Q: Where are you from?
A: I'm from Nanaimo, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada - born and raised.
Q: How did you get your start in music?
A: I've always had a guitar. I can't remember a time I didn't play guitar or ukelele, so it's always just been a part of me. I started playing kind of professional gigs right in junior high school, basically. Me and my pals would rent a hall and do a show and then we started playing bars after that, and it just continues to this day.
Q: What made you pick blues?
A: I really don't know. My dad had some blues albums in his collection alongside you know, CCR and Hank Williams, but he also had BB King and Taj Mahal and people like that.
It's kind of fun because when I started listening to blues, I've gotten to the point in my career where I've managed to open up shows for so many of my blues heroes and even been on stage with them sometimes. I've done a lot of touring with Jonny Winter. He asked me to sit in one night. I've just recently opened for BB King in my hometown of Nanaimo. I actually got to play on stage with him back in Switzerland a few years ago, and a lot of the guys aren't around anymore, like Albert Collins.
Q: How would you describe your musical style?
A: I'm not a traditionalist by any stretch of the imagination, and I've listened to all that music, but when I'm doing my solo show I perform pretty traditional, but I like to throw in modern elements. When I choose a cover tune, I'll use a cover tune that people might not think of as a blues song at all and try to turn it into a blues song. So, to me it's just as much as I respect the past, I'm not a paint-by-numbers kind of guy that tries to recreate the songs the way they were done 50 years ago.
Q: Was there ever a time you thought you'd have to find a different career?
A: I never questioned it. It was not till after I got my first record deal and dealt with the professionals in Toronto. That was really not a good experience in my life, because I always just played music because I liked it and things just kept progressing positively until I ended up having a record deal and a management deal and all this stuff you're supposed to have.
Then things kind of took a nosedive for a while, and I had to kind of go back to the sense of just doing it because I like doing it. It's just something I've always done. It's nice to be back, and the last years have been very positive, you know, selling out shows and the album's doing well again, and the last record I put out sold out, Soul Bender, picked up the blues album of the year award as well as was nominated for a Juno and things like that. Those things are positive reinforcement to keep going, and I'm really looking forward to the festival this
summer, especially with the new album out.
Q: Can you tell me about Come On Down, your latest album?
A: I'm quite excited. The official release date is July 2, and we've got six new original tunes on there as well as some kind of groovy covers.
We're hoping to do quite a few of the new songs at the festival, and I'm going to expand the band when we're back there in Burnaby. We're going to have a couple of backup singers and an organ player.
Q: You've put out how many albums?
A: I think this is number 13, but I'm not sure. I look back and I go, 'holy schnikeys,' 'cause especially a lot of blues guys I know, you might just put out a record every three or four years, but I always like to have something current for people to come out to the show and check out.
Q: Is playing live the best part of your career?
A: You know, you're in a confined space in kind of a sterile environment and I think that's something I've managed to pull off in the last couple of years, is getting that live feel in the studio, kind of recreating that energy from a live show on the disc. So, that's kind of cool. I enjoy doing both, but there's just something about playing in front of an audience and getting the energy.
Q: What can your fans expect from your set at the Burnaby Blues and Roots Fest?
A: Well, new songs, new album, and the addition of a couple extra members of the band, so people who've seen us play in the past, especially in the Lower Mainland, they wouldn't have seen us play with the girls singing, or perhaps even with the keyboard player, so yeah, the band is expanded, and there'll be some new tunes and a new record. The official release is July 2, so we'll have copies, plus it'll be on iTunes and available on the website.
