Blues For Life Your place for blues reviews and news.

Hagerstown, Maryland is the city by which I judge all cities. Basically if you do not have as many blues fests as Hagerstown, you're city is not as cool. First the Western Maryland Blues fest is one of the best I've been to but it seems like they cant go twelve months without a blues fest because in March they have the Cabin Fever Blues Bash featuring The Kelly Bell Band. It's next Thursday March 5th and if I didn't have a mid term that day I'm be driving out there. I'm definitely going to be a the big blues fest May 28, only two weeks after the Chesapeake Bay Blues fest. Fun times.

One 'phat' blues bash - Hagerstown Morning Herald

One 'phat' blues bash Hagerstown Morning Herald, MD The band isn't just out to sell music and tickets, but expand the audience for blues, he said. The band will get that chance next Thursday, March 5, at The Maryland Theatre as it performs at the Cabin Fever Blues Bash. The Blues Bash began as a ...

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Well the long Gatemouth Brown headstone disaster has come to an end. He has been granted a state marker even without the required 10 years to pass before he would be eligible. Brown's family is also getting a more elaborate marker made up for him as well.

We're all happy this has worked out, seeing how all these hurricanes and what not has made for a pretty restless afterlife. It has still convinced me to be cremated though.

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Hey Cleveland; go to your blues fest and see Bobby Blue Bland. I saw him last October after his resent bought of bronchitis and to be honest it wasn't that great. Overall I felt really depressed afterwords. having faced the decline of an idol into a wheelchair bound version of his former self. Maybe you'll have better luck.

From listening to The Black Keys I realize that I really have not listened to enough Howlin’ Wolf and seeing as I will finally get to see Hubert Sumlin (his guitarist) at this year’s Chesapeake Bay Blues fest I figure I better brush up on him. I’m going to start with my favorite song of his, Killing Floor.

You know what I'm not in a blues mood today. I'm on my new laptop transferring my collection of music and I keep thinking about a song I played in Jazz band yesterday, Buddy Rich's famous Channel One Suite. I got to say I can't wait to play this song on our concert in April.

Awesome song and here is you're chance to check it out.

Channel One Suite - Buddy Rich

I'm tired of talking about all the male artists out there so I think it's time for some more love for the ladies and for this I have one of my favorite ladies period, Shemekia Copeland. She is one of the latest in a long tradition of great female blues singers.

Of course her last name should be familiar to a lot of blues fans as she is the daughter of the late Johnny Copeland who is up on my list of the best blues singers ever. One listen to Shemekia though and you're happy that it runs in the family because she is just fantastic. I first saw her at the 2007 Chesapeake Bay Blues Festival and she was really fantastic. Talking to Strangers and The Soul Truth are great albums of hers to check out.

I really recommend checking out the link below. It's got some info on her new album and her thoughts about the future of the blues.

Shemekia Copeland's Singing The Blues, And Its Praises - Hartford Courant

Hartford Couran

Shemekia Copeland's Singing The Blues, And Its Praises Hartford Courant, United States By KATHERINE SILKAITIS | Special to The Courant "I always felt that if country music could get as big as it got, blues could do the same thing," she says. Though only 29 years old, Copeland is an old hand when it comes to the music biz.

So apparently my most hated "Blues" club, House of Blues has failed at the new opening in Boston. With the opening bands named Kid:Nap:Kin, Re-Up, and Sex! opening up the venue the place was quickly overwhelmed by blues fans wanting to see the show....

Actually here is what happened; Blues fans stayed away and skanks went there and froze in the cold because they couldn't get in. Stupid skanks.

Dear Dan Akroyd,

I will buy the new Ghostbuster game but after that you will be dead to me unless you sell you're stakes in House of Blues.

-Dan

On of my favorite bands that I have found on the internet is Michael Holt and the Trophy 500s. They do some great hard driving blues rockabilly fusion. I've talked about them before and today I was checking out their myspace and I saw something so awesome I had to post it. This is their bus. Now that is one awesome bus for an awesome band.

Hi everybody. My computer has decided that today was going to be it's last. Right now my entire blues collection is in limbo, which is some 5 gigs of music. Needless to say I'm a bit upset. I've got a laptop I use for taking not so my posting shouldn't be hurt but I'm still worried about my music, all 30 gigs of it.

In the mean time enjoy this video of a young Otis Rush. (Damnt all my Otis Rush music is on broken computer.)

