Long-haired country music icon, marijuana aficionado, and great musician/songwriter Willie Nelson turns 80 tomorrow, April 30.

Ball of Confusion, by The Temptations.

Courtroom Blues, by Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell.

Night of the Guitars, with the late, great Alvin Lee.

silencethepoet:

Ten Years After - 50,000 Miles Beneath My Brain

Can you love me with a thousand eyes?
Can you see right through my bones?
Can you kiss me with a thousand lips?
Can you melt a solid stone?
Can you hear me from a thousand miles
When you’re screaming at the stars?
Can you pull me up to Jupiter
When I’m all hung up on Mars?

rocknrolldoctor:

Ten Years After - As The Sun Still Burns Away

Album - Cricklewood Green

RIP Alvin, you were one of the greats!

Starvation Farm Blues, by Bob Campbell (1934).

Kindhearted Woman Blues, by Robert Johnson (1937). This is the clearest example of a “guitar solo” in any of the bluesmaster Robert Johnson’s 29 recorded efforts.

I Woke Up This Morning, by Ten Years After (Ssssh, 1969). This song, a relatively modern take on an old blues theme, perhaps as much as any other, made me an Alvin Lee fan many years ago. It holds up pretty well, don’t you think?

Struggle Buggy, by Buddy Moss (1941). Featuring the great Brownie McGhee on second guitar, with Oh Red (George Washington) and Robert Young on washboards.

Jack of Diamonds/Georgia Rub, by Henry Townsend (1931). Townsend, a major figure in St. Louis blues, died in Wisconsin in 2006, at the age of 96.

Obama Urged to Resign Over Beyonce Scandal : The New Yorker

Old Black Joe, by Johnny Hoy and the Bluefish. A rockin’ “public domain” track with some tasty piano blues.

Still I’m Traveling On, by The Mississippi Sheiks.

Dear Abby, by John Prine (live, 1973). Pauline Phillips, otherwise known as Dear Abby, passed away Wednesday in Minneapolis at the age of 94. Mr. Prine, 66, is alive and well in Nashville.