Dave Kelly at the Crawdaddy

Alan Lloyd reports on a show by UK blues stalwart Dave Kelly.

THE DAVE KELLY BLUES BAND AT THE CRAWDADDY, RICHMOND MARCH 22, 2024

Dave Kelly is a veteran of the British blues scene, having started out as a teenager in the 1960s playing acoustic guitar in the folk clubs. He played his first professional gig at the Half Moon in Putney in 1964 and went on to perform in different settings – including as a duo with his late sister Jo Ann Kelly and in the John Dummer Blues Band, before becoming a founder member of The Blues Band with Paul Jones, Hughie Flint & Tom McGuinness in 1979.

Now, just 9 days after his 77th birthday, he appeared at the revived Crawdaddy Club in Richmond with his own band of Pete Emery on lead guitar, Kelly’s sons Sam Kelly and Homer Kelly-Tarrant on drums and bass guitar respectively, Rob Millis on keyboards, and Dave himself on vocals and slide guitar.

The band is promoting a new album “Sun On My Face”, and several of the songs were from that release. Most of their repertoire consists of covers of other artists songs interpreted in their own style and selected from a wider spectrum than just the standard blues fare. We got country (Hank Williams’ “I Can’t Help It” and Kris Kristofferson’s “Lovin Arms”), soul (Otis Redding’s “Dock Of The Bay” and Al Green’s “Tired Of Being Alone”), Motown (Smokey Robinson’s “My Girl”), rock’n’roll (Little Richard’s “Good Golly Miss Molly” and Chuck Berry’s “Nadine”) and pop (John Fogerty’s “110 In The Shade”). Ray Charles was represented by “Georgia On My Mind” and “Hallelujah I Just Love Her So”.

There was more traditional blues/R&B from the catalogues of Blind Willie McTell, Buddy Guy, Memphis Minnie, Titus Turner and Sonny Boy Williamson II. Original songs included “I Am The Blues”, a tribute to the early blues singers, first recorded with The Blues Band, and “Them Old Crossroads Blues” where Kelly contrasts Robert Johnson’s trip to the crossroads to be taught to play the blues by the devil to his own journey to Tooting Bec to learn from T.S. McPhee.

It was a night of excellent musicianship and an interesting choice of songs. Top class entertainment.

Steve Lawrence RIP

I've seen no coverage of the death of singer Steve Lawrence at the age of 88. Yet he was one of the founding fathers of pop music in many ways. He was perhaps best known as the husband of Eydie Gorme who recorded a series of duets including 'I Want To Stay Here'. a UK number three in 1963, 'I Can't Stop Talking About You' and 'The Honeymoon Is Over'. But in the 1950s and early sixties he was a major solo star. He had success with a cover of Buddy Knox's 'Party Doll', 'Pretty Blue Eyes' (covered in the UK by Craig Douglas), 'Footsteps', which made it to number four in the UK in 1959, 'Why Why Why', 'Portrait Of My Love' (a cover of Matt Munro's hit), and 'Go Away Little Girl', which was first recorded by Bobby Vee, sold a million for Steve and was later covered by Donny Osmond and Marlena Shaw. As well as releasing numerous albums Steve was also a TV star and actor and appeared as Maury Sline in 'Blues Brothers' and 'Blues Brothers 2000' as well as several other movies. Top photo shows a UK demo copy of 'Fabulous', which rather quaintly describes the backing group as 'Dick Jacobs and his Skiffle band'.

Johnny Knight RIP

Very sorry to hear of the death, at the age of 86, of 'Mr Rock and Roll Guitar' Johnny Knight. Born John Mangiagli, Johnny played with Johnny Otis in LA in the late 50s and recorded his best known record 'Rock and Roll Guitar', backed by 'Snake Shake', for the short lived Morocco label in 1958. The record did pretty well but the label folded and Johnny found himself label-less. Later he recorded under various other names, including Johnny Marlo, Johnny Donn and Johnny Mangelli before coming up with the comedy character Gamma Goochee. I saw Johnny on a couple of occasions. At Viva Las Vegas in 2016 he appeared wearing a glittery jacket and was pretty good on 'Snake Shake', 'Two Ton Annie' and 'What Happened Last Night'. I had a chat with him at the time (see photo above) and he was very friendly and enthusiastic. At the Rockin' Race in 2019 I wrote: 'The highlight on the first evening (was) 82 year old Mr 'Rock and Roll Guitar' Johnny Knight, backed by the Deke Dickerson band, with Johnny's son on keyboards. Dressed in a splendid sparkly black jacket, Johnny was good on his sole hit, 'Rock and Roll Guitar',and it's B side 'Snake Shake', plus 'Got My Mojo Working', 'What Happened Last Night', 'I'm Going To Buy Me A Dog', 'Two Ton Annie', 'Ooh Poo Pah Doo' and 'Shake A Hand'. He also reappeared as his alter ego, the comedy character Gamma Goochee. Only 30 minutes on stage but effective.' The photos below show him at the Rockin' Race, including one of him in his Gamma Goochee persona. RIP Johnny.

Another recent death is that of W C Clark, at the age of 84, who was known as the Godfather of Austin Blues. Wesley Curley Clark played around Austin in his youth before joining Joe Tex's band. Returning to Austin he helped develop the city's blues scene, forming several bands, with members at various times including Jimmie Vaughan and Angela Strehli. His W C Clark Blues Revue played with the likes of B B King, Albert King and Bobby Bland and he played alongside Stevie Ray Vaughan, Lou Ann Barton and Kim Wilson on the Austin City Limits TV show.

Another death, at the age of 79, is that of BB Seaton (Bibby) who was a Jamaican singer/ songwriter with the Gaylads, the Astronauts and the Messengers. He first recorded with the duo Winston and Bibby in 1960 and aafter leaving the Gaylads had a successful solo career. He was the first reggae artist to be signed by Virgin leading to the formation of Front Line records and was active in the UK from the 1970s onwards as a producer as well as performing with the Gaylads.