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Roy Buchanan
Leroy "Roy" Buchanan (September 23, 1939 – August 14, 1988) was an American guitarist and blues rock musician. A pioneer of the "Telecaster sound", Buchanan worked as a sideman and as a solo artist, with two gold albums early in his career and two later solo albums that made it to the Billboard chart. He never achieved stardom, but is considered a highly influential guitar player. Guitar Player praised him as having one of the "50 Greatest Tones of All Time". He appeared on the PBS music program Austin City Limits in 1977 (season 2).
Leroy Buchanan was born in Ozark, Arkansas, and was raised there and in Pixley, California, a farming area between Visalia and Bakersfield. His father was a sharecropper in Arkansas and a farm laborer in California. Buchanan told interviewers the fiction that his father was a fiddle-playing preacher, which was repeated in Guitar Player magazine but disputed by his older brother J.D. Buchanan told how his first musical memories were of racially mixed revival meetings he attended with his mother, Minnie. "Gospel," he recalled, "that's how I first got into black music". He in fact drew upon many disparate influences while learning to play the guitar (though he later claimed his aptitude derived from being "half-wolf"). He initially showed talent on steel guitar before switching to guitar in the early 1950s, and started his professional career at the age of 15, in Johnny Otis's rhythm and blues revue.
In 1958, Buchanan made his recording debut with Chicago's Chess Records at age 19, accompanying Dale Hawkins by playing the solo on "My Babe". Two years later, during a tour through Toronto, Buchanan left Dale Hawkins to play for Hawkins's cousin Ronnie Hawkins and tutor Ronnie's guitar player, Robbie Robertson. Buchanan plays bass on the Ronnie Hawkins single "Who Do You Love?". Buchanan soon returned to the United States, and members of the Ronnie Hawkins' group later gained fame as the roots rock group the Band. In the early 1960s, Buchanan often played as a sideman with various rock bands, and he played guitar in recording sessions with Freddy Cannon, Merle Kilgore, and others. At the end of the 1960s, with a growing family, Buchanan left the music industry to learn a trade and trained as a barber.
In 1961 he released "Mule Train Stomp", his first single for Swan, featuring rich guitar tones. Buchanan's 1962 recording with drummer Bobby Gregg, nicknamed "Potato Peeler," first introduced the trademark Buchanan "pinch" harmonic. An effort to cash in on the British Invasion caught Buchanan with the British Walkers. In the mid-1960s, Buchanan settled down in the Washington, D.C., area, playing for Danny Denver's band for many years while acquiring a reputation as "...one of the very finest rock guitarists around". The facts behind that claim are that in March 1968 a photographer friend, John Gossage gave Buchanan tickets to a concert by the Jimi Hendrix Experience at the Washington Hilton. "Buchanan was dismayed to find his own trademark sounds, like the wah-wah that he'd painstakingly produced with his hands and his Telecaster, created by electronic pedals. He could never attempt Hendrix's stage show, and this realization refocused him on his own quintessentially American roots-style guitar picking".
Gossage recalls how Buchanan was impressed by the Hendrix 1967 debut album Are You Experienced?, which was why he made sure to give Buchanan a ticket to the early show at the Hilton.[citation needed] Gossage went backstage to take photos and tried to convince Hendrix to go and see Buchanan at the Silver Dollar that night after the show, but Hendrix seemed more interested in hanging out with the young lady who was backstage with him.[citation needed] Hendrix never showed up at the Silver Dollar, but Gossage did talk to Buchanan about seeing the Hilton show.[citation needed] That same night (as the Hilton show) Buchanan played several Hendrix numbers and "from that point on, had nothing but good things to say about Hendrix". He later released recordings of the Hendrix composition "If 6 Was 9" and the Hendrix hit "Hey Joe". In the early 1970s he performed in the Washington, D.C.–Maryland–Virginia area with the Danny Denver Band, which had a following in the area. Buchanan was also popular as a solo act in the D.C. area at this time.[citation needed]
Buchanan's life changed in 1971, when he gained national notice as the result of an hour-long PBS television documentary. Entitled Introducing Roy Buchanan, and sometimes mistakenly called The Best Unknown Guitarist in the World, it earned Buchanan a recording contract with Polydor Records and praise from John Lennon and Merle Haggard, along with an alleged invitation to join the Rolling Stones (which he turned down and which gave him the nickname "the man who turned the Stones down"). He may have turned the Stones down for two reasons. He may have feared abusing drugs and alcohol more if he joined them, and dying, like Brian Jones. And he may have felt that his own career as he was then pursuing it had promising directions that he could not follow as well if he joined the Stones. In 1977, he appeared on the PBS music program Austin City Limits during Season 2. He recorded five albums for Polydor, one of which, Second Album, went gold, and after that another three for Atlantic Records, one of which, 1977's Loading Zone, also went gold. Buchanan quit recording in 1981, vowing never to enter a studio again unless he could record his own music his own way. Four years later, Alligator Records coaxed Buchanan back into the studio.
