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B.B. King (2002)

Interview by Barney Hoskyns, Rock's Backpages audio, July 2002

The Chairman of the Board of Blues Singers looks back at his early days in Memphis, and on the observational nature of his songs, and their universal subject matter.

File format: mp3; file size: 10mb, interview length: 10' 55" sound quality: ****

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Big Brother & the Holding Company, B.B. King, Aluminum Dream: Anderson Theater, New York NY

Live Review by Robert Shelton, The New York Times, 19 February 1968

Janis Joplin Is Climbing Fast In the Heady Rock Firmament ...

B.B. King, Bobby Bland: Winterland, San Francisco CA

Live Review by Tom Vickers, Midnight Sun, 16 January 1975

North Beach walk ...

Mothers of Invention, B.B. King, Booker T. & the MGs: Fillmore Auditorium, San Francisco CA

Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 7 June 1968

America's Musical Soul Shines Through ...

Stevie, Gladys, Nina … Summer of Soul uncovers a festival greater than Woodstock

Retrospective and Interview by Stevie Chick, The Guardian, 15 July 2021

As the US boiled with violence, 1969's Harlem cultural festival nourished spirits with soul, jazz and gospel. Now, Questlove has turned lost footage of it ...

B.B. King, Ray Charles: Circle Star, San Carlos CA

Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 1 December 1972

Let's Call Him King of the B-B-Blues ...

B.B. King Sings the Blues Evra Day, Evra Day

Report and Interview by Michael Lydon, The New York Times, 27 October 1968

A COOL breeze blew in the night outside, across the Mississippi and the cane fields that press against the town of Port Allen, La. Inside ...

B.B. King: King of America

Interview by Gavin Martin, New Musical Express, 10 January 1987

300 nights a year, Lucille-loving BB KING is the world's premier blues ambassador, still carrying the standard for black heroes long gone. GAVIN MARTIN swings ...

Stevie Wonder, Sam & Dave, Arthur Conley, B.B. King, Big Maybelle: Downing Stadium, Randalls Island, NY

Live Review by Robert Shelton, The New York Times, 2 September 1968

Top Pop Concert Draws Only 2,000 To Randalls Island ...

B.B. King: Thirty years on the road

Interview by John Swenson, Rolling Stone, 21 February 1980

LOS ANGELES — B.B. King sat quietly in the American Bandstand dressing room, sipping a diet soda and staring at the words to a song ...

B.B. King (2002) [transcript]

Audio transcript of interview by Barney Hoskyns, Rock's Backpages transcripts, July 2002

This is a transcription of Barney's audio interview with B.B., conducted on a cold summer's evening in Liverpool. Listen to the audio of this interview. ...

The Rolling Stones, Ike & Tina Turner, B.B. King: Oakland Coliseum, Oakland CA

Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 10 November 1969

Rolling Stones End With an Uproar ...

Question & Answer with B.B. King, legendary guitarist

Interview by Roy Carr, New Musical Express, 19 June 1971

IT'S NOT every day of the week that one gets the rare opportunity of meeting a legend, let alone a childhood idol. For that is ...

B.B. King: A True Blues Christmas

Memoir by Bill Bentley, L.A. Weekly, 29 December 1983

HOW MANY memories can one man have? My own mind often feels like an overworked runway at LAX, with a million details buzz-bombing the brain, ...

The Men Who Make The Blues: B.B. King

Profile by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 4 January 1969

B.B. KING is among the most popular of the newer-generation blues-men; and he has certainly been the most influential. Charles Keil, who devotes a chapter ...

Rolling Stones, B.B. King, Terry Reid: Olympia Stadium, Detroit MI

Live Review by Mike Gormley, Detroit Free Press, 26 November 1969

Rock's Rolling Stones Invade Olympia Stadium ...

B.B. King: Lucille Talks Back (ABC ABCL 5149)

Review by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 20 December 1975

B.B. KING IS back on the lists with an album of his own production on which he plays sophisticated blues, near-blues and one religioso. ...

B.B. King: Indianola Mississippi Seeds (Probe SPBA6255)

Review by Jerry Gilbert, Sounds, 31 October 1970

HOW TIMES have changed. Gone is the harsh strident guitar of the early '50s which characterised the sound of B.B. and influenced many. Of course ...

The Rolling Stones...

