out as a committed left fielder. Jones’s take is typically self-effacing, even on his formative years as a musician. ‘You like to think you’re a pioneer,’ he says, ‘but there’s always somebody before you. There was a guy in London playing 12-string guitar called Nicky Thatcher, another guy in Paris called Geno Foreman,

he had a lot to do with it. He brought the black blues players over and put them on as interval spots in the jazz clubs. There was Lonnie Johnson, Joe Williams, the piano player Memphis Slim…there were loads of guys.’

38

We’re sitting in an upstairs room of a pub in the suburbs of

Birmingham. There’s a small bar at one end, and an even smaller stage at the other. The room smells slightly stale and yeasty, and in the afternoon light the walls look long overdue for a lick

the countless bread-and-butter gigs that have hosted Wizz Jones for the 50-odd years he’s been in the business, and which for some inexplicable reason he’s rarely risen above. Inexplicable, because not only is Jones a staggeringly

fine guitarist and songwriter, he’s also one of contemporary folk music’s trailblazers. Go back to the late 50s and do a little homework, and it’s Jones’s footprints, and not too many others, you’ll find at the end of the track. ‘We all used to follow him around,’ says John Renbourn. ‘Him and Davey Graham. He’s the great granddaddy, an excellent guitarist.’ Now 70, Jones’s unruly white hair and genial smile put him somewhere between Doc Brown and an affable, older Beethoven – the sort of guy you might see sitting in a pub and instantly mark

What made Jones different of course, is that he wasn’t black and born in Mississippi – he was white and grew up in Croydon. But it was from his early exposure to the American black blues players – most notably Big Bill Broonzy – that Jones developed his hallmark right hand. He has an uncanny feel for the guitar, and for country blues especially. His playing teeters on the brink of a consummate virtuosity while still managing to sound raw and authentic. It’s this balance that makes his playing so distinctive and virtually unique among British guitarists. Jones is dismissive, and puts much of it down to his busking days. ‘Yeah, there’s an authority there. It comes from being out there in the snow, playing cinema queues and street corners, and wearing fingerpicks to make it louder. I did it for quite a while, and it gives you a certain power in getting the sound across.’ Doubtless, busking played its part, but Jones’s explanation fails to account for his enviable – albeit qualified – reputation among the generation of guitarists that followed him. ‘He’s an excellent player, he’s so underrated,’ claims Bert Jansch. ‘His songwriting, his guitar playing…he should be a superstar…but he isn’t.’ And while it’s true Jones never rose

interview: WIZZ JONES

Eric Clapton and Keith Richards cite him as an important early influence. Bert Jansch describes him as the ‘most underrated guitarist ever’. He has a cult following on the Internet, and his early vinyl fetches daft money on eBay. So why on earth haven’t more people heard of Wizz Jones?

wizz Jones:the Legendary Me

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of paint. It’s typical, probably, of and Chris Barber, the jazz player,

interview: WIZZ JONES

39

to those ranks, he does hold the distinction of having given a leg-up to several who did. A young Eric Clapton used to watch him playing to packed pubs and coffee bars in Soho, before hurrying home to practise what he’d seen. Rod Stewart’s in there somewhere as a busking and travelling companion. And Keith Richards – as if to go one better – insists that he bunked off lessons to learn blues guitar from Jones in the toilets of Ravensbourne art college. It’s a perverse kind of recognition (like the silly money his early vinyl fetches on eBay) that has brought neither wealth nor wider fame, yet it’s difficult to avoid a suspicion that Jones might secretly relish his role as the William Blake of British folk. After all, he’s the man who was there at the beginning, who has lasted the longest, who never got destroyed by drugs or alcohol, and whose work, in proportion to its merits, is the least recognised in the history of the folk movement. It’s also a role that, ironically, Jones credits for his remarkable endurance. ‘Luckily, I was never famous

work. I probably missed my true vocation. I should have been a radio DJ or made music documentaries.’ So we should be grateful that Jones missed his ‘true vocation’. Had he not, British music, and not just folk music, would be all the poorer for it. He might be best known for his blues playing (‘I’m not a real blues player, it’s just what really got to me’), but his repertoire is vast and wide ranging. If it can reasonably be described as folk, roots or acoustic (and a few other genres besides), the chances are that Jones has it covered. He has a gift for making a song accessible, of knowing, perhaps instinctively, how to project it. His edgy, intricate take on Robin Williamson’s valedictory ‘First Girl I Loved’ can stand no end of listening (catch it on YouTube and see if you don’t agree), and though he’s never been a prolific songwriter (‘I had the shadow of Alan Tunbridge with me, this inexhaustible supply of great songs’), he’s crafted some exceptional work – melodic, deeply personal narratives that tug at the emotions without ever spilling into mawkishness. Yet in common with so

many of the early black blues players, Jones has never enjoyed commercial success. And for much the same reason he has played the same guitar for most of his career: a workhorse Epiphone Texan that he bought second-hand in 1967 from Selmer’s, Charing Cross Rd, for £75. It looks tired and disreputable these days, yet Jones can still coax a remarkably punchy sound out of it – something he attributes to his AER amp. That, and a combination of an old Ashworth bug and a Pure Western K&K. And if that wasn’t enough, he mikes it as well. ‘It might be purely psychological,’ he says, ‘but I like to think I’m getting dynamics by moving closer to the mike.’ So how is it to play? ‘Put it this way, it’s not as good as it was,’ he says, adding (somewhat heroically, one suspects), ‘but it’s still pretty good. I could probably play a guitar with a wider neck better. In a way it inhibits my style, but at the same time, it gave birth to my style. It’s grown around that neck.’ Asked how he keeps it going, Jones professes it to be something of a miracle. It has had, like its owner, a colourful, but not an easy life. ‘When I first got it,’

