Neil Slaven
Writer, discographer and record producer Neil Slaven was bitten by the blues bug in the late 1950s. In 1964 with Mike Vernon he founded R&B Monthly and in 1965 with Mike he co-founded the iconic British blues label Blue Horizon.
In 1968 with Blues Unlimited editor Mike Leadbitter he published Blues Records 1943-1966, a ground breaking discography, later expanded to two volumes covering 1943-1970. He contributed to UK music newspapers and magazines including Blues Unlimited, Vox and books such as The Penguin Guide To Blues Recordings.
At Decca and Deram in the late 1960s and early 1970s he produced albums on visiting US blues artists and UK bands including the Keef Hartley Band and Chicken Shack.
In the 1980s and 1990s he produced and annotated reissue albums at Charley Records and researched the vaults of US labels including Syd Nathan's King/Federal Records and the Joe Banashak's New Orleans outlet Instant Records.
His album and box set compilations, sleeve and booklet notes have appeared on RCA, London, Westside, Sequel, Metro, Castle Communications, Boulevard Vintage, Indigo, Snapper, Proper and JSP.
He was a regular contributor to Blues & Rhythm magazine from the 1980s to the present day.
He also wrote Electric Don Quixote, a biography of Frank Zappa in 2003.
In more recent times he compiled blues and R&B reissues for Jasmine Records and compiled and annotated a 35 CD John Mayall reissue box set The First Generation 1965-1974 in 2021.
Neil died in December 2023.
12 articles
List of articles in the library
Sleeve notes by Neil Slaven, Decca Records, July 1966
IN JOHN MAYALL and Eric Clapton we have the two most dedicated blues musicians in this country. Together with John McVie and Hughie Flint, they ...
The Mothers Of Invention, Frank Zappa: Frank Zappa: Frank's Wild Years
Retrospective and Interview by Neil Slaven, Record Hunter, July 1992
AFTER 25 YEARS of unique musical anarchy and as many confrontational albums, Frank Zappa is facing his greatest adversary – prostate cancer. Undulled, he relates ...
Big Joe Turner: Shout Rattle & Roll (Proper)
Review by Neil Slaven, Proper Records, 2005
ROMANTICS CALLED it "The Paris Of The Plains" but no one ever decided which arrondissement of France's capital Kansas City actually resembled. The red light ...
Eric Clapton: Clapton Is God...The Cream Of Early Eric
Sleeve notes by Neil Slaven, Castle Music, 2007
A VIGNETTE from the days when "God" walked the streets of London: Mike Vernon and I are making our way down Wardour Street towards Shaftesbury ...
Review by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, March 2008
IN 1984, THE Italian Albatross label released four albums of Tennessee field recordings and one of Mississippi Delta and South Tennessee Blues made by Lucio ...
Bo Diddley: Bo Meets The Maker
Obituary by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, August 2008
Neil Slaven turns up the volume as his hero refuses to go quietly into the night. ...
Elizabeth Pepin & Lewis Watts: Harlem Of The West, The San Francisco Fillmore Jazz Era
Book Review by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, August 2008
I PICKED UP this little item a few weeks ago at my local FOPP, one of the stores that survived the chain going bust, and ...
Jimmy McCracklin: The Mercury Recordings
Review by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, September 2008
WHEN CHRIS BENTLEY reviewed this set's first appearance in Blues & Rhythm fifteen years ago, his enthusiasm for one of his favourite artists was tempered ...
Washboard Sam: She Belongs To The Devil
Review by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, November 2008
IF YOU WANTED the complete Washboard Sam, you'd be looking at seven CDs (DOCD-5171-7) but they wouldn't tell you any more about the artist than ...
Book Review by Neil Slaven, Blues & Rhythm, September 2009
TWO NEW additions to Nostalgia Corner, neither expensive, one a personal reminiscence from the early years of blues appreciation, the other an informal history of ...
Sleeve notes by Neil Slaven, JSP Records, 2011
LET SHIRLEY COLLINS set the scene. In her fascinating autobiography, America Over the Water, she tells of her first meeting with Fred McDowell at the ...
Sleeve notes by Neil Slaven, JSP Records, 2016
THE ROUTE TO the West Coast guitar skills so influential in the development of blues-and rock-guitar is a well-travelled one that can't avoid its well-spring, ...
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