Electric Blues Rock
Electric Blues Rock guitarist, Dave Munkhoff, plays his blues mixed with some Funk and a little Jazz. He started playing guitar in 1964 for the same reason millions of other young kids and teenagers started... “The British Invasion”. Seeing the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show playing live and not lip syncing their music was a real life changing experience for Dave. This was the first time he had ever been able to connect the music he was hearing with what the musicians were doing with their fingers. All of a sudden, it all made sense and he realized that, yes, he could do that. |
Up until that point, American kids had gotten their Rock & Roll from either Ricky Nelson faking it on the Ozzie and Harriet Show or some bad actor holding a guitar in a surf movie. By the summer of ’64 Dave had been playing guitar for a couple of months and was on a quest to learn the history of Rock guitar. His older cousin, Peggy, gave him her old record player and a hundred or so Rock & Roll 45’s. This record collection included several Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly singles. That summer while the neighbor kids were out playing ball Dave was down in his basement wearing out his Chuck Berry records.
When Dave would go out to buy the latest Beatles or Rolling Stones record, he would always check out the bargain bins. He was now in love with fifties Rock & Roll / Rockabilly and was always on a constant lookout to discover new oldies. One of these trips to the bargain bin led him to a new guy (at least he was new to Dave) with a really cool name. Dave figured with a name like Lightnin’ Hopkins this guy has to be a real rocker.
When he got home and played that record for the first time he didn’t know what to make of it. After listening for a minute or less he decided this was not Rock & Roll then took it off the turntable. The next day after school he listened to it again, trying to understand what he was hearing. Once again, he decided this was not music for young white kids and put it back in his pile of 45’s. Each day he found himself drawn to this strange sounding record listening to a little more each time. Pretty soon he realized this music was very cool and not so far removed from Chuck Berry and early Buddy Holly as he first thought. Young Dave, while still only 12 or 13 years old, had accidentally discovered the real blues.