Blue Wednesday: My Blue Roots

Week Two

Nov 22, 2023

Before we get started, I’d like to wish my readers in the U.S. a happy Thanksgiving! Three words of advice: use tomorrow to pray, don’t talk to your family about politics and don’t be a glutton. 1) Take this day of thanks seriously and praise God for his provision. 2) Seriously, don’t bring up politics. Even if you and your family agree on all that, just let it be. There are so many more things to be talked about and politics is one sure fire way to damper the spirit of Thanksgiving. 3) Do not overeat. It’s not good for you or those around you. Do not believe the lie that you must gorge yourself simply because there’s excess food around.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming…

Happy Blue Wednesday

Welcome back for another edition of Blue Wednesday. First something new: I made a Blue Wednesday logo and Blue Wednesday now has its own section on Seeking The Narrow instead of me just using tags. With as much traction as we’ve seen, Blue Wednesday deserved a more permanent place on my Substack. Check out the logo below!

Last week’s post generated a few new subscriptions and for that, I’m extremely grateful. For those who are new, Blue Wednesday works like this: I share one of my favorite songs of the blues genre and ask my readers and all of the Substack community to share their favorite blues tracks with me.

Last week Blue Wednesday saw the most participation of any week so far. We added 10 songs to the ever-expanding Blue Wednesday playlist on Spotify.

S.E. Reid

jumped into the fray, sharing the beautiful song “Beulah Land” by Mississippi John Hurt. Another reader, Esteban, shared the blues classic “Smokestack Lightning,” by Howlin’ Wolf. And

Shannon Aaron Stephens

shared his experience watching Buddy Guy on Mountain Stage which led to my discovery of Guy’s song “Done Got Old.”

Oh… and I made an updated cover for the Blue Wednesday playlist too!

I’m truly grateful for every like, comment and restack so far. You, reader, have made this a day I look forward to each week.

Something I found

Before we get to the music this week, I have a picture to share. Here is your proof that I was in a band!

This grainy photo was taken on a primitive camera phone somewhere between 2008 and 2009.

Daniel Joseph Petty

can be spotted playing the guitar in the green shirt with the white/striped beanie while I am the furthest back behind the drum set. What you see is the band known as Southwind during band practice. Fun fact; our band was named after the brand of the immobile RV we practiced in which looked a lot like this:

This Week

This week, as indicated by the title of this post, I will again reach back into time and share the music that spurred my love for the blues in the first place. I will again share two songs. First up is “Voodoo Child” by the blues behemoth Jimi Hendrix.

When you’re learning to play music, particularly of the rock/ blues genre, there is absolutely no way around Hendrix. As a musician, understanding your music history is critical. And in the realm of rock and blues, Jimi Hendrix’s brief but profound career is a keystone moment. His unearthly ability to fuse blues and rock with psychedelic lyrics and explosive showmanship changed the face of blues/rock music forever. “Voodoo Child” is a prime example of his unique craftsmanship. The repetitive lyrics are as blue as blues gets, and the guitar playing is so blistering that it burns off everything everyone thinks they know about the blues. I’ll never forget the confidence I felt once our band was sure enough about ourselves to play this song in front of people. As a drummer, this song made me feel unstoppable.

Next up, I want to address a major issue with the Blue Wednesday playlist. Until now, this playlist has not featured blues legend, Eric Clapton. So this week I’ll be adding “Cocaine” which, as best I can recall, is the first Clapton song I paid any attention to. As was the sentiment last week, “Cocaine” was one of the first songs my brother and I learned how to play as we started our band. Our bass player’s dad taught it to us and played it with us over and over again as we learned how to get in sync with each other’s playing. A few years ago I was gifted Slowhand, the album featuring “Cocaine,” and from the very first note I was taken back to that special time. Praise God for music and its ability to transcend time and space.

A note on the playlist

Until this point, I’ve added every song that has been shared with me by those participating in Blue Wednesday. I still have every intention of adding *most songs but will be a bit more discerning from here on out. Last week I added a song which, if we’re all being honest with ourselves, is not a blues song. But I added it in the spirit to treat all participants equally as I have thus far. It has been removed.

Now, I agree that the boundaries of blues can be loose and that the spirit of blues can and does cross multiple genres but all earthly things have limits. And if everything is the blues then nothing is. An illustration; you can’t join a basket weaving group — start building chairs while with the group — and still call yourself a basket weaver. So, if I determine that a song is not actually anywhere close to being a blues song it will be left off the playlist. No announcements or comments will indicate what is left off. I’m not going to make it a huge deal, but I will reserve the right to leave out what is not of the blues genre.

Here’s the updated playlist!

What have you got?

Here’s where I ask you to share some of your favorite blues songs with me. Let’s grow the Blue Wednesday playlist together! So, what have you got?

Thank you all for reading and supporting Blue Wednesday with your likes, shares and comments. I truly appreciate each and every one of my subscribers. May God keep your coffee black and your music blue.

For those of you who have faithfully read all the way through, here is another little gift to you. Blue Wednesday now exists also as a YouTube playlist! Here is your link:

Blue Wednesday on YouTube

I know some of you will benefit more from YouTube rather than Spotify so I wanted to show you you are appreciated. I’ll do my best to keep this playlist as up-to-date as the Spotify list. Enjoy!