ROOSTERS
HAPPY HOUR IS DEBUT CD FROM THE BLUES DOCTORS
Oxford, Mississippi —
Got the rockin' pneumonia and the boogie woogie flu? Or perhaps a hole in your
soul? Well, a new Mississippi-made blues release aims to cure
it.
The Blues Doctors are in.
Leading up to their
performance at Clarksdale, Mississippi's Juke Joint Festival, the Oxford-based
blues duo of Adam Gussow and Alan Gross has released its debut CD as The Blues
Doctors.
"We're really looking forward to this year's
Juke Joint Festival," said Gussow. "A lot of the tracks on our new album are
things we beat into shape on the streets of Oxford, so a big street festival in
Clarksdale should feel just like home."
Named for the steady Friday gig at Rooster’s
Blues House in Oxford, Mississippi, where Gussow and Gross hammered our their
dynamic two-man sound, Roosters Happy Hour aims to please traditional and
adventurous blues fans alike.
Gussow describes The Blues Doctors as "a power
blues trio without the bass." The third leg of the duo is actually Gussow’s
thumping kick drum. The result is a hard-swinging jump combo distilled to the
bare essentials, propelled by Gross’s jangling guitar and Gussow’s over-the-top
harp lines.
"Alan and I had crossed paths on the Ole Miss
campus for ten years, but we didn't actually hook up musically until the summer
of 2012," recalled Gussow. "I needed a local guitar-man to go along with my
one-man band thing, and he needed a new challenge. That's how the Blues Doctors
were born."
Describing Roosters Happy Hour — a mix
of new originals and classic covers — as "down-home blues with a big-city angle
of attack," the duo is always ready to take the show on the road. They headline
Juke Joint Festival's Sunflower Avenue Gazebo Stage on Saturday, April 12th at
5pm.
For those who can't make The Blues Doctors
upcoming festival show, the new album is available as a download or CD at
www.thebluesdoctors.net. The album is also available via iTunes, Amazon and
CDbaby.
BIOGRAPHIES:
Adam Gussow needs
little introduction to blues harmonica fans. Founder of
ModernBluesHarmonica.com, organizer of the Hill Country Harmonica festival,
Gussow is best known for his twenty-five year partnership with Mississippi-born
guitarist and one-man-band Sterling "Mr. Satan" Magee as the duo Satan and Adam.
Their releases include the W. C. Handy-nominated Harlem Blues (1991), Mother
Mojo (1993), Living on the River (1996), and Back in the Game (2011). A longtime
member of the New York City blues scene before relocating to Mississippi in
2002, Gussow has performed and recorded with many guitar-men, including Wild
Jimmy Spruill, Larry Johnson, Charlie Hilbert, Robert Ross, Andrew "Shine"
Turner, Bill Sims, Jr., Irving Louis Lattin, and Brian Kramer. Gussow's debut
solo album, Kick and Stomp (2010), rose to the #2 position in the "picks to
click" category on Bluesville (SiriusXM), America's premier satellite radio
blues show. His second solo album, Southbound (2011), spent March and April 2012
at the #1 position on the Mississippi Roots Radio Airplay Chart. An associate
professor of English and Southern Studies at the University of Mississippi,
Gussow has written three award-winning books about the blues, including
Mister Satan's Apprentice (1998), a memoir about his time as a Harlem
street musician.
Alan Gross is perhaps best-known for his long
association with Mississippi bluesman Terry "Harmonica" Bean — he's played
guitar in his band for a decade — and work with hill country performers Kenny
Kimbrough, Lightnin' Malcolm and Eric Deaton. He's also gigged with R. L. Boyce,
a mainstay of Otha Turner's Rising Star Fife and Drum ensemble, and played
numerous festivals across the state of Mississippi. A professor of clinical
psychology at the University of Mississippi for almost thirty years, his guitar
influences include Muddy Waters, Duke Robillard, Jimmie Vaughan, and Warren
Haynes.
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