Scott Holt: Press

It was Cinco de Mayo at the Dough. Holt had a packed house in February. This time around, he had been noted as a must-see in the paper for both nights he was appearing in the Charleston area. He strode onstage to start the show, breaking into “I Ain’t Gonna Cut You Loose.” Holt may be a Tennessean, but his blues sound Southwestern. Holt also covers blues classics with unique style.

It took a few lines to recognize Elvis Presley’s “One Night With You” which then segued into Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On.” Holt joked, “it’s my wife’s favorite song, and it’s not mine! We are going to have a talk.”

Holt exudes great charisma with his burgeoning crowd as well as with his bandmates. When strings popped, he played “keep away” as the stagehand tried to swap out guitars. He quipped between songs. Later, he leaped offstage and handed his guitar to strangers to play lead. All while the band kept playing. In this scenario, several shows ago, Holt first met Sarah Cole. He handed the 13-year-old the guitar in jest, she then wowed bystanders by skillfully playing it.

This night, Holt once again offered his guitar to his young fan. As she played, she revealed natural talent. Her eyes fixed intently on her fretboard, listening and aptly playing along. A smile crept onto her face when the audience responded appreciatively. Holt knows it’s important to nurture young talent; he was the student once. Hendrix inspired him to play, but a teacher encouraged listening to the work of bluesmen. As a teen, Holt was invited onstage with Buddy Guy. Years later, he joined Guy’s band, playing with them for a decade. Without these experiences, Holt says “I would not be a performer today.” Giving back comes with the territory.

In their live show, Scott Holt Band proves that blues playing is both craft and religion. Through years of exposure to different styles and playing backup for music legends, you eventually find your voice.

On the first trip through any new blues album, particularly by an artist I’m hearing for the first time, I love to discover what surfaces first: a great voice, original and meaningful lyrics, or mastery of an instrument. I like to skip the liner notes, bypass the biography and just soak up what’s coming out of the speakers. In Revelator, it was the guitar that got me first; was that Clapton, Jeff Beck and Hendrix that Scott Holt was channeling? And damned well at that!
Then the printed matter cleared it all up. Buddy Guy, who fed the heads and fingers of a dozen “A” list guitarists, was Holt’s guru, too, and the licks that bubble as well as explode to the surface in Revelator’s 15 cuts are both equally reminiscent of chops you’ve known for 30 years as well as original, fresh and - dare it be said? – Amazing. “Price I Pay” gathers the old and serves it new. “Sunday”, the opener that’s reprised near the end of the CD, conjures a little gospel/revival feel, particularly with the help of backup singers Melinda Doolittle and Janet Kenyon (wife of bass man/keyboards/co-writer Keith). They also bring depth to “’Bout To Make Me Leave Home” and “I Know A Little”. “Another Rainy Day” and “Shorty” begin with unadorned straight acoustic testimony and become much richer with the additional voices and Greg Shumake’s piano.
Holt’s virtuosity doesn’t stop with his skills on the guitar. The end of a romance is arguably the single most used and abused theme in blues music, and a new take on it is as rare as a Picasso in a trailer park. “Civil War” is a lyrical standout and verifies Holt’s solid credentials as a songwriter, employing new metaphor just when you thought the well was dry.
Mr. Holt, if you are reading this, I have one serious criticism and emphatic suggestion: lose the drum machine. If the essence of all great blues music is the heart and soul the musicians bring to a song, there’s nothing that can kill it faster than a tinny, techno pop drum line generated by computer chips instead of a flesh and blood stickman who can either lead or follow you around all the corners. Bring back the hot hands of your earlier albums and concerts and leave the electronics to Kylie Minouge.
If Revelator is your first Scott Holt experience, as it was for me, you’ll be faced with the same task I’ve given myself; go find his first four CDs and trace his evolution from rock, through blues, to the unique fusion that Revelator brings to the table.

