In the late 1940s / early 50s, a creative storm centred around Chicago Blues stalwarts including Willie Dixon, Elmore James and Howlin' Wolf emerged. Their music featured electric guitars, dance beats, and no shortage of suggestive 'Jive Talk'.
'Jump' music was made popular in the 1940s by jazz and rhythm and blues bands doing their darndest to make their audiences stomp and holler. Better known exponents include Louis Jordan, Lionel Hampton and T-Bone Walker.
Rhumba is a genre of ballroom and dance music that appeared across the East Coast of the US during the 1930s. It combined American big band music with Afro-Cuban rhythms.
Separating musical styles is an impossible task. All music is a gumbo of different styles. But one thing you can bet your sweet bootie on is that Chicago Blues, Jump beats and Afro Cuban rhythms were being combined into hot dance floor shakers in smoky night clubs all over the US around the middle of the last century.
Good enough for Howlin' Wolf, good enough for The Shed.
So we thought we'd have a crack at it.
The result is a little ditty we call 'If Only'. Click on the title to have a listen.
Hope y'all enjoy it !
Pete wrote it, sang it, and played the drums
Steve Faggotter played the guitar and did the nasty solo
Gus Washbourne played the guitar
Mick Nadin blew the harp
Neil Porter played the bass and did the production work
In April 2016 Clare Biilmann, a long time friend of The Shed, popped in for a chat. We met Clare way back around 2009.......somehow Clare had gotten the word that there was music being made in The Shed, and her curiosity was piqued.
You see Clare is mother to Jack and Joe Biilmann. Back then both were youngsters with burning ambitions to play music. Well we invited Jack into The Shed and recorded him playing John Butler's 'Ocean', which you can listen to by visiting the PBGB Vault.
That version of 'Ocean' was the first recording Jack ever made. Jack and Neil subsequently worked together to record and produce Jack's first cd.
Jack has gone on to bigger and better things of course, but we remain proud to have helped Jack get his career off the ground.
Anyway, as we said above, Clare dropped in around April. She told us she had been on a holiday in Vietnam and had struck up a friendship with a musician named Tam. Clare told us Tam was a fine guitarist / vocalist who was about to visit Pambula Beach.
"Perhaps you'd like to meet Tam "
Well, yes, perhaps we would........... thanks Clare, great idea, bring him on down.
Fast forward to May 2016, and sure enough Tam is in The Shed playing music with us. We had a great afternoon. Thoroughly enjoyed meeting Tam and playing some songs together.
It was very clear that Tam is a talented man. So before long we had Tam perched on a stool with a guitar in hand, fronting a microphone.
We recorded Tam playing two songs.
The first is titled "bài hát đầu tiên của Tam". The second is titled "bài hát thứ hai của Tam".
We hope you enjoy both songs.
We certainly do. It was great to meet Tam and it is our pleasure to add Tam to the increasing number of international musicians we have hosted in The PBGB Shed.
Tam, whose full name is Tam Huu Nguyen, lives in the town of Hoi An, in Quang Nam province, Vietnam. Tam runs a live music cafe / bar in Hoi An called 'Guitar Hawaii'. We could tell you all about Tam's Bar, but why don't you just click HERE and visit the website.
Guitar Hawaii looks great to us. Maybe in part because it reminds us of The Shed.................instruments everywhere, leads all over the place and what is clearly an open door policy which encourages visitors to jump up and perform.
The website also provides an insight into Tam's life as a musician.
We'll let you know what comes of Tam's invitation to take PBGB on tour to Guitar Hawaii !!!
Tam....................welcome to the PBGB Family sir. It was our pleasure to host your visit to The Shed and listen to your beautiful music. We are delighted to now be friends and we look forward to seeing you again, either in The Shed or at Guitar Hawaii !!
