Clarence Spady, Tinsley Ellis, Joanna Conner, Wayne Hancock, Lil' Ed and Blues Imperials, Center Road
Chameleon Club
02/27/2016 03:00 PM EST
$25
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Clarence Spady
Clarence Spady has a long and rich history of playing the blues in Lancaster and throughout Pennsylvania. He now travels with the best band of his career which finds him at Lancaster Roots and Blues!
Guitarist, singer and songwriter Clarence Spady, a 40-something blues musician,has a bright future. Spady, born and raised in Paterson, N.J., but now living in Scranton, PA, has been credited with taking the music in new and exciting directions, writing at times introspective, autobiographical blues lyrics for the 1990s.
His debut for the Philadelphia-based Evidence Music, Nature of the Beast,received critical praise from all corners of the blues world, and he’s signed to a multi-album deal with the label. (Spady recorded the album independently before executives at Evidence signed him.) Like diddley bow player Lonnie Pitchford, Spady was cited by Living Blues magazine as one of the “top 40 under 40″ blues players to watch in the future.
Spady learned blues from his father, and played his first professional show as a five-year-old in kindergarten, where he performed B.B. King and James Brown tunes for his classmates.
Raised in Scranton, Pa., where he’s still based, Spady would sit on his dad’s lap and watch him play guitar until bedtime. Spady got his first guitar at age four; blues fever caught him early on, and he’s never let it go. His first show came later that year, when he was six, playing with his father, older brother,aunt and uncle at the Paterson Elks Club in New Jersey. Like any good bluesman,Spady was raised singing in church, which he attended every Sunday with his mother. Unlike other Southern bluesmen who were raised just a generation earlier, the blues were not forbidden in the Spady household; quite the contrary, they were encouraged, since his father and other relatives played the music. Spady sang gospel music in church and took his cue from the secular music of the day played on the radio around New York City, including James Brown, the Isley Brothers and Jimi Hendrix. He counts B.B. King and Albert Collins among his main blues mentors, and throughout his formative years, Spady played with various rock and gospel groups, honing his chops in the hope that one day he would lead his own blues band.
After he graduated from high school in 1979, Spady hit the road with regional groups and spent most of the 1980s with the Greg Palmer Band, which opened for major touring acts like the Temptations, the Four Tops and the Spinners. After getting off the road in 1987, Spady played lead guitar in several Scranton-area blues bands and also directed the Shiloh Baptist Church Choir. By the early 1990s, Spady decided to lead his own band.
Much of the material on Nature of the Beast is drawn from his personal experience with drugs and his former relationships with women. Although he’s long since dropped the drug habit he picked up in his years after high school,the experiences provided him with fodder for some of the songs on his debut.
Spady’s multi-album deal with Evidence Music was formalized in February, 1996,after the company agreed to remaster and repackage Nature of The Beast, the independently released album which got him radio airplay and allowed him to tour clubs and festivals up and down the East Coast.
Spady will be a force in the blues world for a long time to come, as he backs up great singing with stellar guitar playing and a creative muse for blues lyric writing that the world will find refreshing. ~ Richard Skelly, All Music Guide
Tinsley Ellis
Southern blues-rocker Tinsley Ellis may speak no evil, but he sings and plays with the conviction of, as Billboard wrote, "...a man possessed." Over the course of eleven albums and literally thousands of live performances, Ellis easily ranks as one of today's most electrifying blues-rock guitarists and vocalists. He approaches his music with rock power and blues feeling, in the same tradition as his Deep South musical heroes Duane Allman and Freddie King and his old friends Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes. Atlanta Magazine declared Ellis "the most significant blues artist to emerge from Atlanta since Blind Willie McTell."
Since first hitting the national scene with his Alligator Records debut Georgia Blue in 1988, Ellis has toured non-stop and continued to release one critically acclaimed album after another. Tinsley's hometown paper, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, calls his music "a potent, amazing trip through electric blues-rock." Rolling Stone says he plays "feral blues guitar...non-stop gigging has sharpened his six-string to a razor's edge...his eloquence dazzles...he achieves pyrotechnics that rival early Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton."
