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Purchase tickets
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Tickets
Seating
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Standing Available on the door
tonight
Doors 7.00pm
Dr Feelgood
7.45pm
Johnny Winter
9.30pm
Close 11.00pm
Times approx.
Please note on the order form
there is an option for standing and seating.
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Seats are on general release only. |
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+ Dr
Feelgood
He’s one of the most highly
rated and respected blues guitarists in the
world. His 2007 gig was a real belter with a
thousand happy fans packed into the Newcastle
Academy for what was a remarkable night. The
word legend is miss-used often, but with
Johnny Winter
it does not seem quite enough. See one of the
greats of blues and rock guitar right here in
the Northeast
A brief biog ....
For over 30 years,
Johnny Winter has been a guitar hero
without equal. Signing to Columbia records in
1969, Johnny immediately laid out the blueprint
for his fresh take on classic blues a prime
combination for the legions of fans just
discovering the blues via the likes of
Jimmy
Page and Eric Clapton. Constantly shifting
between simple country blues in the vein of
Robert Johnson, to all-out electric slide guitar
blues-rock, Johnny has always been one of the
most respected singers and guitar players in
rock and the clear link between British
blues-rock and American Southern rock (a la the
Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd.) Throughout
the '70s and '80s, Johnny was the unofficial
torch-bearer for the blues, championing and
aiding the careers of his idols like
Muddy
Waters and John Lee Hooker.
His recent Grammy nominated I'm A Bluesman
CD, has only added to his
Texas-sized reputation.
For this release, Johnny has again paired with
his long-time producer Dick Shurman (Robert
Cray, Albert Collins, Roy Buchanan),
as well as Tom Hambridge (Susan Tedeschi, George
Thorogood). Backing him on this CD is his
road-tested touring band of guitarist Paul
Nelson, bassist Scott Spray, drummer
Wayne June
with guest appearances by such friends as
keyboardist Reese Wynans (from Stevie Ray
Vaughan's celebrated backing group Double
Trouble) and ace harmonica man James Montgomery
among others.
"I'm A Bluesman was a question of finding the
time and right material", he says. The 13-track
collection includes three tunes by his friend
and 2nd guitarist Paul Nelson, who writes with
Winter's bassist Scott Spray. They collaborated
on the prison-themed Shakedown, a
relationship-gone-bad song titled Pack Your
Bags and the album's title track, which Nelson
describes as a Johnny Winter biography set to
music. "I wanted to write a song about his life,
who he is, and what he represents to other
musicians. I'm really proud that when he heard
the song he said I'd gotten it right."
Winter also opted to record two new songs by
producer, Hambridge, Cheatin' Blues and the
first album single, Lone Wolf. Johnny and his
players cut the tracks for I'm A Bluesman at
several studios in New England, where Winter
makes his home these days. But Winter remains a
native Texan, born and bred in Beaumont, the
town where the famous Spindletop gusher came in
to kick off the "black gold" rush in 1901.
Growing up in rough and tumble town populated by
oilfield wildcatters and shipyard workers, he
spent long hours listening to a local deejay
named J.P. Richardson - The Big Bopper of
Chantilly Lace fame - and became hooked on
50's Rock & Roll. He formed his first band,
Johnny & The Jammers, in 1959 at the age of
15, with his 12-year-old brother
Edgar on
keyboards.
Racial tensions in Beaumont were still high in
those days. The town had been side to one of the
worst race riots in Texas history just nine
months before Johnny's birth. Mobs wandered the
streets, businesses burned, martial law went
into effect, and more than 2,000 uniformed
National Guardsmen and Texas Rangers sealed off
the town from the rest of the world until
tempers cooled. Despite the brutal legacy,
Johnny remembers never hesitating as a kid to
venture into black neighborhoods to hear and
play music.
Looking back, he believes people in the black
community knew that he was sincere, that he was
genuinely possessed by the blues. "Nothing ever
happened tome. I went to black clubs all the
time, and nobody ever bothered me. I always felt
welcome." He also became friends with Clarence Garlow, a deejay at the black radio station KJET
in Beaumont. Who opened Winter's eye's and ears
to rural blues and Cajun music.
There's a famous story about a time in 1962 when
Johnny and his brother went to see
B.B. King at
a Beaumont club called the Raven. The only
whites in the crowd, they no doubt stood out.
But Johnny already had his chops down and wanted
to play with the revered B.B. "I was about 17,"
Johnny remembers, "and B.B. didn't want to let
me on stage at first. He asked me for a union
card and I had one. Also I kept sending people
over to ask him to let me play. Finally, he
decided that there enough people who wanted to
hear me that, no matter if I was good or not, it
would be worth it to let me on stage. He gave me
his guitar and let me play. I got standing
ovation and he took his guitar back!"
Winter's big breakthrough came a few years later
in 1968 when Rolling Stone writers Larry
Sepulvado and John Burks featured him in a piece
on the Texas music scene, which prompted a
bidding war among labels that Columbia
eventually won.
Johnny's self-titled 1969 LP announced loudly
that there was a new guitar slinger on the
national scene. The LP included audacious
covers such blues classics as
B.B. King's Be
Careful With A Fool,
Sonny Boy Williamson II's Good Morning Little School Girl,
Robert
Johnson's When You Got a Good Friend and
fellow Texan Lightin' Hopkins'
Back Door
Friend. It also featured two prime original
Winter songs, Dallas and the controversial
I'm
Yours And I'm Hers, that went into heavy
rotation on FM underground radio.
The album peaked at No.24 on the billboard chart
and was promptly followed by Second Winter later
that same year. Looking back, writer Cub Koda
described the period as one when "Straight out
of Texas with a hot trio, Winter made blues-rock
music for the angels." That trio, by the way,
included bassist Tommy Shannon who would go on
to be part of SRV's Double Trouble and drummer
Uncle John Turner.
Winter stayed with Columbia and it's boutique
Blue Sky label for more than a decade, turning
out such well received platters as Johnny
Winter And (1970), Still Alive & Well (1973) and
John Dawson Winter III (1974). He
also helped to introduce blues giant
Muddy
Waters to another generation of listeners by
producing and playing guitar on the
Grammy-winning Hard Again (1977), as well as
the Grammy-nominated I'm Ready (1978), Muddy Mississippi Waters Live (1979) and
King Bee
(1981). The collaborations were so successful
that Waters took to referring to Johnny as his
"adopted son"!
The Johnny
Winter web site is
www.johnnywinter.net/welcome/
www.myspace.com/johnnywinterguitarist
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Support
Dr
Feelgood
One of the most exciting blues and R&B bands you will
ever see, making this gig one of the top events of the
year. Click on the above photo for more details about Dr
Feelgood
Milk & Alcohol
Down At The Doctors
Roxette
http://www.drfeelgood.de/
See them, hear them live ...
www.myspace.com/drfeelgoodband
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