MickeyV | All About Blues Music

Rev. J M GATES

When the ‘race music‘ industry was getting into its stride in the mid-20s, a surprising number of records were not secular Blues or vaudeville songs, but religious recordings. While the ‘Blues Divas’ and country songsters provided the secular output, the sacred side was dominated by Gospel singers, ‘hell-fire preachers’ and ‘guitar evangelists’. Blind Willie Johnson…

JOHNNY LAWS

For nearly 50 years Johnny Laws has been playing the Blues around the Southside clubs in Chicago and, apart from a couple of excellent albums in the 90s, he has never caused much of a stir outside his own community. That’s a shame because Johnny has a great voice: his passionate falsetto and smooth delivery…

ROSCO GORDON

Rosco Gordon was a Memphis pianist who developed an off-beat shuffle that gave his work a distinctive flavour. That sound went on to be very influential in Ska and Reggae music when Rosco’s records made it to Jamaica. As one of the Beale Streeters, Rosco played with the Blues élite and he had some very…

IMELDA MAY

Imelda May is a self-reliant artist who writes her own material and has produced or co-produced all her work to date, and her material certainly has Rock’n’Roll roots, but her voice and phrasing have Jazz and Blues influences all over them. She is a modern musician with a clear vision of the qualities required to…

JOHNNIE JOHNSON

Johnnie Johnson’s driving, boogie piano was a key factor in the success of Chuck Berry’s music, and the title ‘Johnny B. Goode’ is said to be a reference to Johnnie’s rumbunctious behaviour when he was drinking. Credited with getting Chuck started and then sticking with him for twenty years, Johnnie had a late-blooming solo career…

ERNIE K-DOE

It is easy to write off Ernie K-Doe as a one-hit-wonder, despite his good total of R&B Chart entries, but they were all overshadowed by his monster 1961 hit ‘Mother-in-Law’ which went to Number One in the Billboard Hot 100 as well as the R&B chart. While he never came close to repeating that feat,…

EDDIE ‘Cleanhead’ VINSON

Eddie ‘Cleanhead’ Vinson’s alto sax graced many great jazz, jump-Blues and R&B records, and his distinctive, playful singing voice got him some hit records as a front man in his own band. Equally at home taking solos in The Count Basie Orchestra or rocking the room with The Johnny Otis Revue, Cleanhead’s shining dome reflected…

JAMES COTTON

In 1954, James Cotton was a teenage Memphis harp player who had cut a few tracks for Sun Records, when Muddy Waters showed up and offered him a place in his band. James grabbed the opportunity with both hands and stayed for thirteen years. When he went solo, James unleashed a great roaring Blues voice…

DAVE VAN RONK

Guitarist Dave Van Ronk was a leading light of the Folk/Blues revival movement centred on Greenwich Village in the early 60s. With a deft fingerpicking style, a rough voice and a devilish way with a lyric, Dave was a popular act around New York, but showed little interest in becoming a star, preferring to explore…

JEFF BECK

Jeff Beck was a young session guitarist who was taken up by one of the leading bands of the British Blues Boom and, when he went solo, went on to produce ‘Truth’, one of the most influential albums of his generation. Joe Bonamassa, every single Hard-Rock power-trio and the entire Heavy Metal genre took something…