Tinsley Ellis wears his Southern roots proudly. Born in Atlanta in 1957, he grew up in southern Florida and first played guitar at age eight. He found the blues through the back door of British Invasion bands like The Yardbirds, The Animals, Cream, and The Rolling Stones. He especially loved the Kings — Freddie, B.B. and Albert — and spent hours immersing himself in their music. His love for the blues solidified when he was fourteen. At a B.B. King performance, Tinsley sat mesmerized in the front row. When B.B. broke a string on Lucille, he changed it without missing a beat, and handed the broken string to Ellis. After the show, B.B. came out and talked with fans, further impressing Tinsley with his warmth and down-to-earth attitude. By now Tinsley's fate was sealed; he had to become a blues guitarist. And yes, he still has that string.
Already an accomplished teenaged musician, Ellis left Florida and returned to Atlanta in 1975. He soon joined the Alley Cats, a gritty blues band that included Preston Hubbard (of Fabulous Thunderbirds fame). In 1981, along with veteran blues singer and harpist Chicago Bob Nelson, Tinsley formed The Heartfixers, a group that would become Atlanta's top-drawing blues band. Upon hearing Live At The Moonshadow (Landslide), the band's second release, The Washington Post declared, "Tinsley Ellis is a legitimate guitar hero."
After cutting two more Heartfixers albums for Landslide, Cool On It (featuring Tinsley's vocal debut) and Tore Up (with vocals by blues shouter Nappy Brown), Ellis was ready to head out on his own. Ellis sent a copy of the master tape for his solo debut to Bruce Iglauer at Alligator Records. "I had heard Cool On It," recalls Iglauer, "and I was amazed. I hadn't heard Tinsley before, but he played like the guys with huge international reputations. It wasn't just his raw power; it was his taste and maturity that got to me. It had the power of rock but felt like the blues. I knew I wanted to hear more of this guy."
Georgia Blue, Tinsley's first Alligator release, hit an unprepared public by surprise in 1988. Critics and fans quickly agreed that a new and original guitar hero had emerged. "It's hard to overstate the raw power of his music," raved The Chicago Sun-Times. Before long, Alligator arranged to reissue Cool On It and Tore Up, thus exposing Tinsley's blistering earlier music to a growing fan base.
Tinsley's subsequent releases — 1989's Fanning The Flames, 1992's Trouble Time, 1994's Storm Warning, and 1997's Fire It Up — further expanded the guitarist's hero status. By now his talents as a songwriter equaled his guitar prowess. Guitar World said, "Ellis stands alongside Stevie Ray Vaughan and Johnny Winter, and that ain't just hype." Guests like Peter Buck (R.E.M.), guitarist Derek Trucks (Tedeschi Trucks Band) and keyboardist Chuck Leavell (The Rolling Stones) joined him in the studio. Producers Eddy Offord (John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Yes) and even the legendary Tom Dowd (The Allman Brothers, Ray Charles) helped Ellis hone his studio sound. Features and reviews ran in Rolling Stone, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and in many other national and regional publications. His largest audience by far came when NBC Sports ran a feature on Atlanta's best blues guitarist during their 1996 Summer Olympic coverage, viewed by millions of people all over the world.
A move to Capricorn Records in 2000 saw Ellis revisiting his Southern roots with Kingpin. Unfortunately, the label folded soon after the CD's release. In 2002, he joined the Telarc label, producing two well-received albums of soul-drenched blues-rock, Hell Or High Water and The Hard Way. All the while, Ellis never stopped touring. "A musician never got famous staying home," he's quick to note.
Ellis' 2005 return to Alligator, the searing guitar-fueled Live-Highwayman, was the live album his fans had been demanding for years. Recorded at a packed club just outside Chicago, the CD took Ellis' extended soloing and heartfelt vocals to staggering heights. The Chicago Tribune said, "incendiary live performances, inspired, original and funky." His return to the studio in 2007 produced Moment Of Truth, an album The Chicago Tribune called "incendiary." Speak No Evil, 2009, saw Ellis continuing his non-stop touring, bringing his monumental guitar work and intensely powerful vocals to rock and blues fans all over the world, letting his songs and his guitar do the talking.
Ellis founded his own label, Heartfixer Music, in 2013 with the fan-favorite all instrumental Get It!, followed in 2014 by the deeply personal Midnight Blue. His latest album, Tough Love, was launched in 2015.
