Monday 27 May 2013

This week's playlist

Loretta and The Bad Kings - "Honest I Do"
Anni Piper - "Live To Play"
Geno Washington and The Ram Jam Band - "High Heel Sneakers"
Muddy Waters - Honey Bee
Ray Bonneville - "Canary Yellow Car"
Asleep At The Wheel - "That's Your Red Wagon"
Grandpa Banana - "Blue Driver"
Noah Lewis Jug Band - "Selling The Jelly"
Paul Lamb - "Hootin' And Screamin'"
Mississippi John Hurt - "Hot Time In The Old Town Tonight"
Nicole Hart and Anni Piper - "Ain't Nobody Watchin'"
John Pippus - "House Of Cards"
Robert Nighthawk - "Back Water Blues"
Harmonica Frank - "Howlin' Tomcat"
Mill Billy Blues - "Railroad Worksong"
Anni Piper - "Jailbait"
Nicole Hart and Anni Piper - "Can't Let You Go"
The Jeff Beck Group - "I Ain't Superstitious"
Isaiah B Brunt - "Beale Street"
Big Bill Broonzy - "I Can't Be Satisfied"
James Harman - "Crazy Mixed Up World"

Featured Artist: Anni Piper

Anni Piper

Australian performer Anni Piper’s sultry vocals have attracted significant worldwide interest and she secured a deal with USA label Blues Leaf Records in 2008. Piper’s latest CD was recorded at Showplace Studios in New Jersey, USA and was released in February 2013. ‘Split Second’ features Piper’s bass playing talents throughout and she shares vocal duties with talented Florida based Nicole Hart. The blues songstresses beguile listeners with butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-your-mouth harmonies and heart-rending ballads of love gone sour. But as well as showing their sweet side, there’s a little spice with diverse originals and covers from Janis Joplin to Ronnie Earl.
Anni Piper began playing electric guitar at 12 years old, but became a devoted musician when she was given her first bass at age 14. She quickly discovered an affinity with the instrument, preferring to lay down a groove rather than scream out a solo. Piper’s musical ability and strong focus led her to complete a Bachelor of Arts (Contemporary Music) at Southern Cross University, Lismore NSW, at only 19 years of age.
Piper remembers with clarity the first time she heard the blues back in her school days (“It was Paul Butterfield Blues Band playing ‘Born in Chicago’ - I knew straight away this was the direction I was heading.” she says).
In early 2004 Piper made the decision to record ‘Jailbait’, her debut CD. The album was an immediate success, winning the category of ‘Best New Talent’ at the 2005 Australian Blues Music Awards, plus making finalist for ‘Best Female Vocal’. Piper also achieved first place in the 2004 ABC Radio ‘Fresh Air’ competition. These weren’t the only accolades for ‘Jailbait’ and Piper went on to become a top 5 finalist in the blues category of the 2004 MusicOz competition, and 2nd place winner in the blues category of the 2005 Australian National Songwriting Contest.
To promote the album Piper toured Australia extensively, particularly the east coast. Festival appearances include the Woodford Folk Festival (QLD), Optus National Music Muster (Gympie, QLD), Wangaratta Jazz Festival (VIC), Echuca Blues Festival (VIC), Backwater Blues Festival (SA), Bruthen Blues and Arts Festival (VIC), Queenscliff Music Festival (VIC), and the Australian Blues Music Festival (Goulburn, NSW).
Piper’s second album ‘Texas Hold ‘Em’ was recorded in early 2007. It was a much ‘rawer’ recording, and represented Piper’s live sound at the time more effectively than her first album. Already acknowledged as being an accomplished bass player and singer, this album showed that Piper had blossomed into a songwriter of distinction; her songs having a blues sensibility whilst still addressing the issues of today.
Piper’s USA debut, titled ‘Two’s Company’ was released in January 2009 and hit #1 on the Australian Roots music charts and # 21 on the USA ‘Living Blues’ chart.
Her CD ‘Chasin’ Tail’ was launched in February 2010 at the Australian Blues Music Festival, NSW. ‘Chasin’ Tail’ has also been released by Blues Leaf Records throughout the rest of the world to rave reviews. For this album, Anni chose a tougher sound, influenced by the blues / rock idols she enjoyed in her youth.
Other career achievements include nomination as a top five finalist in the 2010 Musicoz Awards in the Blues / Roots category, and finalist in the 2009 APRA Professional Development Awards. Piper was also a finalist for ‘Best Female Vocal’ at the 2008 Australian Blues Music Awards and received a nomination for the ‘Rudy Brandsma’ award at the 2007 Australian National Songwriting Contest.

