Page 30 - BiTS_02_FEBRUARY_2024_Neat

a way of blowing off steam on the tour and then he goes, man, this is really good. We ought to
turn this into a book. And I was like, man, that sounds like a huge undertaking. He goes, no, we'll
make it a movie, man. We'll get Brad Pitt to star as you [chuckling]. He kind of went off a cliff on
it, you know. So that was kind of how it started was that he gave me the idea that he would publish
it and so that was basically how I got going on it was this blog. It was a tour of Germany, but in
the book, I said it was Holland, and I actually changed the guy's name. You know, the guy in the
book, I think I called him Vulture and his real name was something else.

BiTS: You did indeed. Yes.

MH: I can't remember what his real name was, but it was something similar to something like
Voltin.

BiTS: He was an interesting character that you met there.

MH: And he was very oddball.
BiTS: Kind of creepy.

MH: Yeah, he was a totally oddball
guy. He rode up on a motorcycle, I
think, to pick us up, and the whole
thing was just insane.

BiTS: Can I ask you to comment on Ana Popović
something which is in the
introduction? In the introduction
you say, blues does not seem to be
being passed down to a younger
audience the way it did in the blues
boom of the 80s when Stevie Ray
and all the rest of them were playing.
Do you think that's still true?

MH: I think it's true in the sense of
more traditional blues. I mean, it
does not seem to be being passed
down to a younger generation on
any kind of real basis like it was in
the 80s. No, it's not. I mean, and part of that is because what's happened is the audience that was
in the 80s, they've all aged and basically, you've got that same audience coming to blues events
now. There's a few possible exceptions to that. Like maybe somebody like North Mississippi All

Stars or GA-20. I'd say some bands like that may have, like a younger kind of college crowd that
comes to see them. But really, all in all, I mean, most of the acts out there, and that even includes,
you know, something like Sue Foley, who is like 20 years younger than me, or these gals like Ana
Popović and artists like John Nemeth, all those artists still seem to have that same audience that
was out there in the 80s. Like they're not getting a bunch of people their own age showing up to
the gigs. And that's where it's kind of depressing is that it would be nice if this got passed down
to a younger audience. Now, on the other hand, I see musicians that are starting to catch on. Like,
I mean, there's this kid that I'm in contact with all the time in Mississippi, a kid named Harrell
Davenport. He calls himself Rell R-E-L-L. He's like a high school student. I think he just turned
17. This kid is just phenomenal. He's phenomenal, man. He's A student and he's really got a feel
for guitar and harmonica, like in a way that I haven't heard too many younger artists that really