.

Howlin' Wolf, who popularized this song -- all those first-generation Chicago bluesmen, in fact -- had the best rhythm sections ever. Those were the rhythm sections that inspired The Rolling Stones, Manfred Mann, The Yardbirds, and all those seminal British blues bands, including The Jeff Beck Group.

Listen, then, to the original audio. Hear how drummer, Mick Waller, and bassist, Ron Wood, work in lockstep; there's a reason they call it a rhythm section. Listen to the heavy, heavy syncopation; they spend so long on the dotted eighths that the sixteenth notes almost come too late. The hard, un-syncopated triplets in the instrumental breaks that follow make for a stunning rhythmic contrast with the slinky groove in the verses. There's the sense that the rhythm section is not only important, but driving the proceedings.

The funny thing is that, in the original, the lead guitar and vocal lines take their inspiration from the drums and bass. The song builds from the bottom up, which is right in line with the principles of acoustics. Bass notes have longer wave forms; the sound takes longer to get moving and reach the ear. In fact, when upright bass players use the bow, they have to start bowing before the note is supposed to sound; that's how long it takes the sound to come out. If you build from the bottom up, your timing is better, your drive, or sense of forward motion is better. The music has a more propulsive feel, even when the groove is ostensibly lazy, as it is here. This is masterful work, and incredibly hard, but these guys make it sound easy.

None of that is happening in the El Rey video. The drummer and bassist have taken the easy way out. Beck and Stewart sound less inspired as a result.

The video below? This is the original Jeff Beck Group with "I Ain't Superstitious".

Smacked Down and Fighting Back

Did any of y'all ever get smacked down -- literally or figuratively -- for being passionate about things when you were young?

I don't mean slugging someone when a hearty, "You stink!" would have sufficed; I mean ... loving life.

I did.

So, when I encountered "old people" who were passionate about things, they seemed powerful and daring, but scary, too. As though they had gone through something so excruciating and shameful that they just didn't care anymore.

It was not until much later that I understood they were free. They still scared me just a little, even then.

You'd think the powers that be were challenging me, or something, because I met many such people in my life. All through school, I was blessed with -- and terrified by -- teachers and conductors who were consumed with their subjects.

After I left school, I sought out such people without understanding why. I went to hear the late science fiction author, Ray Bradbury, lecture -- more times than I can count. He was in his 80s, and he just. didn't. care. About anything.

He'd talk about H. Rider Haggard and writing without editing and the great, lost library of Alexandria, like a nine-year-old hunkered down in a blanket fort with a few hundred of his closest pals.

After all this time, the not-caring is no less terrifying, but it is infinitely more necessary. I have passed the point of no return, still terrified because it seems so much easier for some people -- like these two.

Ron Wood and Paul McCartney are fanboy-ing SO hard in this clip, God bless 'em.

They seem fine with it -- who knows?

All I can say is, if you're over the age of 40, and still letting some superannuated Lampwick tell you how uncool you are, you're doing it wrong.