When talking about what it feels like to play music for a living, singer-guitarist Scott Holt quotes another guitarist:
"Carlos Santana said, 'When you hit that first note, you forget about the rent.' Unfortunately, there's some sick part of me that just loves this so much, I would probably still be doing this if I didn't make any money."
Maybe it's unfortunate if Holt had high financial aspirations (he doesn't), but it's lucky for music fans. For a decade, Holt backed up blues guitar legend Buddy Guy, and in 1999, he struck out on his own. For the past year, he's been touring to promote his fourth solo album, "The Revelator."
Off the road for the holidays, Holt laughs easily and often in a call from his Columbia, Tenn., home, which he shares with his wife, Buffy, and their daughter, Olivia. While he's known for the blues, it's obvious both from his music and in conversation that he's no genre snob.
He's enthusiastic talking about acts from Prince ("He had a huge influence on me"), Parliament/Funkadelic ("Now, that's my jam band") and the Sex Pistols ("A friend just really introduced me to punk last year") to Jet and Wolfmother ("They're just good rock 'n' roll bands").
Holt took up the guitar in earnest at the age of 19 after hearing his first Jimi Hendrix album. Four years later, he joined up with Guy (one of Hendrix's influences) and backed up the guitar great for a decade.
"Everything I know about leading a band I learned from Buddy," says Holt. "He was like another father to me. I can remember my dad telling me how to do things, and I'd think, 'Oh, man, why does he do it this way? There's an easier way!' Later I learned he was right. Same with Buddy. Now I know why he did things the way he did."
Holt joined Guy in 1989. Although Guy was a legend in blues circles, his career didn't really take off until the 1990s. When Holt started with Guy, the band was playing clubs and touring in a small van. In a few years, the group was playing several-thousand-seat clubs and touring in a nice bus, and Holt's salary had tripled.
He watched how Guy handled a wide range of audiences.
"Buddy could win over any group of people," says Holt. "It was amazing."
While with Guy, Holt shared the stage with Eric Clapton, Carlos Santana, Albert Collins and other greats.
When Holt decided to strike out on his own, he thought the transition would be smooth.
"It wasn't," he says with a chuckle. "I was saying, 'I played with Buddy Guy!' And everybody was like, 'Well, who cares? Send a package and we'll think about it.'" Holt laughs. "My last year with Buddy, I think we did 200 shows . My first year on my own, I think I did 40."
Holt is now playing 200 dates per year with his own band and hopes to increase the number.
Audiences, he says, are looking for something with more soul than commercial music seems to be offering.
"It's like eating nothing but Twinkies," says Holt. "You can eat that junk so long, but eventually your body says, 'I'm sick of this!'"
It was no different, he says, back when he went looking for something deeper when he was young and found Hendrix and other greats.
"You know, I needed something, and I couldn't get it from Flock of Seagulls!"
Holt believes that real music survives all the cultural trends and changes in technology.
"Now you can go in the studio and hit one note, manipulate it and come out sounding like a genius, but there's no soul in that," says Holt. "Back in the '80s, you had all these shredders like Yngwie Malmsteen, and he was great, but his songs were boring. In the end, the song is everything."
As far as technology, Holt is just glad that it's made things a little easier for a touring musician and music fan.
"Before, I'd have to take all these CDs with me on tour," says Holt. "Now I'll take a hard drive along and my iPod, so I can take my whole (music) collection with me. That way if I wake up at 3 a.m. needing to hear some Blind Willie McTell song, which has happened, I can do it."

SCOTT HOLT was 20 years old
and had been playing second
guitar to blues legend Buddy
Guy for two years when Carlos
Santana approached the young
performer backstage at Slim’s in
San Francisco. "He came down
and shook Buddy’s hand and said
hi to him because they’ve known
each other forever," remembers
Holt, "and I was just excited to
be meeting him. He looked at me
and said, “you know, you’re in
college now. This is the
university.” I said, “Yeah, I
know.” And he was exactly right
because I took a 10 year course
in Bluesman 101."
When Scott first met Buddy
Guy, Holt was 18 years old, had
been playing guitar for 6 months
and had never been in a
nightclub or even seen a
bluesman live. Three hours later,
he was taking guitar lessons with
the master and within months
was on the road with Guy for a
10-year stint, making him the
longest playing band member in
Guy’s 45-year musical career.
Add to that resume a new Scott
Holt solo album, "Dark of the
Night", that features not only
Scott’s own band and Buddy
Guy, but both the original Jimi
Hendrix experience and Stevie
Ray Vaughan’s Double Trouble
produced by Eddie Kramer of
Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin
fame.
The cherry on this cake is that
the bass player performing with
Scott Holt for his area solo debut
at Club 155 on Wednesday,
March 15, is Leo Lyons,
founding member of the
legendary British blues-rock
band Ten Years After. At 30,
Scott Holt has to be the most
tutored and experienced blues
guitarist of his age in the history
of the genre. He has not just
walked among kings; he’s played
and studied with them.
I got to see first hand Eric
Clapton walking into a dressing
room and sitting down and being
attentive to Buddy Guy and
being respectful of Buddy in the
same way that I was," Holt
explains. "By the same token, I
got to see both sides of the coin
when i would see Buddy Guy go
in BB King’s dressing room and
act the same way. And you
understand it’s almost like an
inspirational food chain. I mean,
BB inspired Buddy, Buddy
inspired Eric, and Eric inspires
me. And maybe someday I’ll
inspire someone else. All
students defer to the masters.
It was Scott’s late dad who
invited his 18-year-old son to
Florida and arranged the meeting
with Buddy Guy. Scott calls his
dad "a mover and a shaker".
After inviting his son to a club
show near Disney world in 1986,
Dad called Chicago, tracked
down Buddy’s address and
phone number, called him and
arranged the meeting. To say
that night was magic, doesn’t do
justice to the story. "I had never
been in a club before. You gotta
remember I was 18 years old,"
explains Scott. "I’d never seen
live blues played, only been to a
handful of concerts in my life,
and they were all like big rock
concerts. I’d never been to
anything like this, and
everything I’d ever seen on
television or anything I’d ever
been exposed to in my life (was
like) the band came out, played
their songs, maybe said 3 words
to the audience and left. Buddy
Guy came roaring out! I mean
the guitar was louder than
anything I’d ever heard in my
life. Thirty minutes into the
show, he’s off the stage, around
the bar, and out the door, in the
middle of the street. That’s the
first thing he ever said to me:
"Hold the door for me."
"And he goes out in the street,
and he’s playing, and he comes
back in. He sets at the bar. He’s
drinkin’ and playing at the same
time. It was just blowing my
mind, and it wasn’t like he was
just doing tricks or making
noise, the guy was PLAYIN’ and
doing all that at the same time. It
was seeing Buddy at a point in
his career and a point in his life
that he didn’t have the tour bus,
and he didn’t have all that
extraneous stuff that comes with
the fame and the success, and
there was that hunger. I mean he
was playing like his life
depended on it, and that’s the
time to see Buddy Guy. That’s
when all those cylinders are
firing at the same time, and you
really see the true power of the
blues. It’s a scary thing."