In Russia the blues is in the air. My artistic task is to wring it out
of the air and to translate it into music. It is about the same pain as
that which the black Americans felt on the plantations and after their
'liberation' and which can be heard in their music. My music deals with
urban culture, grey walls, deadly electricity, planes high above your head
and pollution. It is a poison in the air translated into feelings of fear."
New York was overwhelming. The skyscrapers, the madness of that city. I
am still grateful for that experience. It was quite a cultural shock. From
the land where the loser rules, I ended up in a country where losers gain
no respect at all and where only the winners count.
One could say that I am a kind of one-man-band, doing bass-guitar and
drums on my guitar as well. I have been playing the guitar since I was
11 years old and I never took lessons. Many discoveries are based on coincidences
or mistakes.
Many musicians become famous with music that they feel no connection
to. John Lennon is an artist that never sold his soul, and therefore, he
is an idol to me. In spite of his enormous success and wealth, he never
lost his artistic integrity.
Blues is more intimate, more personal... because when I play rock, I'm
playing to a crowd. When I play blues, I'm speaking, one-on-one, to every
individual in the crowd.
Many Americans think my music is odd. This is caused by the fact that
there are blues-emotions in it without the music sounding like blues. It
can be compared to the pain of fear and loneliness. Not the direct pain
that is expressed in rock music but more an old, healed wound. A pain that
you always carry with you. Blues is like a scar. You cannot possibly play
blues when you are twenty years of age. Blues is to be played by people
who have been through stuff in life. I do not make the traditional blues
like the Americans do. I developed my music myself in Novosibirsk. The
music I write comes from deep inside.
at 41, is well-established as Russia's greatest blues guitar player
where he became a legend for his virtuosity. Since moving to the United
States, he has been hailed by Guitar World and The New Yorker Magazine
as "a one-man band" who -- with no overdubbing or sidemen -- sounds on
his tapes "as if three guitars were playing."
In 1993 Naumov won the New-York contest titled "The Best Guitarist"
with a symbolic prize of Fender Stratocaster with Eric Clapton among the
judges. Conditions: "You get 60 seconds on stage and then you're a history!".
Requested skills: originality, style and techniques.
More info. www.briankramerblues.com
CD's available at www.bluearmadillo.com
