Bobby "Blue" Bland
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Two Steps from the Blues: The Gospel According to Bobby 'Blue' Bland
Book Excerpt by Barney Hoskyns, From a Whisper to a Scream (Fontana Books), 1991
WHEN HOWLIN' WOLF left Memphis for Chicago in late 1952, Sun Records' Sam Phillips was left with a crop of younger blues singers who in ...
Audio interviews
Interview by Barney Hoskyns, Rock's Backpages audio, 8 July 1989
Bobby Bland talks about his influences, including MOR men like Perry Como and Andy Williams, and about the ups and downs of his career. Oh, and how C.L. Franklin gave him "the squall".
File format: mp3 File size: 15.8mb Interview length: 17 minutes 12 seconds Sound quality: ****
List of articles in the library
Duke/Peacock Records: The Success Story
Overview by John Broven, Blues Unlimited, 12 June 1964
WITH THE emergence of interest in blues recordings after the war, with its resultant popularity, it was only natural that there should be a multitude ...
Review by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 15 January 1966
HOOKER RECORDS abound, but the latest from Chess, John Lee Hooker Plays And Sings The Blues (CRL4500) is a more than usually satisfying set. ...
Bobby "Blue" Bland, Paulette Parker: Basin Street West, San Francisco CA
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 3 December 1969
Bobby 'Blue' Bland Is Right On ...
Spotlighting the Man: Bobby Blue Bland
Comment by Colman Andrews, Phonograph Record, September 1972
THERE'S A new Bobby Bland single out ('I'm So Tired') that is both typically fine and frustrating: fine in that it is another two and ...
Live Review by Dan Nooger, The Village Voice, 1 November 1973
I RAN INTO Eric Emerson (Formerly of the Magic Tramps and now playing guitar and singing with his new band Angel) on the way into ...
Bobby Bland: Ruthie's Berkeley; Club Long Island, San Francisco CA
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 7 November 1973
Bobby Bland and his brilliant band ...
Profile and Interview by John Abbey, Blues & Soul, 23 November 1973
WHEN THE news was announced that the vast ABC/Dunhill Record complex had purchased the Duke-Peacock group of companies, speculation began as to what ABC would ...
Bobby Bland: This Time He's Here for Good
Retrospective by Tony Cummings, Black Music, January 1974
"HE'S HAD more Hot 100 entries than the Beatles." That's the claim — a totally accurate one — in the Bobby Bland adverts being scattered ...
Profile and Interview by Max Jones, Melody Maker, 30 March 1974
BOBBY "BLUE" Bland is on stage now, smiling at Mel Jackson as he takes the microphone from him and swings into 'Reconsider Baby'. Then a ...
Profile and Interview by Dan Nooger, Phonograph Record, 11 April 1974
BOBBY BLUE Bland is a big, genial man, born 1931 in Rosemark, Tenn., former vocalist of the legendary Memphis "Beale Street Blues Boys," (along with ...
Review by Bob Fisher, New Musical Express, November 1974
ONE DAY last week I tuned into Noel Edmunds and I heard it – and fell back into bed. ...
Soul, Man: New York Johnny meets L.A. Jane for a Medium Massage
Report by Vernon Gibbs, Crawdaddy!, November 1974
L.A. IS A great big freeway they say, pay a hundred down and buy a car, if you don't you won't get very far. Tooling ...
B.B. King, Bobby Bland: Winterland, San Francisco CA
Live Review by Tom Vickers, Midnight Sun, 16 January 1975
North Beach walk ...
Bobby Bland: Whisky A Go Go, Los Angeles CA
Live Review by Harvey Kubernik, Melody Maker, 8 February 1975
LOS ANGELES: At a time when today's music seems to be suffering from forced theatrics, and a lack of talent disguised in glitter and gold, ...
Obituary: Don D. Robey, R&B Pioneer, Dead at 71
Obituary by Joe Nick Patoski, Rolling Stone, 31 July 1975
HOUSTON — DON D. Robey, a leading figure in rhythm & blues and gospel recordings in the Fifties and Sixties, died early Monday, June 16th, ...
Obituary: Don D. Robey, R&B Pioneer, Dead at 71
Obituary by Joe Nick Patoski, Rolling Stone, 31 July 1975
HOUSTON — Don D. Robey, a leading figure in rhythm & blues and gospel recordings in the Fifties and Sixties, died early Monday, June 16th, ...
Interview by David Nathan, Blues & Soul, 16 September 1975
IN RETROSPECT, when the historians or whoever decide to document the music of the fifties, sixties and seventies, the omission of the name Bobby Bland ...
Bobby "Blue" Bland: Phelps' Lounge, Detroit MI
Live Review by Frank Bach, The Ann Arbor Sun, 15 July 1976
JUST ABOUT every time a holiday rolls around nowadays, Bobby "Blue" Bland can be found singing down at Phelps' Lounge, a comfortable nightclub located in an otherwise bleak ...
Bobby Bland & B.B. King: Together Again... Live (Impulse IMPL-8027) ***
Review by Mick Brown, Sounds, 28 August 1976
BOBBY BLAND and B.B. King's last collaborative recording posed the question "When is a live album not a live album?" The answer is when it's ...
Bobby "Blue" Bland: Lone Star Café, New York NY
Live Review by Davitt Sigerson, Melody Maker, 28 April 1979
Two nights of Bland magic ...
