I have only heard Bill play one blues song but I suspect he must have cut his teeth with Cream and other English bands that were blues inspired. Jazz is close to blues so you'd think there'd be some overlap even with that. So I'm wondering if Bill would do some blues songs? Maybe he has nothing to say that is particularly bluesy? Maybe he doesn't like the genre? Maybe he hates those over rated blues musicians back then and still does today? So I don't know if there will be something bluesy coming out as there were experiments with country music on Noise Candy. With Noise Candy there was that slide guitar sound Bill got that was part of the ZOOM FX rack, and maybe Bill will find a blues guitar sound that will inspire him.
On the previous guitar thread, one thing I find curious is that there are no pictures of any 12 string guitars. If I think of BBD's "Lovers Are Mortal" or "Islands of the Dead" I can swear I hear a 12 string guitar. Maybe not -- maybe it was just overlapping guitar tracks.
Lastly, bands like Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Jethro Tull started out as blues bands but changed course. Some great guitarist began with the blues and then, as they became more mature, they also became experimental. I think of Jimmy Page starting with blues and then got into rock, folk, Middle Eastern music, etc. But Jimmy never really left his blues roots. I think Bill has bluesy roots too, so maybe he'll get into the blues.
I don't doubt what you say, like I said I think he cut his teeth on Cream. I once thought there was a distinctive Clapton feel to some of his licks, especially the opening song in Live in the Air Age. And listening and imitating these English guitar players is a great way to learn. That's how I did it and there were distinct challenges to doing it that way. For example, growing up before the internet, I had a friend (Paul Bauer) who was able to play "Going Home" by Alvin Lee's Ten Years After at Woodstock from figuring out the notes by slowing down a reel to reel tape recording. He use to torment me with playing that song because he played it at the fast speed Alvin played it at. I could have shrunk from the challenge or faced up to it. I didn't especially like the song so I was not motivated by love (the carrot) but motivated by fear (the stick) -- fear that I appear inferior to my guitar friends. So I learned the damn song and then went beyond and played it faster than my friend Paul. And there are other songs you try to figure your way through -- until you learn that the notes you are playing are from a scale. Figuring out Clapton's "Hide Away" was like that for me. I slowly learned that the right notes formed a pattern that was a scale. Me sitting in front of the record player playing that song over and over drove my mother nuts -- she thought I was crazy! So you figure out the blues scale from imitating and that made life easier. Though, like "Going Home," there were certain songs that didn't exactly conform to the blues scale and were very fast. Zeppelin's "Heartbreaker" solo is like that. I eventually conquered that. Actually, I recently did Zeppelin's "Dancing Days" and incorporated that insane solo from "Heartbreaker" into the middle of the song.
And there were Bill Nelson/BBD songs that I learned by ear, until I finally figured out that what he was playing was a mode. I painstakingly figure a lot of "Live in the Air Age" and give him credit for very tasty and fast solos. "Adventures In A Yorkshire Landscape" and "Mill Street Junction" particularly come to mind. "Sister Seagull" is nice but there is something not up front with that song -- whether it is a volume thing or what it is, it sits back. So, as with a lot of things, we learn through imitation and I'm sure Bill has listen to, digested and figured out a lot of music, including the English blues musicians.
Au contraire- Bill has a long and fertile association with the blues , British and otherwise...... Peter Greens Fleetwood Mac, Mayall, Cream, a bit of Chicken Shack in the record collection as I recall, among many others I'm sure. Its all in the musical stew!
"On the previous guitar thread, one thing I find curious is that there are no pictures of any 12 string guitars. If I think of BBD's "Lovers Are Mortal" or "Islands of the Dead" I can swear I hear a 12 string guitar. Maybe not -- maybe it was just overlapping guitar tracks."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4gWlBusj5g
Yep, definitely an Ovation 12 string
There's a better video (cleaned up) on the "Be Bop Deluxe at the BBC 1974-1978"
compilation.
Have a look at the Wonderful World of Guitars thread, and that will tell you who and what were the main influences on Bill.
I'm sure he'd say that of course he has some blues in the mix too, but maybe Hendrix-style rather than the more straightforward stuff.
And didn't Bill once do "Need Your Love So Bad" at an Nelsonica?