Kenny Wayne Shepherd To Play London's Islington Assembly Hall For Blues Fest
Wednesday, 04 April 2012
Written by Jon Stickler
Mention the phrase "young blues guitarist" within earshot of anyone with a knowledge of the scene and one of the first names they are likely to respond with will be Kenny Wayne Shepherd.
Still barely in his 30s, the Louisiana-born axe man and songsmith has sold millions of his four Number One blues-rock albums and had a string of Number One mainstream rock singles in the US. While proud to shine a light on the rich blues of the past, Kenny has his own modern twist on a classic sound he has embodied since his teens. He met Stevie Ray Vaughan at 7 and shared the stage with New Orleans legend Bryan Lee at 13. As an adult, he continues to create genre-defining blues-infused rock n' roll.
Kenny Wayne Shepherd's 'How I Go' album not only serves as a strong reminder of the chops that caused Guitar World to place him right behind B.B. King and Eric Clapton on their list of blues guitarists, but it's the strongest indication yet of his gifted songwriting talent. The album pairs Kenny's deeply soulful and impassioned takes on classic material like Bessie Smith's 'Backwater Blues,' Albert King's 'Oh, Pretty Woman' and The Beatles 'Yer Blues' alongside the strongest writing and co-writing of his career thus far.
"At this point, most people who know about me know I can play guitar," Shepherd says. "As far as my approach to guitar on this record, it's not about showing people how much I can play. It’s about really choosing the right notes and playing them at the right times so that every note penetrates people, and they feel it inside and it’s not just some fleeting thing that just goes right by them. I wanted to be conservative, and selective, and tasteful in the solos that I did," he adds. "I wanted to concentrate on the song as a whole: the vocals, the arrangements, so every instrument that is being played contributes to the song and takes it to better place."
The Radio 2 playlisted first single 'Never Lookin' Back' sets the tone for the 13-track album with lyrics about moving on and rolling with life's punches. The song 'Cryin' Shame' has that straight Texas shuffle longtime fans love to hear from Kenny and his band. 'Show Me The Way Back Home' is a powerful blues ballad for the ages. "We hit a really great balance," he says of the album, which he co-produced. Next single 'Butterfly' will be released late June.
The hard-rocking, blues-based, guitar-driven album sounds young, it sounds fresh. Yet it has that distinctive energy and vibe drawn from the deep heritage of the genre. Kenny Wayne Shepherd has grown as a songwriter, musician, and producer. Which isn't to say he's not proud of his past. "I don't have any regrets, other than maybe a couple of outfits that I wore on stage," he laughs.
"My approach from day one was that I was not going to record anything that I couldn't completely wrap my mind around and that I wasn't prepared to play for the rest of my career. As a result of that approach and not letting anybody talk me into doing anything that I didn't want to do, and nobody forcing me to record anything I didn't want to, I've got a body of work that I'm proud of. I still enjoy playing all of the songs off my first album. They are as much fun to play today as they were in 1995 when that album came out. I'm not one of those guys who doesn't want to listen to his own music. I don't go around listening to it all the time, but, my thing is, if I'm making music that I don't want to listen to, then why am I making music? I enjoy what I do. I have a lot of stuff that I'm proud of. Every album that we've done I've tried to do different things. I've never wanted to be an artist where people could predict what was next."
When Kenny’s on the road, his company has extended to The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Joe Satriani, Van Halen, The Eagles, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Bob Dylan, Hubert Sumlin, Willie "Big Eyes" Smith, Buddy Flett, and Bryan Lee. Last month, he was delighted to share the stage with Eric Clapton and Keith Richards, at the ‘Howlin’ For Hubert’ memorial show in New York City, before embarking on this year’s ‘Experience Hendrix’ tour across the USA.
The name "Kenny Wayne Shepherd" is absolutely synonymous with "young blues guitarist" but that phrase isn't the totality of his person. “Blues player is definitely one of the labels I've accumulated, because I'm a huge blues fan and I love to play the blues," he says. "But if you listen to my music, especially over the course of my career, everything that I do is not blues. It's the foundation of what I do, but my stuff has a lot more of an edge to it. It's a little more contemporary. And there's a certain youthfulness to what I do. I started writing and recording music when I was a teenager and that energy has been consistent throughout my career."
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