JJ Cale: "In trying to imitate them, I missed it."

**MarkRhodes** · 08-21-2024, 11:38 AM

"In trying to imitate them, I missed it. And I came up with my own kinda thing." JJ Cale

JJ's main influences were Les Paul, Chet Atkins, and Chuck Berry. He doesn't sound like any of them. But he does sound like himself and that's better.
For a guy with deceptively simple style, he sure bent the ears of a lot of heavyweight guitarists and songwriters: Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, Tom Petty, John Mayer, Willie Nelson----that's quite a fan club!

"Crazy Mama" was the first JJ Cale song I ever heard. It got radio airplay in Nashville, where I was living in 1972.

JJ was known for being an ingredient in the "Tulsa Sound." Here is a good example, a live version of his song "After Midnight."

A solo live version of "Cajun Moon."

"Humdinger"

**ruger9** · 08-22-2024, 06:56 AM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

"In trying to imitate them, I missed it. And I came up with my own kinda thing." JJ Cale

I think that's pretty much how all "influences" work, take several of them and put them together and you have "your style".

**MarkRhodes** · 08-23-2024, 04:32 PM

Originally Posted by ruger9

I think that's pretty much how all "influences" work, take several of them and put them together and you have "your style".

Yet few develop a style as distinctive as JJ Cale's.

**ruger9** · 08-24-2024, 08:00 AM

Originally Posted by MarkRhodes

Yet few develop a style as distinctive as JJ Cale's.

Well, "few" is a relative term. I can think of many who developed a distinctive style, and that is one of the reasons they became so popular. Whether it's a playing style or a songwriting style. Uniqueness is where it's at. Sure, alot of "famous" people aren't unique (just look at the current crop of country music stars), but the good ones rise to the top and stay there, over time.

**MarkRhodes** · 08-24-2024, 11:23 AM

If there are many who become "famous" without being unique, then a distinctive style can't be the only reason people become popular.

And Cale was never that popular in his own right. (Most people know his songs through covers of them by Clapton and Lynyrd Skynyrd.)

It's common for a player to start out imitating his or her favorite players. Indeed, this is often encouraged by great teachers: imitate, then innovate.

Cale's point, as I read it, is that he wasn't good at the imitation part.
By contrast, here is Oscar Peterson showing his mastery of various styles. He can do whatever he wants on the piano. Cale is not like that. I see what he is saying as more like, "I made the most out what I could do and let go of the things I couldn't." That seems different to me.

**digger** · 08-24-2024, 01:13 PM

Recently, I listened to an interesting interview with David Grier (the flat-picking guitar player) talking about Clarence White (one of David's flat-picking inspirations). David said that back in the late sixties the main flat-pickers of the time - Clarence White, Doc Watson, Dan Crary, and so on - all strived to sound different. They didn't want to sound like anyone else. Then Tony Rice came along (he, too, sounded different) but thereafter, for a long time (right up until now, in a lot of cases) the young guns wanted to sound like Tony Rice, because that bluesy sound was so cool. These days, David said, that there are so many guitar players in that genre who have amazing chops and technical ability and speed and dexterity and musical knowledge and wonderful guitars and great production etc... but, he said, they all sound the same. David Grier is certainly one of a kind in that genre.

It's like somewhere along the line the requirement (or preference) ended with imitate, and never reached innovate. I think a lot of audiences tend to like that, too, and maybe that's what's driving it.

Derek