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Originally Posted by Gavin B.
Some of the roots music questions are challenging even to the musically educated forum members. Few people outside of acoustic guitar players know what the Carter lick is. I know Carter lick is, but I can't explain it to a lay person unless I have a guitar as a prop. It's like trying to explain what hammer-on or a pull-off is without using a guitar to demonstrate the techinques.
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The Carter lick is a method of guitar strum that became the foundation of country music. That it had something to do with the Carter Family is all I was looking for. Basically, it's plucking the bass string of a chord followed by the rest of the chord in a kind "oom-pah oom-pah" sort of rhythm that roves up and down the fingerboard. Done correctly, it sounds like two guitars. People thought it was two and were surprised that Maybelle was doing it all by herself.
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Holland Dozier & Holland were Motown's top songwriting team but Norman Whitefield, Barrett Strong, Deke Richards Smokey Robinson and Motown president Barry Gordy were also prolific composers for Motown. I know that Lamont, Dozier and Holland wrote most of the Supreme's big hits but I'd have to do a fact check if you asked me to name a Lamont, Dozier, and Holland song, excluding the Supreme's biggest hits. It's a tough question even for a person with a knowledge of soul music.
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"You Can't Hurry Love" was a big hit for Phil Collins. I only asked for one song. "Can't Help Myself" "How Sweet It Is" "Bernadette" "Baby Love" "Keep Me Hanging On" "Reach Out" "Same Old Song" "This Old Heart of Mine" and there's enough contemporary singers still doing these songs that people today should know who HDH is.
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I'd be surprised if over 20% of MB forum members percentage know who Blind Willie McTell, Charley Patton and Fred McDowell are. Of course I'd be among the ignorant had one of your questions had been about mariachi music or gangsta rap.
The title "King of the Delta Blues Men" is a dubious one because Robert Johnson, Son House, Willie Brown and Charlie Patton have all been called the "King of the Delta Blues Singers" at one time or another.
Patton was playing a full decade before Son House or Robert Johnson. However Patton's generational peer, Willie Brown was a better singer and guitar player than Patton. But Willie Brown lost his claim to "king" when he only recorded 8 songs and disappeared into obscurity forever, while Patton recorded nearly 100 songs.
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Of the choices I gave only one could have had the title. Blind Willie McTell was a Piedmont bluesman, Lightnin' Hopkins was a Texas bluesman and Mississippi Fred McDowell never lived on the delta but founded a blues subgenre called North Mississippi. He spent the first half of his life in Memphis. Patton is the only one listed that lived on the delta so he is the only viable choice.
I'll bet your average Brit knows more about blues than your average American.