Category: Keep the Music Playing

So I have listened to an album over the last few days that i think is one of the best blues albums of the year, Q.E.D. by Jim Allchin. Jim is not quite your typical blues artist. How many blues artist do you know that you can say this about??…. While pursuing his Ph.D. in Computer Science at Georgia Institute of Technology in the early eighties, he was the primary architect of the Clouds distributed object-oriented operating system;[6] his thesis was entitled “An Architecture for Reliable Decentralized Systems”.[7] That’s because not many blues artist are former Microsoft executives. While Allchin…

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So this afternoon’s soundtrack will be the new album from Kara Grainger Shiver & Sigh. Here’s some background from Amazon.com Australia native, now Los Angeles based, Kara Grainger first picked up the guitar at age 12. She started performing in the late ’90s as lead vocalist and guitarist with the successful Sydney-based blues outfit, Papa Lips. With her brother, acclaimed harmonica player Mitch Grainger, Kara and Papa Lips enjoyed a quintessentially Australian experience. Fuelled by national ABC Radio play for their two albums, “Harmony” and “High Time Now,” the band toured up and down the sun drenched beach towns of…

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So one of those early bluesman who mightily influenced blues and rock performers in the 60s  and 70s was born on December 5th! Now the year he was born that may be in question in his review at the AllMusic Guide, Cub Koda writes: A moody, bitter, and suspicious man, no one wove such a confusing web of misinformation as Sonny Boy Williamson II. Even his birth date (stated as December 5, 1899 in most reference books, but some sources claim his birth may have been in either 1897 or 1909) and real name (Aleck or Alex or Willie “Rice” — which may…

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A review of the Roots Music Blues Chart this morning led me to the blues of , Eugene “Birdlegg” Pittman and his 2013 Dialtone release Birdlegg.(#38) Since 1980 Birdlegg has been playing the blues in and around Oakland, California with his band the Tight Fit Blues Band. The band’s lineup would change from time to time but regularly included Texas-born bass player and singer Country Pete McGill and even once featured legendary Chess session guitarist Luther Tucker. Through the years he often told folks:, “I don’t do floors, windows or shoes—I play the Oakland blues!”Birdlegg was named Blues Harmonica Player of the Year by the…

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