Oregon Music News

Peter Dammann without guitar.

The Safeway Waterfront Blues Festival is almost four months away, or should we say only four months away. Not so long. Conjures visions of blankets on the grass and day after day of great music.

Either the number one or number two biggest Blues Festivals in the U.S., depending on who you talk to, it remains the only major Blues festival to be booked by a working musician…Peter Dammann, who plays guitar in D.K. Stewart’s band and several others. And it’s not “Day-man,” it’s “DAH-mann,” thank you.

His title is “Talent Coordinator,” but I’d rather call him “Artistic Director,” “Curator,” even.

On a rare Saturday night off he talked with us about what’s coming up.

Ok, it’s mid-March. Tantalize us with who’s going to appear at this year’s Festival?

Taj Mahal, Trombone Shorty, John Mayall, Walter Trout, Booker T, J.J. Grey and Mofro, Cedric Burnside and Lightnin’ Malcolm. Bobby Rush, Super Chikan and the Fighting Cocks…

Super Chikan

Wait.

Oh they are so tough. They’re from Clarksdale (Mississippi). Super Chikan is Big Jack Johnson’s nephew. He makes his own guitars out of lawn mower parts. Really a trip. The fighting cocks are three women who play in bare feet, stomp around on the stage. It’s really pretty amazing.

I’ve seen Super Chikan a bunch of times down in the Delta but I hadn’t seen him with this band till the last time I was down there. I saw them at Ground Zero, which is Morgan Freeman’s club down in Clarksdale. He was in the audience and so was Karl Malone and all these old NBA guys, and these chicks and the place was packed. It was one of the coolest live blues gigs since Otis Rush in the late 60s. Just really amazing.

He’ll be fun. He’s really talented.

Is there a difference to the sound a guitar makes when it’s built out of lawn mower parts?

Well, he tends to use more processing than typical Blues guitar guys do, but the guitars look so cool. They’ve got lights that flash on them. He’s actually got an endorsement from Bad Boy Lawn Mower Company. He’s got to be the only guitar player in the world with a lawn mower endorsement.

I was talking with someone who was over at the Notodden Blues Festival in Norway, probably the major European Blues festival. They had Joe Cocker and Buddy Guy and all these other headliners on the bill…they all said that Super Chikan completely stole the show from everybody. He’ll be fun.

Watch a sideways video with crappy audio of Super Chikan at Ground Zero (worth it)

Keep going.

Lucky Peterson

Michael Burks’ Band with Lucky Peterson.  When Lucky Peterson was six years old, he was on the Ed Sullivan show playing Hammond organ. His dad was a Blues guitar guy who had club in New Jersey where (Howlin’) Wolf and Koko Taylor and people like that would play all the time and so he grew up hanging with those guys. To me he’s probably the most brilliant Black guitar player/organist out there. He’s had some problems in  the past but he’s on the mend. He’ll play both. I’m going to try to put him in Linda’s (Hornbuckle) gospel set. He did a gospel album of just him and Mavis Staples a few years ago. They’ve played some big festivals around the world.  If he hadn’t had his problems in the past, he would be on the top of the list…of everyone’s list. He’s been a virtuoso guitar player since he was ten years old.

We have a bunch of Zydeco acts…Curley Taylor, Donna Angelle,  Corey Ledet, Andre Thierry…

Commander Cody, Janiva Mangness…Mingo Fishtrap. They’re a big horn band from Austin. Delbert (McClinton) uses them as the horn section of the Sandy Beaches cruise. Somewhere between Tower of Power and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band.

Norton Buffalo’s old band is coming, the Knockouts. I’m not exactly sure what we’re going to do with that. They may just come and do their thing.

A tribute thing?

A possibility.

Galactic and Cyrille Neville

We’ll have Little Feat and Galactic with Cyrille Neville.

I  just saw Galactic at Roseland.

How was that?

It was great!

I heard it was just smashing.

It was. They had Corey Henry from Rebirth playing with them.

He’s coming. It’ll be fun. Little Feat and Galactic are on the last day. That should be kind of a monstrous day. Mofro may end up on the last day.

Watch Galactic with Cyrille Neville

Do you know who’s going to close the Festival?

I’m debating that. I booked Little Feat first. And then I was going to put Galactic on opening night and they couldn’t do that so they may end up closing. I don’t know. I’m kinda up in the air about it. I think Galactic would be a more powerful closer. I think Little Feat would be the act that everybody would know and stick around for so it might work in terms of the crowd. I don’t know.

How are things going economically this year?

Last year we had one of our best years ever, and last year was really dicey going in. I mean this time last year, nobody knew if the wheels had fallen off the capitalist machine or not. It’s not quite so dire, but the reality is more sobering, I think. Just because people have been out of work long enough to realize how serious this is.

In terms of sponsorship, all the big players are coming back. It seems like our sponsor support is where it was last year, maybe even better. In terms of booking, we’re way ahead of last year.

Why is that?

It just may just be the cyclical thing. Some years the people you’re going after are all going to Europe, or coming through the region later in the season. This year, I made offers and a lot more early offers stuck.

We’ll be doing the Marriott Ballroom again. The after-hours stuff in the ballroom will include Mayall, Trombone Shorty, Mofro one night. Booker T is going to do a set.

Check for the full lineup as it stands now and as it is added onto.