Paul Bibbins

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[glow=red,2,300]paul bibbins
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paul bibbins
Rock / Classic Rock / Blues

I was born in a small town in the “show me” state of Missouri. But New Orleans, Louisiana has been my home since I was a small kid.

Growing up in my parents’ home I was exposed mainly to blues, soul, Motown, and R&B. And then in my mid teens I discovered rock-n-roll music by accident. One day as I flipped through the channels on an AM radio, I heard Deep Purple’s song “Smoke On The Water” for the first time on the legendary “Beaker Street” program on KAAY 1090, a high-powered AM-radio station broadcasting from Little Rock, Arkansas. This was a watershed moment for me. Something about that song struck a real chord with me. I was suddenly drawn into listening to more and more rock-n-roll music, such as Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, etc. It wasn’t long before I was a complete rock-n-roll convert.

I bought my first guitar, which was a cheap electric guitar, and dove into teaching myself how to play. Then one day as I walked passed a local poster shop, I saw a poster of a guitar player who I had not yet heard of. The poster was of Jimi Hendrix and the caption read “The late great Jimi Hendrix”. I didn’t know who Hendrix was, but I did know that that picture of him with that upside-down Fender Stratocaster guitar was the coolest thing I’d seen in my life. I immediately went out and bought one of his albums and got totally into the Hendrix mystique. But I stayed away from learning Jimi’s music or anybody else’s at that time.

I’d been playing guitar for only 6 months at that time; but I just had to have that upside-down Stratocaster look. So I went to a few local music stores to try to find a left-handed Stratocaster so that I could flip it over to right-handed, which I am. None of the music stores had the lefty Stratocaster and would have had to order it. But being young and impulsive, I did not want to wait long to get the Jimi look that I wanted. So I bought a right-handed Stratocaster, flipped it over to left-handed, and have been playing guitar left-handed ever since. That was many long years ago.

Over the years I have alternated between taking music slightly seriously and at other times just flat out goofing off with it. Now that I’m a lot older, I’ve come full circle and now take my music very seriously. But for many years I had a bad gambling habit and there were times where I’d go months without even touching my guitar. To overcome gambling took mammoth willpower on my part. I call this Phase 1 to musical enlightenment----you can’t have vices, such as gambling, that consume every free moment if you’re serious about music.

Though I’ve always been blessed with many creative juices, I’ve always had a “tin” ear when it came to hearing music. Even though I was in the know as to all the musical intervals that make up popular music, I could not readily hear and pick them out in actual music. What this means for those who don’t know, is that I had real problems playing music spontaneously with other musicians. I just could not follow the flow of the music fast enough for improvisation. About three years ago I gradually grew into the routine of listening to a song on the radio, then after the song would end, I’d keep humming the bassline of the melody to myself and try to analyze the musical intervals. To my surprise I got pretty good at doing this in just a few weeks. I started analyzing what all the instruments where doing in a song. I continue this routine still today, and now I have a pretty good musical ear, though not as sharp as the musicians who’ve had the sharp ears all their life. But my musical hearing is getting stronger everyday. Phase 2 to musical enlightenment----to be a good musician you must have a good, if not great, musical ear.




As I said before, I’ve been blessed with a creative spark when it comes to music. I’ve always been able to write fairly unique melodies and songs. But, and this is huge for a man who always wanted to be called a lead guitar player, for years I was a minimalist at best when it came to playing guitar solos, and there was no real passion and power in my playing. But about five or six years ago I started really learning the songs of my heroes such as Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and Robert Cray because I started a power trio cover band. And through learning those guys' lead guitar licks and rhythm playing, the passion and power started creeping into my lead and rhythm guitar playing as well. I think that now the passion and power can be prominently heard in my music. But you listeners out there are the ultimate judges of this. Phase 3 to musical enlightenment----there is always a value to learning from those who came before you.

At the present time I am a solo artist. I’ll tell you why. I started taking music more seriously when I started my rock-n-roll power trio cover band about five or six years ago. From the start I hooked up with a great drummer who fit perfectly with what I wanted to do. But I had major problems with bass guitar players. It became a revolving door of bass players. There was the bass player who, at rehearsals, would rather argue about bible and religion than practice. Another one who would stop playing mid-song because he felt his bass guitar was actually talking to him; and this same guy would spray mosquito repellent as air freshener in the rehearsal studio. It turns out that he was crazy and on medication to keep him in check. Then there was the string of bass players who wanted to totally change what I wanted to do musically, and the ones who were professionals and were looking for bands that were already making money from gigs. Since they made their living from music, they wouldn’t stay even when they really grooved with the drummer and myself.

