Detroit Jambalaya (feat. David Gerald)

#84 in The Need To Know Badass Blues Instrumentals Series, Detroit Jambalaya, features the phat and furious tone of Detroit native son, David Gerald, on guitar. The son of Rural Mississippi born and raised parents, David marinated in the sounds of the Blues and R&B music. He's the youngest of eleven children, six of whom were born and partly raised in Mississippi. Because of segregation and racial discrimination, David's dad moved the family north to Detroit so they might have a better chance at the "American Dream." First picking up a guitar at fourteen, David's earliest influences as a guitarist were Prince and the '80's Rock shredders - and it wasn't until he was in his mid-twenties that he went back to the sounds that he had grown up with: Albert King, ZZ Hill, and B.B. King. Successfully touring and recording as the David Gerald Band, David took a page from the Prince playbook and played all the instruments on his last album, N2U. From the first note that David played on this session I knew it was gonna be alright and by the time he left the session he had cooked up a full-on Jamabalaya! Bon appetite!

The backing band on this track is Rich Kirch (John Lee Hooker 1984-2001) on rhythm guitar, Alvino Bennett (Dave Mason, Stevie Wonder) on drums, and myself on bass. The track was recorded at Skunkworks in Capitola CA with additional tracking at NTA, San Bruno CA. Mixing duties were executed by a very welcomed new addition to the family, Mr. Malcolm Catto (Heliocentrics, Idris Ackamoor) at his Quatermass Sound Lab, London UK. Mastering by F-Bomb.