Report by Wayne Robins, The Berkeley Barb, 14 November 1969

... at Oakland Coliseum, November 9, 1969. Featuring Ike & Tina Turner, B.B. King, Terry Reid, with a special appearance by Bill Graham. Written November ...

The Rolling Stones, B.B. King, the Ike & Tina Turner Soul Review: Forum, Los Angeles CA

Live Review by Ian Dove, Record Mirror, 15 November 1969

Youth Power at Stones show ...

B.B. King: Hammersmith Odeon, London

Live Review by Adam Sweeting, The Guardian, 17 October 1986

AFTER 30-ODD years in the trade, in which he's travelled millions of miles and used up lord knows how many sets of guitar strings, it's ...

B.B. King and Robert Cray: "Being a Blues Singer is Like Being Black Two Times"

Interview by Charles Shaar Murray, Q, November 1986

Ask the besuited patriarch or the bedenimed young turk. Charles Shaar Murray talks to B.B. King and Robert Cray. ...

B.B. King, 1925-2015

Obituary by Tony Russell, The Guardian, 15 May 2015

Self-deprecating but with a magisterial stage presence, King developed a style that was both innovative and rooted in blues history. ...

Vinyl Icon: B.B. King's Live at the Regal

Retrospective and Interview by Johnny Black, Hi-Fi News & Record Review, August 2015

ON NOVEMBER 21, 1964 Chicago's historic Regal Theater became the recording location for B.B. King's incendiary in-concert album Live at the Regal, which would not ...

Bobby Bland & B.B. King: Together Again... Live (Impulse IMPL-8027) ***

Review by Mick Brown, Sounds, 28 August 1976

BOBBY BLAND and B.B. King's last collaborative recording posed the question "When is a live album not a live album?" The answer is when it's ...

B.B. King, Robert Cray: Hammersmith Apollo, London

Live Review by Roger St. Pierre, Blues & Soul, 15 December 1992

KING BY name, King by nature — B.B. of that ilk was certainly well named. ...

The Making of B.B. King in London

Retrospective and Interview by Johnny Black, Blues, August 2015

AFTER FIFTEEN years as the undisputed King Of The Blues, B.B. King's career seemed to have sailed into some kind of doldrums when the '60s ...

Soul, Man: New York Johnny meets L.A. Jane for a Medium Massage

Report by Vernon Gibbs, Crawdaddy!, November 1974

L.A. IS A great big freeway they say, pay a hundred down and buy a car, if you don't you won't get very far. Tooling ...

B.B. King, New York Rock 'n' Roll Ensemble: Meadowbrook Theater, Oakland University, Rochester MI

Live Review by Mike Gormley, Detroit Free Press, 29 August 1969

B.B. IS the Blues King At Meadow Brook ...

Welcome, Bluesway Records

Interview by Jim Delehant, Hit Parader, May 1967

THERE AREN'T many new blues albums around, much less a label devoted to blues product. Why, you might ask, when the demand for blues is ...

Behind the B.B. King Box

Essay by John Broven, Blues & Rhythm, March 2001

The Ace Records 4-CD B.B. King box set The Vintage Years was released in June 2002. This is the story behind the production of this ...

B.B. King: Waterfront Hall, Belfast

Live Review by Colin Harper, The Irish Times, 24 September 1999

CAREFULLY-PACED is the byword for the B.B. King show these days: he's 73, a little frail and vocally not as powerful as he once was. ...

Eyewitness: The Black Woodstock — 22-23 September 1974

Retrospective and Interview by Johnny Black, Q, June 2000

As Muhammad Ali and George Foreman waited to go toe-to-toe in Zaire, Don King persuaded James Brown and BB King to headline a music festival. ...

B.B. King: B.B. Brings the Story of Lucille to the Rescue

Interview by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 3 May 1969

EVERYONE KNOWS — everyone, that is, who knows much about the blues of the younger generation — that B.B. King is among the most original ...

B.B. King, Fleetwood Mac, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Duster Bennett: Royal Albert Hall, London

Live Review by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 3 May 1969

B.B. KING SPELLS OUT THE BLUES ...

Talk to the Boss: His Majesty Mr. King

Interview by Wayne Robins, Blues Access, Spring 1999

THE BLUE Note may be the most upscale of expensive jazz and blues clubs in New York and a major stop on the itinerary of ...

B.B. King and Guests: Philharmonic Hall, New York NY

Live Review by Ian Dove, The New York Times, 1 July 1973

B.B. King's Blues Barn Creates Echoes of Past ...

