By Mubarak Ali

There is no set formula for music creation, no framework for production and never a guarantee of favourable reception. In dealing with this fact, the most applied strategy seems to be to shun past successes and looks to be as innovative as possible to breach a heavily saturated market. Admittedly this strategy has its merits and has yielded fractious shifts creating new genres of music; however, these instances are rare and typified by era-defining artists. Increasingly there is the implementation of an ‘adapting’ philosophy; whereby artist incorporate past styles in homage to founding fathers and mothers, whilst integrating new techniques and skills. Soul and blues music have a number of artists who have utilised this new form of music creation; two of those being Gary Clark Jr and Leon Bridges.

Grammy award winner Gary Clark Jr, a Texas native, released his first EP back in 2011 titled The Bright Lights EP. Clark cites the late great B.B King as an inspiration, going on to share the stage with his idol later in his career. The parallels between the two artists are clear to see, two naturally gifted blues guitar players producing soulful blues music. ‘Bright lights’ and ‘When my train pulls in’ are two of Clark’s songs that best exemplify his roots of soul music as influenced by B.B King. Whilst King primarily made soul music, Clark has gone on to blend elements of rock and R&B into his music which is best illustrated by his cover of The Beatles song ‘Come Together’. Here we can see the pathway of musical evolution that Gary Clark Jr has undertaken; despite his advances and changes in music style, his songs remain entrenched in the style of blues and allows him to expand upon that which came before him.

Leon Bridges is the prominent soul and blues artist of his generation producing music of this genre almost exclusively. Born in USA, Georgia, Bridges has a style reminiscent of blues music of the 1950s and 1960s comparable to the greats Otis Redding and Sam Cooke. Redding and Bridges share a birthplace in Georgia, but more pertinently share a style and brand of music. ‘River’ and ‘Beyond’ are two of Bridges’ songs with the signature emotive tone heard in songs such as ‘Try a little tenderness’ and ‘I’ve been loving you too long’ performed by Redding. Leon Bridges is bringing back a genre that seems lost to many and in doing so is remaining close to the roots of soul. Here we see that simply re-capturing a genre in a contemporary manner fills a niche in an overwhelmed market; reiterating that new does not always guarantee better.

The pivotal question is whether this methodology of music production is sustainable? Blending aspects of new music with old styles could feasibly allow for the creation of slightly variant music indefinitely. Realistically there will be a time where this format has exhausted most alterations of a theme; in my personal opinion, this will likely coincide with the next big shift in contemporary music and in doing so will allow for another cycle of this ‘adapting philosophy’. Despite this renaissance of Motown, it is only a matter of time before contemporary musicians start drawing inspiration from other musical influences. However, for the time being we can simply appreciate this revival of blues music and the slightly deviant sub-genres inspired by it.