John Mayall wasn’t kidding when he said “...rather hoping to expand on it through guest appearances and in the company with other musicians…” about his music after he disbanded the Bluesbreakers. It turns out that the “guest appearances” would be with none other than than the king of the blues himself B.B. King who is returning to the Untied Kingdom for 4-date tour at Manchester MEN Arena on Wednesday 24th June, 2009, and will also take in arena dates at the Birmingham NIA, Cardiff CIA and London Wembley Arena. If you are in the UK and have any idea of where those places are I urgently suggest that you get tickets because who knows the next time B.B. makes it to your islands.

Source: Music News.com

Yep still more posts of The Black Keys but this time in a new awesome video form. Here are The Black Keys on Leterman from last April pluging their most recent album Attack and Release.

Ok I am now down $9.95. I apologize for comparing Patrick Carney to cancer scares, and for everything I have said bad about The Black Keys. I take that back their name sucks for a band that does not have a piano.

Now what would have made me actually take back anything I have said? Well it is The Big Come Up , The Black Keys first album. This is one pretty rocking album. It has that sixties blues feel with a bit of British and Southern sound all under the umbrella of Howlin’ Wolf. Seriously they even used poor vocal mics as a way to get Wolf’s raspy voice in there.

This is some seriously good rocking blues here so why the hell are Hipsters into this band? I mean now I would say I’m into them now that my foot is out of my mouth and I certainly am happy that they have a group of followers that like them. But really what is it that hipsters like about them? I can name a lot of hard blues rock bands like them, are they popular too? Sure The Black Keys have some stuff that is out there but that is maybe thirty percent of there music. Hipsters don’t seem to be drawn to any other blues band so this is really strange to me.

Perhaps hipsters don’t suck as much as I though they do? Well they probably do but now they are more confusing. If someone could help me out on this I’d be grateful.

God damn it how could i have missed this guy who was right down the road. Why did no one ever tell me about Sonny Landreth? Oh well maybe I can catch him at the Heritage Music Bluesfest.

It seems today that the only blues band known by anyone near my age is this group known as The Black Keys. I was first introduced to them by a “hipster” girl at my school. If you don’t know what a “hipster” is than consider yourself lucky but if you really must know than I’ll refer you to an article by Douglas Haddow poetically called Hipster: The Dead End of Western Civilization. By directing you to the afore mentioned article you can get an idea about my opinion on the cultureless rabble called Hipsters.

Now you must be wondering where do The Black Keys come into this? Well it turns out Hipsters LOVE The Black Keys. You see The Black Keys are an Akron, Ohio indie band that has been described by some woefully incorrect journalists (The Guardian) “have reignited the spirit of the blues.” This statement should be surprising to most Blues fans and we weren't aware that the spirit had gone out. To people who know better, the Blues is perhaps the most resilient genre there is, considering that many genres have died suffering less than half  losses the Blues has.  Best Buy has a Blues section but last I saw there was no Disco. When I heard The Black Keys had reignited the blues spirit I only had one thing to say, “Who are these guys?”

The Black Keys are a due consisting of Dan Auerbach on guitars and vocals and Patrick Carney trying to play the drums. Yes it there are in fact no black keys (piano) in the band. To be honest Dab Auerbach is a pretty good guitarist and Carney is good in the way that horrible scares are your face left are when an tumor was removed are good, sure you don’t have cancer but now people look at you funny in public.

So here is what I’ve put together so far: Hipsters suck, Hipster like sucky things, Hipsters like The Black Keys, therefore The Black Keys suck. 

But where am I going with this? Well I’m going to do some investigative journalism and actually listen to them and see if they are better than their youTube videos (which suck). Now I’m also going to put my money where my mouth is, I’m going to download an album of theirs and if I like it I swear on Stevie Ray Vaughan’s grave (big swear) that I will buy the album and shut up about them being so sucky.

Stay tuned for part two of this ground breaking investigation.

So per my previous post you know my schedule was looking pretty full coming up. Well I found out Buddy is going to be here this summer so that has opened up some opportunities for other shows. Robert Cray is set and now I'm looking at getting Joe Bonamassa tickets. I'm pretty excited and I'll let you know if I get the tickets.

Till then About.com's blues blogger Kieth Gordon has got a great preview of Joe's new CD.

Joe Bonamassa CD Preview

via About.com Blues

Blues-rock guitarist Joe Bonamassa's own independent J & R Adventures label has announced a February 24th, 2009 release date for Bonamassa's new album, The Ballad of John Henry. Working once...

We all love free things and it has been awhile since I posted some links. So here is a link to a free Saffire mp3.