Tag: Blues

Saturday Matinee – Flaco Jiménez, Big George Brock & Dan Patlansky

Flaco Jiménez (1939-2025) began playing the bajo sexto at the age of seven with his father, Santiago Jiménez Sr., a pioneer of conjunto music. He later adopted the accordion after being influenced by his father as well as zydeco musician Clifton Chenier.

Big George Brock was born in Grenada, Mississippi on May 16, 1932. By the time he was eight, he was working as a sharecropper picking cotton. He moved to Mattson, Mississippin, while in his teens, met and performed with Muddy Waters. In the late 1940s he moved to Walls, Mississippi where Howlin’ Wolf hired him as a roadie and sideman, and while in Walls he jammed with Memphis Minnie at house parties.

Dan Patlansky was voted the #4 Best Guitarist in the world and (besides Joe Bonamassa!) remains the only artist in the world with two worldwide No. 1, and two worldwide No. 2 Best Blues Rock Albums as voted by Blues Rock Review USA.

Got a lotta stuff to think about getting around to planning to do one of these days, but not tomorrow because I’ve got an appointment on the porch around porch time. See you there.

Saturday Matinee – Shinyribs, 19-Twenty & Wee Willie Walker

Based in Austin, Texas, and fronted by Kevin “Shinyribs” Russel,
Shinyribs “defies genres as a sonic melting pot of Texas Blues, New Orleans R&B funk, horn- driven Memphis Soul, country twang, border music, big band swing, and roots-rock.”

19-Twenty is a high energy roots rock/blues band who have played numerous prominent festivals and many small venues across Australia. Their recordings include collaborations with other Aussie greats like Aloe Blacc, Lachy Doley, Roshani & Hussy Hicks.

Wee Willie Walker (1941-2019) was a gospel, R&B and soul singer born in Hernando, Mississippi, raised in Memphis, Tennessee. His first release, in 1967, was a cover of the Beatles’ Ticket to Ride.

Holy crap what a week of weather – record heat, record rains, record floods. Prayers to those who suffered losses of property and especially to those who lost loved ones.

Galeanthropic Hot Links

GTR, Chase Walker Band (2024)
The Chase Walker Band is a blues roots rock and soul band from Riverside, California.  Guitar prodigy Walker has already attracted the attention of many in the industry, and he’s still in his twenties.

Slab City.

Rat Rods.

Ghostfish.

“You do you.”

Rust harvest.

The Future Bean.

Schrödinger’s Deli.

1959 Spülmaschine.

Watch this cucumber.

The Gold Medal House.

Trix ‘O’ Treat Billy Move.

Brazilian crowd control.

A Forest Full of Fireflies.

Norty Blues Episode 124.

Stevie Wonder on drums.

Swedish barn conversion.

Lois Gibson’s many faces.

The bow of the USS New Orleans.

English Rat Girls [via Memo Of The Air].

Classic fighters [via The Feral Irishman].

“Sorry to bother you, but I got a favor to ask.”

1930s nightclub matchbook covers [via Everlasting Blört].

Cheater Slick Culture [h/t Mr. Joe @ The View from Lady Lake].

[Top image via Xwitter: All at Sea, Louis Wain (1860-1939)]

From the Archives: 1 year ago. 5 years ago. 10 years ago. 15 years ago.

Saturday Matinee – Blues Against The Machine, The Future Shape Of Sound & Otis Rush

Blues Against The Machine is a six-man blues/jump/boogie/rock supergroup with members from Portugal, Spain, Norway, Poland and Italy. Winners of several prestigious blues awards, BATM are headliners at many blues festivals around Europe.

The Future Shape Of Sound, aka The Church of Rock & Roll, advertise themselves as a “9-piece Rock’n’Roll Gospel Spectacle”. Three of the members have a side hustle as the award-winning Soca Divettes.

From his first hit in 1956 (I Can’t Quit You Baby) Otis Rush was the sound of West Side Chicago electric blues. His vocals and playing style influenced many who followed, including Buddy Guy, Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughn (who named his band after Rush’s 1959 hit Double Trouble).

I intended to post something insightful and brilliant about the recent state of affairs but decided to save it for another time and another place.
Like tomorrow. On the porch. Be there or BL7.

Happy Independence Day!

Independence Day 1919 Washington D.C.

Have a happy 4th, and if you do the splody things, may you have the same number of fingers tomorrow – your hair will grow back, but they won’t. For those in the BBQ and beer crowd, here are some random tunes from the archives in no particular order.

