Month: November 2016

  I’ve just made a short film using a superb 1928 guitar duet as the soundtrack. It’s by Lonnie Johnson and jazz guitar pioneer Eddie Lang, who died prematurely five years later aged just 31. There’s more about Eddie in my book America’s Gift. Eddie Lang is playing rhythm guitar and the wonderful single string… Continue reading Blues – America’s greatest gift to the world?

George Barnes, anyone? I bet only the most hardcore blues and jazz enthusiasts know of that sublime electric guitarist George Barnes. This isn’t just sad, it’s a travesty. George was recorded eight years before Muddy, before Buddy (Guy – not Holly), before even Howlin’ Wolf – in those days before the electric blues-style of guitar-playing we know… Continue reading 1938’s blues guitar boy wonder

One of London’s lesser known attractions is a network of ancient tunnels, carved out by man, under the city’s leafy south-eastern suburb of Chislehurst. Fittingly, David Bowie, who lived and grew-up in nearby Bromley, regularly performed in the Chislehurst Caves with his pop band, the Konrads, in June 1962. David was 15-years-old and yet to change his… Continue reading Raves in the Caves. World’s oldest rock venue?