The Rockford Register-Star’s state political reporter Aaron Chambers is also a big music fan, and he scored an interview with BB King not long ago:

Fear is not among the emotions that come to mind when B.B. King, the undisputed King of the Blues, takes the stage. But that’s just what the King said he feels.

“I’m scared when I first get out there.”

Scared of what?

“I don’t know,” he said.

“But I think some people call it stage fright. If you haven’t been married, you won’t understand. But to me, it’s like meeting your in-laws for the first time. … And you say, ‘Oh God, I hope they approve of me. And I hope I can be myself.’

“After I go on stage, after a couple of tunes, it’s like I’m the No. 1 quarterback. I’m throwing the right plays. I start feeling like I’m in control.”

It also turns out that BB is an MP3 guy:

King, relaxing in his cabin beside his laptop computer and his digital audio player, recounted his favorite artists: Lonnie Johnson, Blind Lemon, Charlie Christian, Django Reinhart and T-Bone Walker.

“I was myself. I heard many other people, wished I could play like ‘em, wanted to. But couldn’t. I could never do some of the things,” he said.

“Those five people I got on my MP3 right here, right now, that I listen to. And I still can’t play like ‘em. So I had to go on doing the things the way that I felt that I could do.”

Forget those washed-up hacks U2, IPod should sell a BB King edition.