Yeah, those strings sure bend on the videos, so it's hard to imagine them being that heavy. But that's why he got that incredible attack. He HAD to hammer the strings.

The last thing I got in the way of a blues recording was the East/West Live CD. An extension of the Butterfield Blues band's second album...East West. Bloomfield had the idea for doing the Indian-music raga thing and they came up with East West. The long jam. Anyway, the organist for the group, Mark Naftalin, took along a reel to reel to record some of their shows in 68-69? and released some of the recordings a while back. The three cuts on the disc are versions of the song 'East West' recorded at different places. Sound quality is bad, but it's good to hear those guys, like they are HERE right now, after so many years.

There's some movie with Redford and Portier...some semi-spy comedy thing...with an opening title sequence of Bloomfield's blues cut off the Super Session album he did with Al Kooper. Most fluid blues guitar I ever heard. And on the East-West Live liner notes Bloomfield told someone once he just wanted to be in that handful of guitarists that is recognized immediately from style. I think his super-smooth guitar work accomplished that. And it wasn't just slick playing. Some of those passages are as heart-felt as anything around.