Down by the river.

Thursday night found me back at the Riverside Club in Staines. If last week was all about the silliness of a Jug Band, today was the serious business of the Blues, that is;

Paul “Chicken Legs” Burris - guitar and keyboards.

“Wildman” Roger Fuller on the blues harp.

The fabulous “Mr 110%” Mark Roberts drums.

“BB” Bruce Fryer guitar.

Alan (sorry no name on your website) on electric bass

Collectively known as ‘Blues Business’ they came from the ‘deep south’, that is the ‘deep south’ of errh, Sussex.

Robert Johnson went down to the crossroads, they came down by the river at Staines.

Now, if I’m honest I prefer ‘Rhythym and Blues’ to the plain old blues but this was good. British ‘R ‘n B’ was harder, faster and tougher than the blues. Like George Thorogood and the Destroyers but angry with it. But beggers can’t be choosers and today was something of a beggers banquet.

You know what they say; “The blues had a baby and they called it Rock ‘n Roll” and several times this strayed over the border, like on ‘Route 66’ when the rubber chicken fell off the Yamaha (and that’s not a euphemism, there was a….and it fell off)

Check them out for yourself at;

 www.blues-business.co.uk

Oh, and here is “Wildman” Roger Fuller giving the blues harp some feeling.

 

                                  Nice shades, Wildman.

The highlights for me were ‘My Girl’, ‘Baby please don’t go’, and at the start of the second set the medley – a series of numbers linked together by some pretty slinky slide guitar from Paul Burris.

The “Wildman” played a mean harp, while Bruce Fryer showed us that his gold Gibson Les Paul was worth every penny.

Solid drums and a very strong baseline throughout.

Still in the game. Eh?

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)