Averaging over 150 live shows a year, Ellis has played in all 50 states as well as Canada, Europe, Australia and South America. He has shared stages with almost every major blues star, including Stevie Ray Vaughan, Otis Rush, Willie Dixon, Son Seals, Koko Taylor, Albert Collins and many others. Whether he's out with his own band or sharing stages with major artists like Buddy Guy, The Allman Brothers, Gov't Mule or Widespread Panic, he always digs deep and plays, as Guitar Player says, "…as if his life depended on it."
Joanna Conner
JOANNA WAS BORN IN BROOKLYN ON AUGUST 31, 1962 AND GREW UP IN WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS. FROM AN EARLY AGE, SHE WAS DEEPLY INFLUENCED BY HER MOTHER’S MUSICAL TASTES, AS SHE’S OFTEN CITED TAJ MAHAL’S 1968 RELEASE “GIANT STEP” AS THE FIRST RECORD TO MAKE A SIGNIFICANT IMPRESSION ON HER. SHE RECEIVED HER FIRST GUITAR AT AGE SEVEN AND STARTED STUDYING CLASSICAL MUSIC.
AT AGE TEN, JOANNA ATTENDED A BUDDY GUY CONCERT WITH HER MOTHER WHERE SHE SAT MESMERIZED ON THE FLOOR IN FRONT OF BUDDY’S AMP (A PRESCIENT MOMENT THAT JOANNA WOULD EVENTUALLY JOKE WITH BUDDY ABOUT WHEN SHE WOULD OPEN FOR HIM YEARS LATER). AT FOURTEEN, SHE STARTED PLAYING ACOUSTIC BLUES GUITAR, TAKING LESSONS FROM RON JOHNSON AND LEARNING SLIDE GUITAR IN HER LATE TEENAGE YEARS. SHE STARTED PERFORMING IN BANDS AT SEVENTEEN, EVENTUALLY SWITCHING TO BLUES AND BECOMING A PROFESSIONAL MUSICIAN AT NINETEEN.
THIS WAS ALSO THE AGE WHEN JOANNA MADE A VISIT TO CHICAGO THAT CEMENTED HER DESIRE TO LIVE AND LEARN IN THAT NEW CITY.
JOANNA’S ARRIVAL IN CHICAGO OPENED UP A NEW UNIVERSE FOR HER. SHE TREKKED TO ALL CORNERS OF THE CITY TO WATCH AND LEARN FROM THE BLUES ARTISTS SHE SO LOVED (WHILE BRAVING THE EXPECTED CITY TRIBULATIONS SUCH AS THE MERCURIAL WEATHER, AS WELL AS THE UNEXPECTED ONES, LIKE A KNIFE ASSAULT) AND EVENTUALLY STARTED PLAYING THE LOCAL CIRCUIT WITH JOHNNY LITTLEJOHN.
WHILE SHE WAS BLESSED EARLY ON WITH THE SUPPORT AND ENCOURAGEMENT FROM SUCH NOTABLE ICONS AS MAGIC SLIM, BUDDY GUY AND JUNIOR WELLS, IT WAS DION PAYTON’S INTENSE, MELODIC PLAYING THAT REALLY SPOKE TO HER. A FORTUITOUS ENCOUNTER WITH PAYTON AND LONNIE BROOKS AT B.L.U.E.S. ON HALSTED LED TO JOANNA’S TENURE IN HIS 43RD STREET BLUES BAND, PLAYING AS A MEMBER OF THE HOUSE BAND AT BOTH THE CHECKERBOARD LOUNGE AND KINGSTON MINES AS WELL AS ON HIS LEGENDARY TRACK “ALL YOUR AFFECTION IS GONE” ON THE SEMINAL ALLIGATOR RECORDS RELEASE, “THE NEW BLUEBLOODS.”
DOC PELLEGRINO, STORIED OWNER OF KINGSTON MINES, WAS THE CATALYST TO JOANNA SEARCHING OUT HER OWN BAND, AND THUS, HER OWN VOICE. HE SAW HER RAW TALENT AND WANTED TO GIVE HER A WEEKLY GIG AT THE FAMED CLUB. JOANNA DIDN’T FEEL READY, BUT NOW ADMITS THAT THIS OPPORTUNITY PUSHED HER OUT OF THE NEST AND ULTIMATELY INTO THE LIMELIGHT. DOC GAVE HER TUESDAY NIGHTS AND A MONTH’S NOTICE TO PUT TOGETHER A BAND AND REPERTOIRE. THE NEWLY FORMED BAND STARTED THEIR RESIDENCY WHILE JOANNA AND HER MOTHER ASSEMBLED A PROMO PACK AND STARTED BOOKING THE BAND AROUND THE MIDWEST.