His first album for Alligator, When a Guitar Plays the Blues, was released in early 1985. It was the first time he had total artistic freedom in the studio. His second Alligator LP, Dancing on the Edge (with vocals on three tracks by Delbert McClinton), was released in late 1986. He released the 12th and last album of his career, Hot Wires, in 1987.[citation needed] Buchanan's last show was on August 7, 1988, at Guilford Fairgrounds in Guilford, Connecticut.
According to his agent and others, Buchanan was doing well, having gained control of his drinking habit and playing again, when he was arrested for public intoxication after a domestic dispute. He was found hanged from his own shirt in a jail cell on August 14, 1988, in the Fairfax County, Virginia, Jail. According to Thomas Hartman, who was in a cell near Buchanan's, the deputy sheriff opened the door early in the morning and found Buchanan with the shirt around his neck. His cause of death was officially recorded as suicide, a finding disputed by Buchanan's friends and family. One of his friends, Marc Fisher, reported seeing Buchanan's body with bruises on the head.
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Roy Buchanan
Leroy "Roy" Buchanan (September 23, 1939 – August 14, 1988) was an American guitarist and blues rock musician. A pioneer of the "Telecaster sound", Buchanan worked as a sideman and as a solo artist, with two gold albums early in his career and two later solo albums that made it to the Billboard chart. He never achieved stardom, but is considered a highly influential guitar player. Guitar Player praised him as having one of the "50 Greatest Tones of All Time". He appeared on the PBS music program Austin City Limits in 1977 (season 2).
Leroy Buchanan was born in Ozark, Arkansas, and was raised there and in Pixley, California, a farming area between Visalia and Bakersfield. His father was a sharecropper in Arkansas and a farm laborer in California. Buchanan told interviewers the fiction that his father was a fiddle-playing preacher, which was repeated in Guitar Player magazine but disputed by his older brother J.D. Buchanan told how his first musical memories were of racially mixed revival meetings he attended with his mother, Minnie. "Gospel," he recalled, "that's how I first got into black music". He in fact drew upon many disparate influences while learning to play the guitar (though he later claimed his aptitude derived from being "half-wolf"). He initially showed talent on steel guitar before switching to guitar in the early 1950s, and started his professional career at the age of 15, in Johnny Otis's rhythm and blues revue.
In 1958, Buchanan made his recording debut with Chicago's Chess Records at age 19, accompanying Dale Hawkins by playing the solo on "My Babe". Two years later, during a tour through Toronto, Buchanan left Dale Hawkins to play for Hawkins's cousin Ronnie Hawkins and tutor Ronnie's guitar player, Robbie Robertson. Buchanan plays bass on the Ronnie Hawkins single "Who Do You Love?". Buchanan soon returned to the United States, and members of the Ronnie Hawkins' group later gained fame as the roots rock group the Band. In the early 1960s, Buchanan often played as a sideman with various rock bands, and he played guitar in recording sessions with Freddy Cannon, Merle Kilgore, and others. At the end of the 1960s, with a growing family, Buchanan left the music industry to learn a trade and trained as a barber.