[Caveat: I don’t own the copyrights to any of the recordings. They are presented here for entertainment purposes only.]

Saturday Matinee – The Big Wait, Jesse Dayton, and The Hoax

A couple readies a remote Australian town for visitors who might never arrive. The pair are the sole occupants of Forrest, a former railway town that’s home to an emergency airport, which serves as an essential stop for planes needing to fill up mid-journey. More about them here.

The song featured in the short documentary is Heaven and Paradise by Don Julian and The Meadowlarks (1955).

Jesse Dayton has been around for a while, playing a mixture of Texas blues, outlaw country, and punk, while collaborating with the likes of Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Rob Zombie, John Doe, and more recently, Samantha Fish.

From Devizes, Wiltshire, England, The Hoax is/was a blues band who got a lot of attention in the 1990s. Their debut album Sound Like This was named Best British Blues Album of the Year at the British Blues Connection Awards in 1994 and they’ve recorded several more since. [Their website appears to be defunct, but they have a FB page.]

What a week. First that, then the other thing, and now we have to deal with this. We definitely need some serious porch time tomorrow, and I’ll be there when you are.

Saturday Matinee – Lil’ Jimmy Reed, Bag of Nails & Blackburn Brothers

Leon Atkins, better known as Lil’ Jimmy Reed, is one of the last original Louisiana bluesmen. Born in the late 1930s in a small sawmill town on the Mississippi, he was playing a cigar box guitar at six years old; by the time he was a teen he was playing guitar and harmonica in local clubs around Baton Rouge. Atkins earned his nickname the night he filled in for local bluesman Jimmy Reed.

Formed in Athens, Greece, in 2015, Bag of Nails describe themselves as a psychedelic blues/soul/rock trio inspired by classic music of the 1960s and ‘70s.

Blackburn Brothers were described by Living Blues magazine as a “generational family band [that] plays traditional blues and R&B with a contemporary take.” The heart of the group are the sons of Toronto R&B great Bobby Dean Blackburn.

Getting serious news overload these days, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to let up. So many topics will be up for discussion when the porch opens tomorrow at, um, you know, porch time. See you there.

Saturday Matinee – The Danielle Nicole Band, Funky Mojo Daddy & Laurie Wright

“Nicole brings it, bakes it, and serves it up blazing on a silver soul-rocking platter.” –Blues Music Magazine
From Kansas City, Missouri, southpaw bass player Danielle Nicole has some pipes. She was inducted into the Kansas Music Hall of Fame and has been the recipient of Eight Blues Music Awards.

Blues, funk/soul and roots rock group from Gary, Indiana, Funky Mojo Daddy‘s cover of Robert Johnson is a good ‘un.

Laurie Wright went from an alcoholic crackhead street bum to a sober rocker. If Johnny Rotten could shred guitar and had a tight backup band, this is him.  (The Beeb covered Wright’s recovery in April 2020 during the covid lockdowns.)
[h/t Chuck S.]

Let’s see… what’s on the itinerary for tomorrow… oh yeah. Porch Time. We can sit and discuss the latest Xwitter soap opera, or we can just sit. See you at sometime o’clock.

Saturday Matinee – The Seatsniffers, Seratones, Eliza Stark & The Dappers, and Sue Foley

The Seatsniffers are a Belgian roots rock band with a large following throughout Europe.  Unfortunately they don’t seem to have a website. [h/t Chuck S.]

They’re part rock, part psychedelia, part R&B and part soul, but mostly Seratones is lead singer and guitar player A.J. Haynes. When asked what inspires her, she responded, “Afrofuturism.”

Eliza Stark & The Dappers:
“The only rockabilly band based in Montenegro. A classic trio of guitar, drums and hot chick slapping double bass and regular guests of national TV and festivals, they also well-known for their true and original music far beyond the borders of Montenegro.” – ES & The D Facebook Page

Sue Foley covers Clarence Gatemouth Brown’s classic Okie Dokie Stomp with style (and her trademark pink paisley Stratocaster). She’s been performing and recording since she was 21, has won many awards since [bio here].

Memorial Day

Arlington National Cemetery (via Google Maps Street View)

For those of you in the Memorial Day BBQ crowd, wrapping up your roadtrips, or just chillin’ on the porch, here are some random unrelated tunes posted in May of the years 2020 – 2025, ordered by year of release.

[Caveat: I don’t own the copyrights to any of the recordings. They are presented here for entertainment purposes only.]