![]() ![]() It was this perfect storm of influences that lead to a unique sound, as my father witnessed in the early 70s while Murch performed with Red, White, & Black, his local group at the time. As a teenage guitar prodigy, Murch would open for James Cotton, Muddy Water's longtime harmonica man, and then be hired to tour with him while still in high school. ![]() He took lessons at Piero's Music, just as my father and I did, and spent his summers in North Carolina on his family's tobacco farm, learning firsthand lessons about the blues and segregation in the Jim Crow south. With a diverse local music scene in the '60s and a military base next door, it was a melting pot, where Murch would trade albums with sailors from Liverpool, listen to everything from Motown and Stax to the British invasion, and even learned his first "A" barre chord from none other than bluesman Jimmy Reed while working at his dad's restaurant. Michael "Murch" Murchison, later playing under the name Michael Powers, was born and raised in Bayonne, New Jersey, the same town my father and I grew up in. According to my father, this guy was the closest thing to Hendrix he had ever seen, and although I was skeptical, figured what the hell, I could squeeze a few under-aged drinks out of the night at the very least, so we picked a Friday and headed over to Terra Blues on Bleecker street. the kind of enthusiasm you love and appreciate, but with an eye roll after a while. Now, my dad was the same guy who would call me up at my college dorm to play Steely Dan's "Reelin in the years" guitar solo to me over the phone because it came on the radio at work. I was 18 or 19 when my father, a musician his entire life, called me up with a very excited tone of voice he had just learned that a guitarist from his old Bayonne tavern gigging days was performing regularly in the Village, and we had to go, because I'd love him. ![]() I call it the American Blues Dream, and these are it's heroes. These are guys who grind it out several nights a week, three-hour sets, and twice a day on weekends, while working a 9 to 5 or getting by as best they can from music. In this blog mini-series, I'll be focusing on working-class musicians from three cities close to my heart: Dallas, my birthplace New York City, my home and New Orleans, my favorite getaway. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |