Cd Isle...CDs by BC island recording artists

Bill Johnson is on the move with his 2nd cd release " The Bill Johnson Blues Band 'LIVE' ".

His first cd "Why I Sing the Blues", is a collaboration between Bill and top US and Canadian poets.
Debuting to sold out shows in Vancouver and Victoria, Bill is beginning to be seen by a wider audience.

When the first version of his band debuted, Victoria's Times-Colonist dubbed him "Victoria's Guitar Flame Thrower" after his performance at the International Jazz Festival. The title has stuck even though Johnson's style has matured. While his contemporaries have pursued FM rock's version of the blues, Bill's style is more that of yesteryear, citing his influences as Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters, T-Bone Walker, Eric Clapton, and BB King.

Previously Bill Johnson has been heard with Vancouver Island's Auntie Kate on her debut CD, and then again on a collaborative blues CD featuring Bill. In 1998 Bill teamed up with Grammy Award Winning Texas Bluesman Don Johnson for the CD "Donald Ray". Songs from that CD are currently play-listed on cable's Galaxy Networks blues channels, and on CBC radio, as well as some US stations.

Bill is very proud of his band. Featuring the multi-talented Gary Preston on harp, piano, and voice, Rick Erickson on acoustic/electric bass, and Paul Nixon on drums. The versatility of this band is amazing and sure to please blues fans everywhere.

Very rare cd by Bruce Kennedy 'the Bus'. A short-lived life that has left a profound impact on original music. A Canadian Poet.

Born in rural Eastern Ontario, Rick heard his first country blues circa 1969 via the powerful FM station CHOM, Montreal. The classic Blue Thumb label album "Memphis Swamp Jam" and especially the haunting sound of then 100-year-old Nathan Beauregard doing "Nathan's Bumblebee Blues" was a favourite with  late night DJ's."  The soul-etching had begun.

In 1970 Rick was sent to the University of Hard Knocks at Burritts Rapids, Ontario, for disagreeing with the Queen on which naturally occurring plants are permissible for consumption. There, Rick taught himself guitar, learning to play on an old Hofner archtop salvaged from the trash and Stephan Grossman's first instructional book "Delta Blues Guitar".

After "graduation" in the early 1970's, Rick moved to Ottawa and now reveled in constant jam sessions and  his growing record collection. Influences from Johnny Winter, classic blues artists  Furry Lewis, Bukka White and Fred McDowell, bluegrass wizards Tony Rice and Doc Watson and especially his adopted mentor John Paul Hammond, Jr. were added to the stew. He bought his first good guitar, a Gibson Southern Jumbo. String popping pull-offs and back beat thumb rolls now combined to define the hypnotic grooves that were happening. Rippin' acoustic versions of "Mean Town Blues," "Highway 61," "Mona" and "Who Do You Love?" began to solidify. Delta blues, bluegrass and rock blues combined and morphed into the hard-driving, fast picking tunes that now poured out from under the steel finger pick's and slide tubes.

Fast forward to the late 1990's and Rick, now living on northern Vancouver Island, decides it's time to get a little more serious about his music. After nearly 30 years of playing around street corners, campfires and coffee house's from coast to coast, he starts organizing regular performances in the cozy lodge of the small community ski hill of  Mt.Cain. "Caindawg" is born and the moniker applied to his first independent CD release,  2002's    "at the end of my chain." 

Co-produced with Ken Hamm, the CD was recorded in three sessions at Raincoast Studios in Nanaimo in the spring of 2001. Session players were Todd Sacrety on bass, Billy Hicks on drums, and Gerry Barnum on harp and electric slide guitar. Ken drops in the mandolin on "Untrue Blues" and long time Ontario buddy John Little adds the electric solos to "I'm A Man."