Spent the last week working on a website for Swamp Train which is one reason this blog has slowed down – it’s not finished but is presentable (I hope), please leave a message if things look weird in your browser – so it was a nice break to join friend Blaise for a gig at the 2nd Festival Blues de Giez. Giez is a small village at the foot of the Swiss Jura mountains not far from Grandson and the festival take place in the village’s ridding school. An old wood building with straw bales, sawdust and a huge “is my back straight” mirror along one of the sides the ring was filled with tables for the pizza and other more local style foods that us blues fan could indulge with while listening to the various bands that played. Blaze and I opened the festivities followed by our friends from Geneva: Floyd Beaumont and the Arkadelphians and then our own (Swamp Train’s) guitarist Mr. CutFinger ; so as you can see we were among family.
The evening continued with Jean Sangally who was born in Cameroon and lives in France and ended with Bonny B. Ice B & Cherry B. as well as a short jam session featuring everyone. Readers of this blog may remember the Jamming with Bonny B posted a mere three years ago although it seems a whole lot longer. An unnecessary bit of proof that keeping on keeping on can be worth it…
This was only the second time I’ve played with Blaise as a duo, him on cigar box guitar, harmonica and vocals, me on percussion and backup vocals except on one song I wrote which I attempt to sing. On our set, I play paper bag, rhythm bones and washboard as well as some not too complicated drumset activity embellished with a restaurant sized coffee can and a slab of bronze. We play a mixture of original songs and traditional blues such as Slim Harpo’s “King Bee” or Blind Willie Johnson’s “John The Revelator”.
All things considering it went well besides an embarrassing blunder on the afore mentioned song that I sing: Back To My Lady. Usually we can find (or talk) our way through whatever comes up, but in this song Blaise plants a little guitar riff on a looper so he can mouth harp his magic around the melody. I guess I should also add that the song now has six breaks in which the looper is stopped and then restarted. A last minute addition only rehearsed a couple of times last week (up to then the song didn’t have any breaks). With hindsight this is an obvious case for disaster but what would life be if you didn’t try… When Blaise forgot to stop the looper but then stopped it when it was supposed to start again we both looked at each other…, and laughed. Then I waiting for him to start it up again but it turns out he was waiting for me to start singing before he came back with the looper (which makes sense if you know the song) and that was where the real trouble began…
Unfortunately I got it all on video it seems so I’ll have to watch how bad it all looked one of these days… :P
Fortunately I got it all on video so I be able to post one or two songs (if they’re decent enough).
I enjoyed hearing Jean Sangally, African blues has a sound of it’s own which can carry you far away if you let it….