A famous old blues
says ”some people just
sing the blues
just because they know the song”
yes... blues can be heavy and sarcastic at times, my blues is
rather
ironic instead
I have always written my own blues so... I
am not another blues player...
a transient phenomenal guitarist who has to show off;
I am an author, I play what I feel and not just whatever I like to
play"
"Many
artists can play the blues but only few can create it"
Max
Marinaio
Max Marinaio
I started inventing blues tunes since my creative
beginnings, when I was 19/20 years old.
It was in the summer 1984 when
I wrote a song called My
Real Life.
That song
changed my life because it made me gain awareness of myself as a
composer. After that, I realized I could really be a songwriter in
life.
Soon after I wrote other blues songs like What He Says, Man
Without a Babe, Look Look Look, I Wanna Hear You
which I have played live with my band for years and that are
the cornerstones of my
blues repertoire. You can find them in the Album "Let The
Good Times Rock'n'Roll" which is out now on Bandcamp and on all
digital platforms.
These
songs at the beginning were only made up with lyrics, vocals and
rhythmic guitar.
I
remember the time when I played them alone in my bedroom with my
classic guitar.
They are stuck so deep in my soul and in my life... like a part of me.
Later
on, I added the bass parts, the piano parts and the guitar solo licks.
All came to me so incredibly natural. These songs will be with me until
I die.
Even when I dedicated myself to writing different songs, sooner or
later I always returned to the blues, so I can say that blues music has
always been a constant in my artistic life.
Nor have I ever asked
myself what kind of blues to do. Sometimes it was acoustic blues, other
times it was a Chicago blues, a Boogie or a New Orleans blues, and at
other times it was a rock-blues. My songs take the form of
the inspiration and the mood in which I find
myself when the song comes to me.
STORY
OF AN ANOMALOUS GUITARIST
In the beginning I considered
myself
primarily a rhythm guitarist, so my first blues songs had a basic
rhythm often alternating with riffs of my own invention like in My
Real Life or in Everybody Knows.
At
other times I used a fingerstyle accompaniment. That was a
simple and
optimal system since I had to sing and play simultaneously without a
backing band providing the harmony and the arrangement.
When
I started my first band at about 23 y.o. I had to turn also
into a soloist, because
the other guitarist really couldn't play any solo or improvvisation! LOL
In any case my way of writing songs didn't change. I
always prefer starting with a good riff, that's where the real
creativity lies for me.
Years later I added the piano to some songs that were born on the
guitar, Like Man
Without a Babe and I
Wanna Hear You.
Both Man Without a Babe and What He
Says hadn’t any blues solo commentary but a central solo you
can still hear.
After all, I thought, I can always throw in some improvised solo
comments at any moment. Where is the problem?
So I
didn't memorize solo parts except for the riffs... only some real
solo... I preferred to
write the bass parts instead, because they help define a song.
I've always been good at that too.
I started writing the guitar licks only in the 2000s when, having to
release my first Album, I started treating the arrangements in a more
precise way.
The more I played live, the more I realized how important the solo
parts are, in the blues. So my way of conceiving blues has evolved over
time but without ever coming to consider a rhythm part superfluous.
Although today I write solos and licks, for me the basis of a song is
always a good riff, a good melody and a good rhythm.
AUTENTICITY
IS THE MAIN THING FOR ME
As any other thing I do, my Blues songs comes from my personal
experiences in life, I tend to avoid clichés and I never talk about
life down in Mississippi I'm not from there.
So you can say loud my blues is peculiar... but sure it
is authentic and this is the main thing for me.
Basically I'm not a melancholic person. I can't stand people who always
whine. That's not my blues. I try to say things.
I also try to have fun and to spread some joy... in fact I have written
and played a lot of boogie and I like to listen to jump blues too.
In my songs I often talk about people's
strange (from my point of view of 'course) behaviors, their
way of thinking, with a certain humorous
flavor that distinguishes my personality. Sometimes I can be sharper...
that too is part of my difficult temperament! LOL
LIVE
EXPERIENCE
I played blues from 2005 to 2011 with my band The
Flying
Cats, reaching the Pistoia
Blues Final already in 2005, I played in the
Bolognini
Theatre in Pistoia.
We played in many pubs and made Square
Concerts. Recently I have played as Max Marinaio's Soul-Blues Trio
in Festivals and Memorials
and I also like to perform as a solo artist, in the style of
the
old bluesmen, with just vocals and a semi-acoustic guitar. That's great
music too.
DISCOGRAPHIC
PUBLICATION
After a major publication hiatus... in 2019 I
started publishing some blues singles on Bandcamp and
I have a great album
out now on Bandcamp and other platforms:
don't
miss it! I Employed years to make it and it is music made to last.
For the most faithful blues lovers, I am planning to publish a
"blues only" editorial line with Nautilus Studio which will be
called "Early Blues".
The future looks bright, stay tuned!
