Walk, Don't run

The Ventures, from left: Nokie Edwards, Bob Bogle, Don Wilson and Howie Johnson in 1960


Bob Bogle, a founding member of the Ventures, the long-running guitar band whose jaunty 1960 hit “Walk — Don’t Run” became an early standard of instrumental rock ’n’ roll and taught generations of guitarists how to make their solos sparkle, died on Sunday in Vancouver, Wash., where he lived. He was 75.

I can hear that guitar.

Mr. Bogle and Don Wilson, two young construction workers and novice guitar enthusiasts, started the group in Tacoma, Wash., in 1958. Unable to attract a record label, they founded their own, Blue Horizon.

Smart.

“They took a jazz song that had some swing to it, and they garaged it out,” Peter Blecha, author of “Sonic Boom: The History of Northwest Rock From ‘Louie Louie’ to ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit,’ ” said in an interview on Tuesday. “They stomped their way through it, ignored the niceties of the sound and made it palatable to 15-year-old tastes.”

“Walk — Don’t Run” became the Ventures’ formula, applied on hundreds of subsequent records. That same year, 1960, they had another hit with their instrumental version of “Perfidia,” a much-covered song by the Mexican songwriter Alberto Domínguez. (Charlie Parker, Glenn Miller, Nat King Cole and Linda Ronstadt, among others, have also recorded versions of it.)

Bird did Perfidia? Never heard it.

The band covered pop hits, television theme songs and various novelties in the signature Ventures style, including Johnny Cash’s “I Walk the Line,” “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue” and the “Batman” theme. Psychedelic albums followed in the late 1960s, and in 1972 the Ventures covered “Theme From ‘Shaft,’ ” the blaxploitation classic by Isaac Hayes.

Ventures doing I Walk the Line? Wild, man.

In 1965 the group released an instructional album, “Play Guitar With the Ventures,” and over the years many top rock guitarists, including George Harrison and John Fogerty, have acknowledged a debt to the band.

Wow.

The Ventures were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008; Mr. Fogerty was the presenter. Mr. Bogle was not in attendance, but Mr. Wilson and Mr. Edwards were, and Ms. Taylor, the band’s manager and widow of Mel Taylor, accepted the honor on his behalf. Mr. Taylor died in 1996, and Howie Johnson had died in 1988. At the ceremony, the band performed the “Hawaii Five-O” theme and “Walk — Don’t Run.”

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Are you Experienced?

I have been, and am, listening to Jimi Hendrix. I've long loved Hendrix: in the 1960s he, Joplin, the Doors, John Lennon, among others, were my music. When Jimi and Janis died I began to drift away from rock; I didn't know who Bruce Springsteen was, at first, when my good friend Lou mentioned "The Boss" to me. By then I was into Beethoven, Tchaikovskii and Stravinsky, and was getting into jazz (Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young).

Over the years I listened to rock now and then. I liked Living Colour when my sons were growing up (mid 1980s, I'd guess); Cult of Personality was, I think, their biggest, certainly a big, hit. There were others I liked, but not much. Living Color reminded me of Hendrix; Jimi was the standard, the (in modern terminology) metric. Stevie Ray Vaughn I dug a lot. Eric Clapton I always liked. George Harrison put out albums over the years, and I liked him. Once Lennon was gone, taken, my exile, or separation, from rock and roll was certain.

Yet the memories remained, and from time to time I'd listen to my old Hendrix albums: Band of Gypsies and Live in the West are the two I still have. Recently I returned to listen; the progression is a bit blurry, because I did not make note of it happening, I just took CDs from HWPL and listened.

It began with SRV. Stevie Ray Vaughn: I remember when he was killed in the accident; I was into Clapton at that time. I also remember being into SRV (I'd see him on Austin City Limits), and was hurt deeply by his passing. SRV reminded me a lot of Hendrix; in fact, SRV idolized Jimi, and played his music a lot.

I came back to SRV from the biography of John Hammond that I read, The producer : John Hammond and the soul of American music . Hammond recorded Bessie Smith, Lady Day, Prez, Basie, Dylan, Springsteen and SRV.

From SRV I moved to Hendrix, to Marley, and, now, deeply into Jimi. So, there it be.

Yet it is more than just listening to music, I think. There is very little 1960s music I can tolerate; when I hear WFUV playing, I cringe, keep myself from retching, and move on. Only some of the music is tolerable, and that which is, is more than tolerable: it is fun, enjoyable, pleasurable.

This past weekend, as I drove upstate, a thought flashed in my brain: I am here, riding in my station-wagon, 55, listening to Hendrix on a CD. It seemed, well, cool, neat (no, I won't say ... cringe ... groovy).