In 1961 he released "Mule Train Stomp", his first single for Swan, featuring rich guitar tones. Buchanan's 1962 recording with drummer Bobby Gregg, nicknamed "Potato Peeler," first introduced the trademark Buchanan "pinch" harmonic. An effort to cash in on the British Invasion caught Buchanan with the British Walkers. In the mid-1960s, Buchanan settled down in the Washington, D.C., area, playing for Danny Denver's band for many years while acquiring a reputation as "...one of the very finest rock guitarists around". The facts behind that claim are that in March 1968 a photographer friend, John Gossage gave Buchanan tickets to a concert by the Jimi Hendrix Experience at the Washington Hilton. "Buchanan was dismayed to find his own trademark sounds, like the wah-wah that he'd painstakingly produced with his hands and his Telecaster, created by electronic pedals. He could never attempt Hendrix's stage show, and this realization refocused him on his own quintessentially American roots-style guitar picking".
Gossage recalls how Buchanan was impressed by the Hendrix 1967 debut album Are You Experienced?, which was why he made sure to give Buchanan a ticket to the early show at the Hilton.[citation needed] Gossage went backstage to take photos and tried to convince Hendrix to go and see Buchanan at the Silver Dollar that night after the show, but Hendrix seemed more interested in hanging out with the young lady who was backstage with him.[citation needed] Hendrix never showed up at the Silver Dollar, but Gossage did talk to Buchanan about seeing the Hilton show.[citation needed] That same night (as the Hilton show) Buchanan played several Hendrix numbers and "from that point on, had nothing but good things to say about Hendrix". He later released recordings of the Hendrix composition "If 6 Was 9" and the Hendrix hit "Hey Joe". In the early 1970s he performed in the Washington, D.C.–Maryland–Virginia area with the Danny Denver Band, which had a following in the area. Buchanan was also popular as a solo act in the D.C. area at this time.[citation needed]
Buchanan's life changed in 1971, when he gained national notice as the result of an hour-long PBS television documentary. Entitled Introducing Roy Buchanan, and sometimes mistakenly called The Best Unknown Guitarist in the World, it earned Buchanan a recording contract with Polydor Records and praise from John Lennon and Merle Haggard, along with an alleged invitation to join the Rolling Stones (which he turned down and which gave him the nickname "the man who turned the Stones down"). He may have turned the Stones down for two reasons. He may have feared abusing drugs and alcohol more if he joined them, and dying, like Brian Jones. And he may have felt that his own career as he was then pursuing it had promising directions that he could not follow as well if he joined the Stones. In 1977, he appeared on the PBS music program Austin City Limits during Season 2. He recorded five albums for Polydor, one of which, Second Album, went gold, and after that another three for Atlantic Records, one of which, 1977's Loading Zone, also went gold. Buchanan quit recording in 1981, vowing never to enter a studio again unless he could record his own music his own way. Four years later, Alligator Records coaxed Buchanan back into the studio.
His first album for Alligator, When a Guitar Plays the Blues, was released in early 1985. It was the first time he had total artistic freedom in the studio. His second Alligator LP, Dancing on the Edge (with vocals on three tracks by Delbert McClinton), was released in late 1986. He released the 12th and last album of his career, Hot Wires, in 1987.[citation needed] Buchanan's last show was on August 7, 1988, at Guilford Fairgrounds in Guilford, Connecticut.
According to his agent and others, Buchanan was doing well, having gained control of his drinking habit and playing again, when he was arrested for public intoxication after a domestic dispute. He was found hanged from his own shirt in a jail cell on August 14, 1988, in the Fairfax County, Virginia, Jail. According to Thomas Hartman, who was in a cell near Buchanan's, the deputy sheriff opened the door early in the morning and found Buchanan with the shirt around his neck. His cause of death was officially recorded as suicide, a finding disputed by Buchanan's friends and family. One of his friends, Marc Fisher, reported seeing Buchanan's body with bruises on the head.
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