BLIND PIG RECORDS SIGNED HER IN 1989, AND THE SUBSEQUENT TOURING FOR HER DEBUT ALBUM MOVED JOANNA OUT OF THE FISHBOWL OF THE CHICAGO SCENE AND INTO MAJOR BLUES VENUES AND FESTIVALS AROUND THE U.S., CANADA AND EUROPE. THE MOMENTUM SWELLED AND SHE TOURED RELENTLESSLY, TRAVERSING THE EUROPEAN CONTINENT AN IMPRESSIVE THIRTY-TWO TIMES FROM 1990-1999. HER TRAVELS GAINED HER A STRONG LEGION OF FOLLOWERS IN EUROPE, SOUTH AMERICA AND JAPAN, AND IN 2007 SHE BECAME THE FIRST AMERICAN ARTIST TO TOUR TAIWAN. THE PACE WAS GRUELING BUT THE PAYOFF WAS ULTIMATELY WORTH IT. JOANNA WAS UNQUESTIONABLY COMING INTO HER OWN.
JOANNA’S SIGNATURE SOUND IS AN AMALGAMATION OF VAST INFLUENCES AND SHEER, NATURAL TALENT. ALTHOUGH SHE IS TYPICALLY CATEGORIZED AS A BLUES ARTIST AND IS WIDELY KNOWN FOR HER FIERCE ATTACK AND SEARING SLIDE SKILLS, HER STYLE IS AN UNCONVENTIONALLY CONVINCING AND POTENT MÉLANGE OF FUNK, ROCK, JAZZ, WORLD MUSIC AND, OF COURSE, BLUES.
AS A SONGWRITER, SHE KEEPS IT SIMPLE, TURNING TO LIFE EXPERIENCE, FAMILY AND WORLD EVENTS FOR INSPIRATION. EACH ALBUM IS ESSENTIALLY A TIME CAPSULE, A MELODIC CHRONICLE CAPTURING HER LIFE AT THAT TIME AS JOANNA SHARES HER STORIES ABOUT MOTHERHOOD, THE DEATH OF HER FATHER, SPIRITUALITY, LOVE, LUST AND LORE. HER COMPELLING STORYTELLING IS EMOTED THROUGH A STRONG, SEASONED VOICE, NOT WORLD-WEARY, BUT INSTEAD REFRESHINGLY EMPOWERED.
IN RECENT YEARS, JOANNA’S TOURING HAS BECOME LESS FREQUENT, PARTIALLY AS THE RESULT OF HIGHER TRAVEL COSTS, BUT PRIMARILY BECAUSE SHE HAS BEEN ABLE TO SUPPORT HER TWO CHILDREN BY PLAYING MORE LOCALLY, AN OPPORTUNITY NOT AFFORDED TO HER IN HER EARLY CAREER. A MAINSTAY AT KINGSTON MINES, JOANNA’S WEEKEND SHOWS DRAW IN HUNDREDS OF FANS. NEWER GENERATIONS ARE BEING CAPTIVATED BY HER INCENDIARY ARTISTRY, WHILE LONGTIME FANS (MANY OF WHOM HAVE SEEN HER AS A RESULT OF HER DILIGENT AND EXTENSIVE TOURING) ARE ABLE TO REDISCOVER WHAT DREW THEM TO HER IN THE FIRST PLACE, AS THE AUDIENCES THAT SHE WORKED SO HARD TO REACH OUT TO ARE NOW REACHING OUT TO HER.
HER FAN BASE HAS ALSO EXPANDED ASTRONOMICALLY AS THE RESULT OF AN ENRAPT CONCERTGOER WHO CAPTURED A FEW MOMENTS OF HER PERFORMANCE AT THE NORTH ATLANTIC BLUES FESTIVAL IN JULY OF 2014. THE VIDEO, POSTED IN NOVEMBER OF 2014, WENT VIRAL AND HAS BEEN VIEWED UPWARDS OF SIXTEEN MILLION TIMES, HAVING BEEN COPIED TO SEVERAL PROFILES. THIS UNEXPECTED SURGE OF RECENT ATTENTION HAS BAFFLED AND THRILLED THIS GROUNDED, HUMBLE ARTIST AND HAS INJECTED A SPIRIT OF EXCITEMENT OF THE UNKNOWN INTO HER CAREER. OUT OF THE BLUE, JOANNA HAS BEEN APPROACHED WITH OPPORTUNITIES RANGING FROM FILM WORK TO A REQUEST FROM “AMERICA’S GOT TALENT” TO SCHEDULE AN AUDITION.
