Interview: Luther Allison

In 1969, a 30 year old blues guitarist from Chicago's West Side, broke into the collected consciousness of American audiences with his legendary performance at the Ann Arbor Blues Festival. But in spite of his enormous impact and popularity, he found it necessary to leave America in the '80s and become one of the many Blues expatriates living in Paris. He spent almost 10 years performing and recording in Europe, before his triumphant return to the States in 1990. He brought with him a recording, that was eagerly snapped up by Chicago's renowned Alligator Records. I recently had an opportunity to talk with him and asked what it was like moving to Paris. I'd like to share "the ride" and his insights...

Luther: Well, I've had to deal with everything in my life... leavin' the family, learnin' what not and what to do. I can respect a person, doing what they do. I went from a champion... it became very hard in the beginning, because I gave up everything in the States, to take this chance. When I went there, I didn't go to stay. It happened like when I got stranded in California. But this time I'm not going to panic, because I ain't got no family to run back to. I'm going to stick it out. And I did!

I knew Memphis Slim lived in Paris and I knew Champion Jack Dupree was in Germany. These guys was my old friends, my buddies. They were going to tell me what was going down, good or bad. If they tell me to get the hell out from over there, then I would have to do that. 'Cause I would believe that. They didn't, they said, "Welcome! You made a great move. Get your things together, these people is for you... they're for us. The USA is nice, it's home. But if you can't be there, get what you can now, then go back home if possible." And I did that."

Now it looks a lot brighter. I have a lot of energy I don't waste now, wonderin' and worryin', goin' here and doin' that, tryin' to see what would happen. I'm very happy now. People really know about Luther Allison. They know I'm never a fake. I was always hard workin'. I'm getting, "Wow, we miss you now! I seen you 20 years ago, you haven't lost anything!" "Well, you saw me 20 years ago, but I only been gone for 10..." That's my answer back. "Where were you the other 10 years?"

When they say, "The blues is back..." I was in Europe, I heard this stuff. At the same time, my son was in the States. My son played 3 years with Koko Taylor. I know what's goin' on in the USA. I don't have to worry about reading the paper to find out who's who and what's happening, or who's playing what. We played the same thing in Europe we played in the States. When you have a repertoire like Luther Allison, you played like Luther Allison! And many of the guys came to Europe and cliched the situation , "Well, the people in Paris say, that's the Chicago Blues..." I never believed in Chicago blues, because my thing didn' come from there. My thing came from down south, in the cotton plantation. Many came that route. We all went to Chicago - like I went to Paris, like I went to Los Angeles.

I put an X on all this crazy stuff, put my feet forward, and say, "I did a lot of great things in the States as far as music was concerned. As far as helping other people is concerned and opening doors. I'm the one that was able to take the chance. I'm the one the night club owners could trust." In other words, my personality and respect carried me a long way. It's like goin' back in time, "Blacks over here, whites over there." I never had to worry about that. I played clubs of Chicago, west of Chicago, the USA and I was hired because people had heard about Luther Allison's respect.

I would teach my band, "This is what we do, an' this is what we don't," and my musicians listened. I would tell my group, "I'm not into drugs." You know, if we get drunk one night on the gig, because somebody won't understand and we can't back out... "Oh! You're to good to drink with me!?" I'd say, "We're goin' to handle this..." and many times I was messed up. But there was not a job that could say that Luther Allison didn't do his job.

I talk to a lot of young guys in the States, coming up. Girls and guys. You might of heard of Marva Wright, I believe it is... we talk about these things and look at the situation. You look at a woman, doin' her trip, tryin' to be involved with blues - with the guitar for instance. You did not see this so much when we were coming up. And now you see a lot of this. I talk to the girls, I say, "You want to play the guitar? Sit down and deal with it. What I want to do, is play music for somebody who believe in me. I want to play in a place people want to hear me. I don't want to be in some big beautiful place that nobody want me, because I play the blues.

But to get back to "the blues is back"... people say, "Luther, what do you think about the fact, the blues is back?" How can I say the blues is back? I moved around to make sure ends meet. The blues always been there with me. As far as I'm concerned, it always will be. In the blues, it just takes so long for us to get recognized. This little stretch brought on people like Robert Cray, Albert Collins returned, Gary Moore - comin' into the other side, Buddy Guy, Otis Rush if he takes the chance... Luther Allison's sittin' here, still waiting...

Luther Allison will be headlining a world class blues festival in my northeastern Pennsylvania this summer. Held at the Big Boulder Ski Resort (which lies nestled in the Pocono mountains) on the last weekend of July, this world class event will be featuring 14 internationally acclaimed blues artists.

More information about the musicians and event can be found at the Pocono Blues Festival's Home page: http://www.scranton.com/bluinfo.html or sending an email request for the Saturday (July 29) or Sunday (July 30) line-ups, with the date in the subject line, to: blues@lydian.scranton.com