Billy Jean as you’ve never heard it before … played on beer bottles

Copenhagen’s Bottle Boys first performed on empty beer bottles to liven up a boring party about 12 years ago. What do Michael Jackson and the old-time jug-band genre have in common? Well, take the song that launched the Michael Jackson era in 1983, and perform it, jug-band style, on beer bottles. We’re talking here about…

Remembering Johnny Otis: Greek God of R&B

Remembering Johnny Otis: Greek God of R&B

Updated 26 July, 2019. A young Johnny Otis. He’d give Errol Flynn a run for his money   Writing the previous Leiber-Stoller post reacquainted me with that great rhythm & blues pioneer, Johnny Otis, and Shuggie, his talented multi-instrumentalist son. Shuggie, I believe, stood for ‘sugar’, his mother’s nickname for Johnny Jnr. Johnnie Otis Snr. was a…

Leiber-Stoller: perhaps the greatest rock & roll song writers of all

Leiber-Stoller: perhaps the greatest rock & roll song writers of all

[et_pb_section][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text] Mike Stoller (left) with Jerry Leiber in the 1970s. Just as most non-classical music – rock and roll, R&B, jazz, pop, etc. – came from the blues, so one of pop music’s truly landmark song-writing partnerships began specialising solely in blues and R&B songs. I’m talking, of course, about the American rock and roll/R&B composers-supreme, Jerry…

Blues broadcasts garnished with blues and rock history. Every Mon, Wed & Sat.

Blues broadcasts garnished with blues and rock history. Every Mon, Wed & Sat.

The birth of blues rock and its path to hard rock then heavy metal New “How Blues & Rock Evolved” broadcast explores the origins of heavy metal  Prepare your ears for a special 30-minute-plus version of “How Blues & Rock Evolved”. We track how blues influenced the monster guitar riff … became blues rock ……