With all the bass player problems my power trio only gigged three or four times in three whole years. The drummer finally called it quits. I found another dynamic drummer. But the problems with bass players continued, and after a year my second drummer moved on.

So I decided to fly solo. And in doing so I was able to complete and release my first CD, “Songs From The Index Of Fools” as a result. With all the bass player problems, my power trio just never could get to that point. So for me I’m at a great point in my new found musical quest.

Jimi's Ghost...

Album: Index Of Fools - REDUX
Label: Bittersweet Records
By Brian Sidler
Former music writer - Chicago Music Magazine

When Jimi Hendrix died, there was a huge hole left in the fabric of Rock. Noboby, but nobody, who has come along could even approach the summit that he single handedly built to climb. Jimi Hendrix is deified because he deserves it. And we still talk about him in the present tense because there isn't a lead guitar player worth their salt that doesn't presently, at least seriously look at the Hendrix body of work. It's no different for Mozart or Beethoven either.


Electric guitar players are a lot like gun slingers of the old west. The question that looms on this point is: Who's gonna get their head chopped today? For the bystander what that question means is: Whose chops are going to outdo who?


For some time now, we'd say around 35 plus years, guitar players all began experimenting with and forging the path of playing lead fills with blinding speed, forgetting the expression of the fill to begin with. As if blinding speed, in and of itself was the thing most worthy to emanate. So, it became an exercise for the next guitar lesson. The same phenomena had occurred many years earlier during the Be Bop Jazz era. Charlie Parker and Diz set the path and many followed. But then, along comes Miles Davis. Which yet again, changed the direction of Jazz forever.


In order for someone to fill the hole that Jimi left or someone to even try, one had to have a hell of a lot of "sand" to do that! Because no matter what that player did, they'd be standing next to the all time icon of the electric guitar. There is no one in music that will dispute that statement.


So one day a couple of months ago we were cruising through the "Space" and along comes this request for an add. We clicked on the profile. It was Paul Bibbins.


Now we weren't stoned at the time. Nor had we had anything to drink other than coffee...but by the time we were done listening to the four songs put up on the player, we were convinced that we were. Ummm...stoned, that is.


At the onset of all this, let's understand something. Electric Lead Guitar players have huge egos, though refreshingly, such is not the case with Paul. They're all such experts on who did what and how they did it. Easily enough, this can also be because of their passion for playing the electric guitar, which basically is the modern day version of the classical violin and not just an expression of elephant heads. But we weren't listening to Paul with an eye towards that end. We were just a few witnesses to our own experience of hearing what was coming over the speakers. Quite frankly, and there was a guitar player in the room at the time, we were transfixed on the screen and the speakers. For us it was like being hit with a brick on the side of the head without knowing the brick had been thrown. And what a brick that was! Simply put, we were knocked out. Cold!


Are we an easy audience? Perhaps you should go take a look at the column written on the Brian MySpace profile. The direct answer is no, we don't think so.


So on several occasions after that we had talked with Paul. We were going to sign him, on that there was no doubt...at least we wanted to, let's put it that way. The album Index Of Fools deserved to be looked at for another go around of treatment. Most often, time and money stop progress in the expression of recorded musical art (and notice how we phrased that, instead of the ubiquitous...recordings) especially for independent artists like Paul Bibbins. We had felt the same about Paul's Debut release.Index Of Fools.




Excellent guitarist, musician, playing some excellent music, if you want to hear some of his authentic Blues, go over to his my-space page, he has four songs on there, "Eagle's World Blues" "Index Of Fools" "Soft Rain Will Come" & "Joe Cool & Jack Ode" , or to his web site, he has more music & some videos on there, and give him a listen, you wont be disappointed

MySpace URL:
www.myspace.com/paulbibbins

Band Website
paulbibbins.com

Some videos of Paul Bibbins

Paul Bibbins studio jam Mar. 2007
Solo guitar studio jam by Paul Bibbins, of an original song called "Run". Copyright. 2007 Fool's Index Music,
Thanks to pnbibbins




Eagle's World Blues
This song is the centerpiece of my CD, "Songs From the Index Of Fools-REDUX". It's 9 minutes of guitar frenzy, that's both rockin' and funky.

I do it instrumentally in this video....If you want to hear the song with the vocals, visit my MySpace page at www.myspace.com/paulbibbins

You can also buy digital downloads of this song and all the others from my CD on my MySpace page




Voodoo Child
From my CD, I'm doing my rendition of Jimi's electric guitar classic. I didn't want to stick to the script on this song, so I did it my own way