They never got much beyond opening for The Rolling Stones. You may remember them for "Bad to the Bone." These guys used to show up at a squeezed capacity, Kerrisdale Cyclone Taylor Arena year, after year, after year. And they always put on a show. (the song begins @ 3:35 and continues to the end.
They bill themselves as the World's Greatest Bar Band...and they are.
ReplyDeleteAlways loved the line "I rid my coat"
ReplyDeleteIts good ole boy elegance.
Perhaps the best thing that came to me while spending my immediate post-military years attending university in the states during the height of the Vietnam War was that it exposed me and drew me to some genuine American progressives who, while I rejected their occassional extremism, brought me a new political insight on my own country.
ReplyDeleteMy best friends at Michigan were two returned Vietnam vets, one with two tours under their belt. They were from both sides of the then prevailing political spectrum that, remarkably, we would both take as utterly socialist. Even Nixon's gang would be seen by today's mainstream Republicans as borderline subversive and Johnson as the American reincarnation of Trotsky.
Young people back then who didn't want to unquestionably embrace either side but disagreed deeply about a war to support a dysfunctional, corrupt and inveitably doomed local government, found mental refuge, I think, in artists like Thorogood. My American friends also took me to bars where I could listen to the ultimate, ever backup band - The Funk Brothers - play genuine Dixie Blues/Jazz of world class standards. You could somehow just release yourself into this music.
The Ultimate Bar Band - yeah, I think that's right.