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Pop Rock Nation

Tag: blues

  • I’ve just discovered Joanna Connor!

    I’ve just discovered Joanna Connor!

    Sometimes Facebook is good for things other than drama! Thanks to Facebook, I’ve just discovered Joanna Connor!

    If you’re like me, the name Joanna Connor may not mean much the first time you hear it. And actually, the first time I heard this legendary rock-blues woman play, she wasn’t immediately identified by name. Someone posted a video of her playing a wicked guitar solo at a blues festival with the caption “She might not look like the typical rock star but GOOD LORD can this lady shred!”


    I watched this and my mouth dropped open in astonishment…

    Being a woman in my 40s who is musical and not very fit, I immediately admired Joanna Connor for just being confident, talented, and freakin’ awesome! It’s clearly all about the music and she appears to LOVE what she does. I’ve seen some really great musicians play live who look like they’d checked out of the performance and were playing by rote. Not Joanna Connor. That woman really does “shred”.

    I had to find out more about Connor, so I visited her official Web site. I was surprised to find it very simple and uncomplicated. I would expect someone who plays like Joanna Conner to have a beautiful site extolling her tremendous gifts. But no… her Web site is very down to earth. And having watched a few more of her videos, it looks like she’s down to earth, too. I find that as refreshing as her virtuoso guitar playing is.


    Can you imagine being in someone’s backyard listening to this? According to the uploader, the neighbor turned on the sprinklers. What a buzz kill!

    Joanna Connor is a native of Worcester, Massachusetts, but in October 1985 moved to Chicago to play blues. Not only does she play a killer blues guitar infused with rock and roll, she is also quite the singer.


    Here she is singing “Little Wing” last year at a club in Chicago.

    She’s also appeared with some pretty legendary rock and blues stars like Jimmy Page, ZZ Top, Etta James, Joe Cocker, and Susan Tedeschi, among many others. I can tell she can hold her own with any of those people. She’s definitely in their league.


    A little acoustic guitar magic from Joanna Connor.

    Now, at this point, I don’t own any music by Joanna Connor, but I may have to remedy that issue very soon. She’s an artist who’s been around for a long time and I’m just now getting to know her. So many thanks to the random Facebook friend who shared the video that introduced me to Joanna Connor and her awesome band. This makes me want to go to Chicago and hang out in a blues club!

  • Eminem the Bogeyman

    In my email this morning was an ad targeting parents of children much younger than my college and high school kids.  Take a look:

    This is an out-of-touch marketer. If the goal to strive for alteration and invoke another E name overrides common sense marketing and being topical, then I guess they hit their goal.  But Eminem as the bogeyman?  Go ahead, click the image and make it big so you can see it.

    I don’t want that kid listening to Em except maybe a clean version of Mockingbird.  But I’m not so sure I want her listening to Elmo either.   There’s a middle ground, and my hackles raise up when I see music being used to scare parents.   Look, this happened with blues, with jazz, with doo-wop, with pop and Lord knows, it happened with rock.

    But isn’t it time to say, “I don’t need that little cutie to be a real emo kid and start cutting herself, but you’re not going to scare my family.   She’s listening to Louis Armstrong, early Bach and a mix of the more melodic McCartney tunes.  She’s quite fine, thank you.”  For her seventh birthday, we’re buying her the new Common release.

    Maybe I’m  overreacting, but this ad ticks me off.