On Practicing Guitar

Wilson Pickett, Cornell Dupree and Jimi Hendrix rock the house.

R&B titan Wilson Pickett really knew guitar players. Just two of the hot shots that he employed in the 1960s include Duane Allman and Jimi Hendrix. Didn’t they come out number one and number two on a Rolling Stone Greatest Guitarists list awhile back? Well, like I said, Pickett could pick ‘em. He also worked with Steve Cropper, one of the masterminds of the Stax sound, and even wrote songs with him, such as “In The Midnight Hour.” But who is playing the scalding, driving, greasy guitar on his first big hit, “It’s Too Late,” from 1963?   

Jimi and Duane weren’t actively recording at that time. The famous picture of Jimi and Pickett also includes Cornell Dupree, who backed Sam Cooke on his incendiary Live at the Harlem Square Club (1963). Cornell Dupree is possible but it seems his recording work with Pickett came a little later. Speaking of Sam Cooke, Bobby Womack is also possible – he was touring with Cooke around that time, too. Another hot guitar player who was given to playing quick bursts of notes is David Walker, who played with Etta James on her Rock The House live album, recorded September 1963 at the New Era Club in Nashville. 1963 would seem to be a watershed year for smokin’ R&B. This Etta album is a favorite of mine and I have to add that I have a minor obsession with live albums from this period.

One last guitar player comes to mind, and that would be Chips Moman, who just passed away. He was most famous for his work as a producer, orchestrating Elvis Presley’s comeback in the late ‘60s. But he started out doing studio work and was a founding member at Stax. But let’s take a look at that blistering run. (see video and tab)

Sixteen notes are unleashed in an almost arrhythmic frenzy – triplets, sixteenth-notes and sixteenth-note triplets all tumble out in short order. The foundation however is quite simple, a major pentatonic scale in C that is straight out of the pattern that I call Long Form I, a lower and upper extension of minor pentatonic scale Form I at the fifth fret (the one that everybody learns first). This lick uses only the lower extension and the central part of the scale. The chord progression for the intro and verse is C – Am – F7, and the lick begins over the F7 chord, leading back to C. The sixteenth note triplet (hammer and pull) at the beginning emphasizes the note Eb (the 7^th of the F7 chord) which gives the run its seriously bluesy sound.

I’m not sure what kind of guitar this gunslinger is playing, but judging by pictures of Wilson with Jimi and Duane, and the fact that Steve Cropper is a Tele player, I think we can safely say it’s a Fender. I tried recording it once with a Strat, but I didn’t think that any of the pickup selections matched the sound that well. It could have been a Jazzmaster or Jaguar. I ultimately decided to use my Kelly Tele, and you can see for yourself if you think I got a good approximation of the tone. I used a Fender Deluxe 65 RI with a Weber Greenback and a Boss OD-3 set to a moderate amount of gain. The pickups are Lindy Fralins.

The mystery remains – who was that masked man? If anyone out there knows, please drop me a line. In the meantime, I’ll continue my research. It’s one of my favorite activities and probably one of yours, too. -Chris Botta