Monday 20 May 2013

This week's playlist

Nine Below Zero - "Hard Goin' Up (Twice As Hard Comin' Down)"
The Mustangs - "The Line"
Chris Thomas King - "Hard Time Killing Floor"
Rabbit Foot - "Down The Road"
Paul DeLay Band - "Harpoon Man"
Little Walter - "Hate To See You Go"
Memphis Jug Band - "He's In The Jailhouse Now"
Sunday Wilde - "He Thrills Me Up"
Roy Gaines and The Crusaders - "Hell Of A Night"
The Mustangs - "Payback"
Sandi Thom - "Help Me"
Eric Bibb - "Bayou Belle"
Bessie Smith - "He's Got Me Going"
Poplar Jake - "Five And Some Change"
Freddie King - "Hide Away"
Savoy Brown - "Highway Blues"
Seasick Steve and The Level Devils - "Hobo Blues"
The Mustangs - "Gotta Be Good"
The Mustangs - "When God Met The Devil"
Flyin' Saucer Gumbo Special - "New Orleans"
Earl Hooker - "Hold On"

Featured Artist: The Mustangs

 The Mustangs
The Mustangs are a British blues rock band that were formed in Hampshire in 2001. They are unusual on the blues rock circuit as their albums are made of entirely original material.
The Mustangs were formed by Adam Norsworthy and Derek Kingaby after an impromptu jam session in the Fountain Pub in Rowland's Castle, Hampshire, in 2001. The Mustangs first came to national attention after winning the Eel Pie Club's Search for New Blues Talent competition in 2004.
The Mustangs have played and headlined a wide variety of gigs and blues festivals across the UK and Europe including Colne, Maryport, Blues on The Farm, Newark, Swanage, Skegness, Hyde Park, Goodwood, Zinc Paris, Gosport and Southsea. Their concerts showcase singer Norsworthy's dynamic energy: he runs and jumps about the stage throughout each concert, whilst maintaining a visible camaraderie with the other band members.
As well as their own material, in concert the group often plays some blues standards, though radically reinterpreting the arrangement to suit the band's "truly storming... ferocious" sound. These include Leadbelly's "Hands Off", Troyce Keane's "Annie Maybe" and Cyril Davies "Countryline Special".
Chiefly influenced by the British blues rock bands of the 1960s such as Led Zeppelin and Fleetwood Mac as well as Dr. Feelgood, the Mustangs also draw on more traditional blues influences such as Muddy Waters, Elmore James and Robert Johnson. The band's use of blues harp, played by Derek Kingaby, adds to an authentic, traditional blues sound.
The majority of the songwriting is by Norsworthy, but all four members of the band have contributed songs to the albums.
The band's fifth album, Cut Loose, received a 5 star review in the May 2010 issue of R2 magazine. In the same year, as well as being nominated for best band at the British Blues Awards, Ben Mckeown and Jon Bartley were nominated for an award in their own instrument categories, Mckeown for Best Bass Guitarist and Bartley for Best Drummer.
The band's sixth album, Shaman & the Monkey, was released in October 2011. The band supported the release with a number of shows at high profile blues festivals across the UK including Maryport, Cambridge, Swanage, Newark and the Isle of Wight. The Mustangs left Cross Border later in 2011 and signed to the Trapeze Music label, who subsequently took over the release of the Shaman & the Monkey album, as well taking over the distribution of the band's entire back catalogue.
In December, 2012 Shaman & the Monkey was voted Best UK and European blues rock album by the prestigious Blues Underground Network. The song 'Highwire', from Shaman & the Monkey, was nominated as Best Original Blues Song at the 2012 British Blues Awards. This was the band's fourth ever nomination at the Awards.
The band's seventh album, Speed of Love, was released on April 8th.
In 2012, as Adam & the King Bee, Norsworthy and Derek Kingaby released Pow Wow, a collection of blues- and country-tinged songs that they had written while rooming together on tour with the Mustangs