Payin' Some Dues — Blues at Ann Arbor

Live Review by Miller Francis jr., The Great Speckled Bird, 18 August 1969

"I'd like for them to hear the real things. I don't think yet that most of the white people like my music because it's blues. I ...

Tempo: B.B. King (part 2)

Interview by Jim Delehant, Hit Parader, December 1967

ANYTHING YOU want to sell nowadays, all you've got to do is advertise. I think people are just beginning to advertise blues. Aretha Franklin, for ...

Tempo: B.B. King

Interview by Jim Delehant, Hit Parader, November 1967

B.B. King has been getting some attention lately; still not enough for a great master, but it's attention anyway. Charles Keil did a chapter on ...

Newport Jazz Festival 1969: New Records & Not All That Jazz

Live Review by Ian Dove, Billboard, 19 July 1969

NEWPORT, R.I. — On paper at least the experiment of adding rock music to the Newport Jazz Festival 1969 came from the purest of motives. ...

B.B. King and Freddie King: Kings Of The Blues

Interview by Richard Green, New Musical Express, 11 December 1971

Two bluesmen who have become living legends talk about their careers and the state of the blues today. And B.B. King and Freddie King both ...

King B Stings: B.B. King: Hammersmith Odeon, London

Live Review by Gavin Martin, New Musical Express, 5 May 1984

A GIANT of a man and a giant of the post-war blues boom, B.B. King is the figure most prominently placed to express the essential ...

Johnny Cash: The Junkie And The Juicehead Minus Me (CBS); B.B. King: Friends (ABC)

Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 23 November 1974

IN WHICH two culture heroes find themselves well and truly on the artistic skids. ...

Various Artists Sun Records: The Blues Years 1950 — 1956

Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 15 February 1986

"The blues is a chair, not a design for a chair, or a better chair… it is the first chair. It is a chair for ...

B.B. King: Bright Lights Big City

Report and Interview by Paul Trynka, MOJO, May 1998

Fifty years ago B.B. King arrived in Memphis, Tennessee, and found himself in the eye of a musical hurricane. Today he celebrates the giants who ...

B.B. King: 'I Owe My Popularity To The Beatles. They Started The People Towards Really Listening...'

Interview by Danny Holloway, New Musical Express, 13 November 1971

GUITARIST-SINGER B. B. King, at 45 the toast of many young musicians, arrives at London Airport next Friday (19) to appear in London and Bristol ...

B.B. King: Keepin' The Blues Alive

Interview by David Nathan, Blues & Soul, 7 September 1976

THE WORD "blues" has become almost synonymous with the word "king", be it Albert, Freddie or B.B. The blues as a musical form has existed ...

King Of The Road: On The Road With B.B. King In The Mid-1950s

Sleeve notes by John Broven, Ace Records, 2002

First published in the book accompanying the box set B.B. King: The Vintage Years (Ace Records), 2002. ...

B.B. King: Mississippi Homecoming

Report and Interview by Fred Schruers, Rolling Stone, 30 November 1989

RILEY B. KING, a son of the Mississippi Delta and by everyone's admission but his own the King of the Blues, stands by a two-lane ...

B.B. King: Background To A Living Legend

Interview by John Abbey, Blues & Soul, 25 June 1971

B.B. KING is the undisputed King of the Blues – fact! Every press release in existence on B.B. will tell you that he is a ...

Memphis Blues: Sun Rise

Overview by Colin Escott, Record Mirror, 13 November 1971

IN 1950 WHEN Sam Phillips gave up his job as band promoter for the Peabody Hotel in Memphis and opened the studio of the Memphis ...

B.B King: Reds and Blues

Interview by John Abbey, Blues & Soul, 31 July 1979

"I learnt the true meaning of freedom...But I also believe that music is the international denominator for bringing people together" ...

B.B. King: Hammersmith Odeon, London

Live Review by Max Bell, New Musical Express, 21 October 1978

IF ONLY B.B.King had let his fingers, and not his likeable but oversized ego, do the talking then I would have enjoyed his return to ...

B.B. King: The Fortunate Son

Retrospective by Colin Escott, Goldmine, 29 April 1994

B.B. KING'S misfortune is that we too often take him for granted. He has been there as long as most of us can remember, and ...