enough to become an alcoholic,’ he says sardonically. ‘It would have happened, but I never had the money.’ It seems improbable that a mere lack of money could keep alcoholism at bay for Jones or anyone else if they were set on it, but self-deprecation is one of his traits, and much of the time he’d rather talk about other musicians than himself. The names trip off his tongue like he’s plucked them at random from Soho coffee shop billings from the 60s: ‘Long John Baldry had such a fantastic blues voice … Alexis Korner – not a great player, but a great passion for the music … Davey Graham was a true innovator, hugely influential … Always admired John Martyn because he had so much front … Steve Tilston should have had an award years ago – Ziggurat is a superb album … Bert Jansch? Now he is a genius…’ It’s almost irksome at times, trying to get Jones to talk about himself, something he readily admits. ‘The music is what always inspired me – what excites me most is turning people on to another musician’s

Interview - Wiz Jones.indd 2 05/02/2010 16:00

40

Jones says, ‘I had a row with my wife and slammed the boot of the car down on it, and a hinge went through the back. Tony Zemaitis repaired it, but then I made the mistake of shaving off the sunburst finish to make the table a bit thinner. Very fashionable at the time, but a daft thing to do. And I have this habit of whacking the guitar. The whole table creaks now and that’s started to come through on the PA. I suppose I’ll have to train myself to do less of that,’ he says with a shrug.I ask him if he ever considers treating himself to a new axe, and a look of wry amusement crosses his face. ‘I can’t afford to,’ he says. ‘I’ve never got any money. It’s my personality – money flies away from me.’ So what about a manufacturer presenting him with a guitar? Didn’t they do that sort of thing when a musician’s done as much for the business as Jones has? He laughs. ‘Nah, I wish they would. You’ve got to have a name and a body of work behind you. It’s not enough to be an influence. I’m just known among other musicians. After 50 years in the business, I’ve only just qualified for free strings from John Pearse.’ One might think, after half a century, Jones would have at least enough of a following to get all the work he could use, but he says it’s a constant fight. ‘I’m chasing it every day, but most of the time people have never heard of me. You can hardly blame them, it’s a different generation, so it’s quite a battle.’ Jones is ambivalent about the current state of British folk, and flip-flops between Eeyore-ish pronouncements and a boyish enthusiasm. ‘It’s another world now, a big corporate thing,’ he says. ‘Every pub seems to have a parade of young girls singing about their love life for three chords, trying to get a record deal and into the charts. It’s alright,

I suppose, but it’s not what we were doing. We were inspired by the music. We didn’t think about performing, we just loved the music. We tramped across the country carrying old tape recorders to learn it. Any little bit of knowledge on the guitar was really something. You’d meet someone and you’d say, “You know that bit on such and such, how do you do that?” And they’d show you. Perhaps by today’s standards it’d be nothing, but in those days it was really exciting. It didn’t occur to us to do it just to perform, but now that’s what you do.’ He pauses. ‘But I can still get enthusiastic.’ And his whole demeanour changes suddenly, and his praise becomes almost gushing. ‘There’s a young guy called Jo Woolley down in London…great voice…writes his own songs…sense of humour…great stage presence. Yeah, he really impressed me.’ I ask who was left now from the old guard. It’s probably not the most sensitive of questions at the time, and Jones hesitates. ‘Well, there’s me and John Renbourn. Bert may not play again. Then Carthy, I suppose, but he came in a little later. I’m older than all of them.’ Jones sighs, then looks up. ‘Don’t get me wrong. I’m honoured to think I’m part of that crowd, and honoured that people like Clapton and Keith Richards came along to watch me play. I only wish it paid the bills. Still, I’m knocked out that I can still get gigs and do them. So many of my contemporaries can’t. It’s been brilliant, really. I’ve spent my whole life moving among all these different strata, rubbing shoulders with all sorts of people. I’ve been all over the place, seen all kinds of things. For a working-class boy with no trade or education I could never have done that, could I?’Noel Harvey

interview: WIZZ JONES

Shadow Electronics boldly claim that their latest product is the world’s very first soundhole tuner, and

at first I was a bit curious as to why no one else has done this before. The soundhole tuner can be installed in a few minutes without permanent alterations or damage to your acoustic guitar, and comes with a series of Velcro strips to attach the tuner to the inside of the guitar.Shadow Electronics state that you can tune your instrument more than 1,200 times without changing the included 3-volt cell battery. The tuner comes with a five-year warranty. Now, the obvious advantage of fitting a tuner inside the guitar is the unlikely occurrence of forgetting it at your next live performance! In addition, the placement is quite discreet if you feel exposed tuning at a concert mid performance. To install you will have to loosen the treble strings and affix the Velcro pads behind the bracing (on acoustic guitars). Once positioned

successfully, Shadow Electronics advise leaving the tuner in for 24 hours to allow the Velcro adhesive to bond with the wood. In use, the tuner – an automatic chromatic type – finds the pitch well without wavering undecidedly. The multicoloured lights are clear for dark-stage use, with the blue light indicating the played note and the red and green lights assisting with fine-tuning. My first real gripe with this product is with the placement of the on/off switch, as it’s quite difficult to locate while playing my acoustic guitar. Had it been by the tuner lights I’d have been able to access it far better, although I acknowledge this would possibly crowd the tuner display.I also wouldn’t want to switch the tuner out into another acoustic guitar at a performance, an obvious advantage with a headstock clamp tuner design. While a novel and unique product, I’ll be sticking with my current tuner for now.Nick Gordon

fieLd rEpOrt

In The ShadowsNew Soundhole Tuner

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