Monday 13 May 2013

This week's playlist

Sunny Blair - "Glad To Be Back Home"
The Jeff Healey Band - "Confidence Man"
Leadbelly - "Good Morning Blues"
Wesley Pruitt Band - "Gone Gone Gone"
James Cotton - "Bird Nest On The Ground"
John Primer and Bob Corritore - "Harmonica Joyride"
Josh White - "Good Gal"
Mississippi Sarah and Daddy Stovepipe - "Greenville Strut"
The Mighty Mojo Prophets - "Sweetness"

The Jeff Healey Band - "Nice Problem To Have"
Status Quo - "Good Thinking"
The Jeff Healey Band - "I'm Ready"
Charlie Mosbrook - "Catnipped"
Charlie Mosbrook - "I Will Be Coming Home To You"
Alexis Korner and Peter Thorup - "Gospel Ship"
The McCarthys - "Feed The Hand"
Eric Bibb and Habib Koite - "Goin' Down That Road Feelin' Bad"
James Buddy Rogers - "Guitar Sue"
The Jeff Healey Band - "Yer Blues"

Featured Artist: Jeff Healey

Norman Jeffrey "Jeff" Healey
(March 25, 1966 – March 2, 2008)
What made Jeff Healey different from other blues-rockers was also what kept some listeners from accepting him as anything other than a novelty -- the fact that the blind guitarist played his Fender Stratocaster on his lap, not standing up. With the guitar in his lap, Healey could make unique bends and hammer-ons, making his licks different and more elastic than most of the competition. Unfortunately, his material leaned toward standard AOR blues-rock, which rarely let him cut loose, but when he did, his instrumental prowess could be shocking.
Healey lost his sight at the age of one, after developing eye cancer. He began playing guitar when he was three years old and began performing with his band Blues Direction at the age of 17. Healey formed The Jeff Healey Band in 1985, featuring bassist Joe Rockman and drummer Tm Stephen. This trio released one single on its own Forte record label, which led to a contract with Arista Records. The Jeff Healey Band released their debut album, “See The Light”, in 1988 and the guitarist immediately developed a devoted following in blues-rock circles. Featuring the hit single "Angel Eyes," the record went platinum in the U.S. While The Jeff Healey Band's subsequent records were popular, none were as successful as the debut.
As the 21st century dawned, Healey began to change his direction. He taught himself to play the trumpet and began to lean toward the kind of traditional 1920s and '30s jazz that had always fascinated him. He released two classic jazz albums, 2002's “Among Friends” and 2004's “Adventures In Jazzland”, on his own HealeyOphonic label, and a third traditional jazz outing with “It's Tight Like That”, which appeared on Stony Plain in 2006. And while he continued to do shows in his earlier blues-rock style, he increasingly gigged with his jazz combo, The Jazz Wizards.
In 2008, a month before the release of his last studio-recorded blues album, “Mess Of Blues”, Healey died from cancer.
“Songs From The Road”, a collection of live blues-rock performances from 2006 and 2007, was released by the Ruf imprint in 2009, nearly 18 months after Healey's death. His final studio jazz album, “Last Call”, was issued by Stony Plain in April 2010.

Monday 6 May 2013

This week's playlist

Timothy Hay - "Feral Beast"
Grateful Dead - "When Push Comes To Shove"
Ray Manzarek and Roy Rogers - "Fives And Ones"
Big Twist and The Mellow Fellows - "Flip Flop"
Kathy Frank - "Florida Blues"
Frank Crummit - "Frankie And Johnnie"
Cincinnati Jug Band - "George Street Stomp"
Bill Bourne and The Free Radio Band - "Forever Truly Bound"
The Paul Rose Band - "Rollin' And Tumblin"
Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band - "Blue Yodel"
Grateful Dead - "Truckin"
Paul Rose - "Ball And Chain"
Paul Rose - "Just A Little Bit"
Memphis Minnie - "Georgia Skin"
King Biscuit Boy - "Get It Right"
Zoot Money - "Get On The Right Track Baby"
Dr Feelgood - "All Through The City"
Lonnie Johnson - "Get Yourself Together"
Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band - "Casey Jones"