Bobby Bland: The Best Of (MCA)
Review by Gavin Martin, New Musical Express, 5 June 1982
FIRST time I've heard Bobby Bland and it's obvious – the man's a star. ...
Talkin' Blues: John Lee Hooker/B.B. King/Bobby 'Blue' Bland
Retrospective and Interview by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 5 June 1982
THE BLUES speaks haltingly at first, haltingly and quietly in a darkened room. The curtains are drawn to shut out whatever passes for daylight during ...
Millie Jackson, Bobby Bland: Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles CA
Live Review by Don Waller, Los Angeles Times, 6 July 1982
THE WAY Millie Jackson carries on in concert would make Bette Midler blush. Jackson, who sprang to prominence in the early '70s with a batch ...
Overview by Barney Hoskyns, New Musical Express, 12 January 1985
From the raw to the pure, from the sublime to the meticulous — BARNEY HOSKYNS sings the praises of 24 of music's most glorious voices. ...
Bobby Bland: Members Only (Malaco)
Review by Brian Case, Melody Maker, 1 February 1986
MEMBERS' ENCLOSURE ...
Bobby "Blue" Bland, Denise LaSalle, The Rose Brothers: Saenger Theatre, New Orleans
Live Review by Paul Sexton, Record Mirror, 31 May 1986
THE DEEPER you go into the heart of them ol' United States, the deeper the soul, and way down yonder in N'awlins this kind of ...
Malaco: Soul’s Retirement Home
Report and Interview by Barney Hoskyns, The Times, 10 July 1989
"BLUES SINGERS don't retire", said the late Howlin' Wolf, and Bobby "Blue" Bland might well agree with him. After thirty seven years virtually nonstop on ...
Book Review by Tony Burke, Blues & Rhythm, August 1990
BIG NICKEL PUBLICATIONS continue their unsurpassed service of providing a mine of information to R&B record collectors with another addition to its catalogue of books, ...
Bobby “Blue” Bland: I Pity The Fool – The Duke Recordings, Vol. 1
Sleeve notes by Don Snowden, Chess/MCA Records, 1992
AN ENDURING IRONY of the periodic blues revivals that rear their heads is that each and every one has managed to pass by the immense ...
Love Throat: Bobby "Blue" Bland
Interview by Robert Gordon, Rolling Stone, 28 May 1998
BOBBY BLAND'S people seat me at a table, make sure I'm comfortable. An effective entrance demands the proper set-up. ...
Review by Ben Edmonds, Rolling Stone, 24 May 2001
A BOUNTY OF classic blues albums has recently become available on CD, fortified with bonus tracks and unissued material. ...
Malaco Records: The Last Soul Label
Report and Interview by Mike Atherton, Echoes, 2002
JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI, has been a music town for over half a century. In the early 1950s, Lillian McMurry's Trumpet label made Sonny Boy Williamson into ...
Mick Hucknall meets Bobby "Blue" Bland
Interview by Andria Lisle, MOJO, June 2008
He revolutionised soul in the early '60s, sings like an angel in anguish, and has influenced everyone from Otis Redding to Van Morrison. Now Bobby ...
Mick Hucknall: From Red To Blue
Interview by Terry Staunton, Record Collector, July 2008
As the multi-million-selling figurehead of Simply Red, Mick Hucknall found himself in a creative cul-de-sac. On his debut solo album, a tribute to his idol ...
For Members Only: Bobby Bland on Malaco
Sleeve notes by Barney Hoskyns, Malaco Records, October 2010
TWENTY-FIVE years ago, searching for the extant spirit of southern soul, I made my way to a former Pepsi-Cola warehouse in a decidedly unlovely industrial ...
Charles Farley: Soul of the Man – Bobby "Blue" Bland
Book Review by Mick Brown, Daily Telegraph, 22 July 2011
I HAVE TWO REASONS to vividly remember the first occasion I saw Bobby "Blue" Bland perform in a Los Angeles nightclub 35 years ago. ...
Book Review by Andy Gill, The Word, September 2011
FORGET JAMES BROWN: the hardest working man in show business is surely bluesman Bobby "Blue" Bland, who played over 300 shows per year, for decades ...
Bobby "Blue" Bland: Two Steps From The Blues (Soul Jam)
Review by Mike Atherton, Echoes, 2012
WHEN BOBBY BLAND'S debut LP Two Steps From The Blues crept out over here on Vogue in the early '60s, one reviewer, whether through bitchiness, ...
Obituary by Tony Russell, The Guardian, 24 June 2013
BOBBY "BLUE" BLAND, who has died aged 83, was among the great storytellers of blues and soul music. In songs such as 'I Pity the ...
Caught by the Reaper: Bobby "Blue" Bland, 1930-2013
Obituary by Tim Tooher, Caught by the River, 26 June 2013
FIRST GEORGE JONES, and now Bobby "Blue" Bland. If Billie Holiday were still alive, she'd be feeling very nervous right now. Jones and Bland were ...
Talking Blues: Bobby Bland in 1973
Interview by Dan Nooger, Record Collector, December 2017
Bobby Bland was one of the most beloved blues (and soul) singers of the '60s and '70s, an influence on rock vocalists from Rod Stewart ...
Tracing the Influence of Bobby "Blue" Bland in Americana
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Nashville Scene, 6 September 2018
A look at new work by Nathaniel Rateliff, Anderson East, Shemekia Copeland and other artists playing AmericanaFest ...
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