NEW MUSIC IS ON THE WAY, A RENEWED SPIRIT HAS BEEN GIFTED TO THIS CREATIVE WORKHORSE, AND A REBIRTH OF AN ALREADY IMPRESSIVE CAREER SEEMS IMMINENT.
Wayne Hancock
"Wayne Hancock has more Hank Sr. in him than either I or Hank Williams Jr. He is the real deal." - Hank III
"Hancock, who tosses out a roots mix of old country, roadhouse blues, western dance swing, boogie bop, and straight-up rockabilly, takes what was once old and makes it seem like it's always been and always will be."---allmusic.com
"The country music scene could do with a lot more characters like Wayne, who push the music's limits while staying truer to its roots than any well-known names associated with the genre today." – Slug Magazine
Since his stunning debut, Thunderstorms and Neon Signs in 1995, Wayne "The Train" Hancock has been the undisputed king of Juke Joint Swing--that alchemist's dream of honky-tonk, western swing, blues, Texas rockabilly and big band. Always an anomaly among his country music peers, Wayne's uncompromising interpretation of the music he loves is in fact what defines him: steeped in traditional but never "retro;" bare bones but bone shaking; hardcore but with a swing. Like the comfortable crackle of a Wurlitzer 45 jukebox, Wayne is the embodiment of genuine, house rocking, hillbilly boogie.
Wayne makes music fit for any road house anywhere. With his unmistakable voice, The Train's reckless honky-tonk can move the dead. If you see him live (and he is ALWAYS touring), you'll surely work up some sweat stains on that snazzy Rayon shirt you're wearing. If you buy his records, you'll be rolling up your carpets, spreading sawdust on the hardwood, and dancing until the downstairs neighbors are banging their brooms on the ceiling. Call him a throwback if you want, Wayne just wants to ENTERTAIN you, and what's wrong with that?
Wayne's disdain for the slick swill that passes for real deal country is well known. Like he's fond of saying: "Man, I'm like a stab wound in the fabric of country music in Nashville. See that bloodstain slowly spreading? That's me."
Little known fact: Wayne is the only Bloodshot artist to have had their CD taken aboard a space shuttle flight.
"A rare breed of traditionalist, one who imbues his retro obsessions with such high energy and passions that his songs never feel like the museum pieces he's trying desperately to preserve." —AllMusic.com
Lil' Ed and Blues Imperials
From smoking slide guitar boogies to raw-boned Chicago shuffles to the deepest slow blues, guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Lil’ Ed Williams is an awe-inspiring master bluesman. He and his blistering, road-tested band, The Blues Imperials—guitarist Mike Garrett, bassist James “Pookie” Young, drummer Kelly Littleton—are celebrating 20 amazing years together. Live, Lil’ Ed And The Blues Imperials simply can’t be beat as Ed breaks out the deepest back-bends, the highest toe-walks, and the most authentic electric slide-guitar blues being played today. Not since the heyday of Hound Dog Taylor & The HouseRockers has a Chicago blues band made such a consistently joyous, rollicking noise.
Lil’ Ed boasts a direct bloodline to blues history—his uncle and musical mentor was the great Chicago slide guitarist, songwriter and recording artist J.B. Hutto. According to The Chicago Tribune, “Williams represents one of the few remaining authentic links to the raucous, pure Chicago blues.” The Associated Press agrees, stating, “Williams fills Chicago’s biggest shoes with more life and heat than anyone on stage today.” Adding to the legend is Ed’s storybook rise, taking him from working in a car wash to entertaining thousands of fans all over the world. In 2006 he made multiple appearances on Late Night With Conan O’Brien (including a hilarious film with Lil’ Ed teaching Conan how to play the blues) culminating with Lil’ Ed on stage jamming with O’Brien in front of a television audience in the millions.
Venue Information
Chameleon Club
223 North Water Street
Lancaster, PA 17603
http://www.chameleonclub.net/