Featured Artist: Jerry Garcia

Jerry Garcia
August 1, 1942 - August 9, 1995

Guitarist, singer, and songwriter Jerry Garcia was best known as a founding member of The Grateful Dead, the rock band for which he served as de facto leader for 30 years, 1965-1995.
Jerome John Garcia, named after the show tune composer Jerome Kern, was born August 1, 1942.
Garcia displayed an early interest in music and took piano lessons as a child.
He showed great interest in art, attending the California School of Fine Arts during the summer of 1957, and for his 15th birthday that year, his mother gave him a guitar
18 years old, Garcia moved to Palo Alto, CA, where he lived informally over the next several years, playing in clubs and bookstores near the campus of Stanford University and encountering many of the people he would work with for the rest of his career.
The early '60s was the period of a folk music revival, and Garcia became an avid student of folk, old-time country, and bluegrass music, playing both the acoustic guitar and banjo in ad hoc groups with names like the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, the Wildwood Boys, and the Hart Valley Drifters over the next two years.
During 1964, he began playing in a jug band, Moter McCree's Uptown Jug Champions, that also featured guitarist/singer Bob Weir and singer/harmonica player/keyboardist Ron McKernan (aka Pigpen). At the turn of 1965, the group took up electric instruments and became a rock & roll band, adding drummer Bill Kreutzmann and renaming themselves The Warlocks. Phil Lesh, another friend of Garcia's joined on bass by June 1965, and in December the quintet first performed under its new name, The Grateful Dead. Their first single, comprised of the traditional songs "Stealin'" and "Don't Ease Me In," was released by Scorpio Records in June 1966, The Grateful Dead signed to Warner Bros. Records for the release of their first album,'The Grateful Dead', in March 1967.
Taking up the pedal steel guitar, he helped form The New Riders Of The Purple Sage with singer/songwriter John Dawson and guitarist David Nelson, the latter one of his old friends from his Palo Alto days, the band filled out by Grateful Dead members Lesh and Mickey Hart.
His first track as a solo performer was "Love Scene," which appeared on the soundtrack to the 1970 film Zabriskie Point. He also began playing in a pickup band in a club in San Francisco with keyboardist Howard Wales, beginning a string of gigs that would lead to The JGB, although the more immediate result was his first "solo" album, an LP actually credited to Wales and him, called 'Hooteroll?', released by Douglas Records in 1971.
In June 1974, Round Records released Garcia's second solo album, which, like his first, was called Garcia. To avoid confusion, fans began calling it 'Compliments Of Garcia' because of the legend "Compliments Of" that appeared on a sticker on promotional copies sent to radio stations, and it later was officially retitled 'Compliments'. The album featured no new compositions by Garcia and was more in the mode of his club band, with numerous cover songs. Nevertheless, it reached the Top 50
It has been suggested that the dearth of recordings by either Garcia or The Grateful Dead in the early and mid-'80s was partly the result of the guitarist's drug usage during the period. Always known for his affection for psychedelic drugs Garcia apparently had moved on to harder drugs by this time. On January 18, 1985, he was arrested for possession of cocaine and heroin. He avoided jail time by agreeing to seek treatment, attend Narcotics Anonymous meetings, and do a benefit concert. Along with his drug usage, his smoking and other unhealthy behavior contributed to a physical decline during what turned out to be the last decade of his life.
Garcia did a special series of shows at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater on Broadway in New York City in October 1987, leading an acoustic string band in the first set and The JGB in the second. The shows resulted in a live album, 'Almost Acoustic', credited to The Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band, released by Grateful Dead Merchandising in 1988.
In February 1991, Garcia added a third steady group to his schedule, appearing in an acoustic duo with his old friend Dvid Grisman at the Warfield and, shortly after, releasing the album 'Jerry Garcia/David Grisman' through Grisman's Acoustic Disc label. Warfield shows from 1990 with The JGB were the source for Arista's two-CD set Jerry Garcia Band, released in May 1991.
The summer of 1995 found The Grateful Dead as usual playing outdoor stadiums, and they finished the run with a show at Soldier Field in Chicago on July 9. It was the band's last concert. A week later, Garcia checked into the Betty Ford Clinic, his first-ever attempt at formal rehab to kick his heroin habit. He stayed a couple of weeks, but did not complete the clinic's one-month program. On August 8, he entered another rehab facility in Forest Knolls, CA. In the early hours of August 9, 1995, he died there in his sleep of a heart attack at the age of 53.
Although Garcia eschewed the title of leader of The Grateful Dead, his significance to the band was obvious, and the surviving members' announcement in December 1995 that the group was breaking up without him was no surprise.