Izzy Stradlin and Rick Richards performing "Spoonful" on the nationally-syndicated radio program: Rock-Line.
"Spoonful" is a blues standard written by Willie Dixon and commonly associated with Howlin' Wolf.
It's also been recorded by Cream, Etta James, Paul Butterfield, Canned Heat, Allman Bros., Ten Years After, Grateful Dead, Gov't Mule, and The Who.
I always thought of it as a heroin/cocaine song, because of the lines:
Men lie about that spoonful
Some cry about that spoonful
Some die about that spoonful
But, I think that's taking the song too literally.
Anyway, I did always think of it as a "drug" song.
The Rockline radio show used to be a really big deal to my friends and I. This was before the internet, and MTV was still in its infancy. I'd stay up late to listen to Rockline, with the sound of crickets drifting in through the open Summer windows of my teenage bedroom.
Up until a few years ago, I still had a few cassette tapes of Rockline segements. My favorite was when Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia were asked what they did during set breaks.
Their answer was radio gold.
For a moment I had an inkling of what it was like to listen to radio in the 1940s.
Thanks to Been A Fix for the images
and RockIsDead/RIP for the audio.
-Mack "La Macchina" Arillo
No Mack. You are completely right about it being a drug song! The song actually dates back to the 1930's (or maybe even late 20's) to a guy whose name I can't remember right now. But I have the original version somewhere in my music collection on an old blues compilation. Anyway, I just found your site for the first time tonight. Are you the guy who sent us the extra Izzy tunes? I'm pretty sure are/ have to be. Thanks! Didn't know you had your own site. I've learned a lot in the last 20 minutes. I didn't even know that Scott Weiland was out of VR!!
ReplyDeleteAlso, thanks for acknowledging Rock is Dead on your site (and doing it the right way). We appreciate it.
And Izzy does by far the best version of it I've ever heard!
I love the way they play thins..
ReplyDeleteThis is actually a Howlin' Wolf song from the '60s ;-)
take care,
Jewel