B.B. King: An Audience With The King

Interview by John Abbey, Blues & Soul, 14 November 1978

The King in question is Mr. B.B. King and in this exclusive interview he talks to John Abbey about the future of the blues as ...

B.B. King: Uneasy Lies The Head That Wears The Crown

Interview by Charles Shaar Murray, Q, February 1993

From the no-horse town of Ita Bena, Mississippi, to the planet's most prestigious culture palaces, Riley "Blues Boy" King has spent half a century as ...

Soul on Fire

Report by Philip Norman, The Sunday Times Magazine, 1972

STEVIE WONDER crosses the hotel lobby, resting on the elbows of two other people. That he is blind, has been blind from birth, is nonetheless ...

B B King: Hammersmith Odeon, London

Live Review by Phil Sutcliffe, Sounds, 19 April 1980

THE QUALITY of B. B. King is not strained, it droppeth as the gentle dew from heaven...and I only wish Bill Shakespeare (what a fine ...

B.B. King: King O' The Blues

Interview by David Nathan, Blues & Soul, 3 December 1971

PERHAPS MORE than any other single entertainer, B.B. King has contributed a good deal to "opening the doors" for the blues and for making it ...

Muddy Waters, BB King, Chuck Berry: Woke Up This Mornin'…

Report and Interview by Nick Kent, New Musical Express, 28 July 1979

...Blues Giants All Round My Bed. NICK KENT meets the Three Wise Men of the Blues. ...

BB King: The Las Vegas Tax Deductible Blues

Interview by Pete Wingfield, Melody Maker, 28 October 1978

PETE WINGFIELD played with B.B.King seven years ago, on one of the guitarist's less celebrated albums. They met up again last week – only this ...

B.B. King: Reflections

Review by Bill Wasserzieher, Blues Revue, August 2003

B.B. KING ALREADY had a career dating back 20 years - first playing to chitlin circuit audiences and then at the Fillmores and other psychedelic ...

B.B. King

Book Excerpt by John Tobler, Stuart Grundy, The Guitar Greats (BBC Books), 1983

IN CONSIDERING the dozens of potential candidates for this book, one essential ingredient was a representative of the blues/R&B heritage, for without the inspiration of ...

B.B. King: Love Me Tender (MCA)

Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 5 June 1982

"HE HAS one musical ambition as yet unfulfilled: to make a series of classic albums. These consist of one album with a big band, one ...

B.B. King: Hammersmith Odeon, London

Live Review by Adam Sweeting, Melody Maker, April 1980

A SLY old dog who knows all the tricks, B. B. King is capable of making you realise that the blues is rather more than ...

Talkin' Blues: John Lee Hooker/B.B. King/Bobby 'Blue' Bland

Retrospective and Interview by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 5 June 1982

THE BLUES speaks haltingly at first, haltingly and quietly in a darkened room. The curtains are drawn to shut out whatever passes for daylight during ...

B.B. King: Blues 'N' Jazz

Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 23 July 1983

A FEW years ago, B.B. King let it be known that there were three albums that he had always wanted to record: one album of ...

The Day B.B. King Went to Jail

Retrospective by James Maycock, The Independent, 11 September 1998

ON A SUBLIME autumn day in 1970, B.B. King performed for 2,117 prisoners in Cook County Jail. Against the sound of B.B. King's musicians ...

A Monarch on Merseyside: BB King

Profile and Interview by Barney Hoskyns, The Independent, 12 July 2002

"MY BAND tells me I’ve earned the right to siddown if I wanna," says the vast man with the twinkly eyes. "I wanna." ...

Will Success Spoil B.B. King?

Comment by Tony Russell, Cream, January 1972

ANY ARTIST who becomes noticeably successful soon has the more inquisitive, the harder-to-satisfy, of his followers asking ‘What’s he going to do now?’. Some sit ...

B.B. King: King Of The Blues

Profile by Tony Russell, The History of Rock, 1983

Riley King was born in Itta Bena, Mississippi, on 16 September 1925. For a young black boy growing up amid the poverty and racial segregation ...

B.B. King: There Must Be A Better World Somewhere

Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 1981

IN 1966, B.B. King put out a live album entitled Blues Is King, and – as far as the major U.S. labels are concerned – ...

How to buy B.B. King

Guide by Fred Dellar, MOJO, March 1998

HE’S FILED under ‘Blues’. Which is convenient. But Riley ‘Blues Boy’ King can be anything you want him to be — king of the juke ...

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