Blinddog Smokin’
Blues, R&B, Funk, 2010s
Fatback funk, blistering blues, uptown horns and low-down grooves: Grammy nominated Blinddog Smokin’ renders millions of miles and thousands of gigs into a deep American repertoire of profound authenticity.
In 2014 the band garnered a Grammy nomination for the 57th Grammy Awards for a CD/DVD featuring Rock n’ Roll Hall of Famer Dr. John.
The album was up for Song of the Year and Best Soul Blues Album in the Blues Music Awards and won an award for Best Soul Blues Album in the Blues Blast Music Awards. The album debuted at #6 on the Blues radio chart and charted on Americana radio, its received glowing press from The Wall Street Journal to USA Today to Living Blues, radio play on Sirius XM’s B.B. King’s Bluesville, and a music video in rotation on MTV, VH1, and Dish.
The music emanates from the rotating community of players and echoes across the legions of folks who have communed with the band at 200 - 320 gigs per year for well over two decades. Blinddog Smokin’ has played every conceivable venue, from Mississippi juke joints to high mountain roadhouses; across Europe and the Mediterranean all the way to the main stage at the King Biscuit Blues Festival in Helena, Arkansas, an event that attracts upwards of 100,000 attendees. Traveling by bus to 42 of the continental United States – plus international tours – they have been rightfully crowned “Ultimate Road Warriors,” by Southland Blues Magazine.
The lead dog in this hard traveling show band is the band’s founder and charismatic front man Carl Gustafson; an adventurer, world traveler and philosopher whose gravel road of a voice is paved with the power of his convictions and the revelations in his songs. First chronicling the band’s adventures in an online column, “Tales Well Told,” he authored the book Ain’t Just The Blues, It’s Showtime: Hard Times, Heartache and Glory Along Blue Highway, an enthralling diary of the band’s journeys. Whether in song, performance or prose, he is a masterful raconteur.
Blinddog Smokin’ is flexible. They might showcase illustrious guest members like the Chicago guitar master Carl Weathersby or the brilliant blues harpist Billy Branch. Regular compadres include the original drummer “Chicago” Chuck Gullens, and 13-year bassist Roland Pritzker a.k.a., Junior Bacon, whose respective pistol hot snare shots and subsonic timbres anchor the rhythm section.
The songs of Blinddog Smokin’ animate a vivid cast of motley characters. They sport “Pimp Shoes,” see visions of “Angels at the Crossroads,” chase young girls like a “Funky Old Man,” ruminate on “Skinny Little Ladies” arrive on “Bobby Rush’s Bus,” and accompany the ancient bluesman who has “Just Come Home to Die.” We meet a disillusioned preacher in an old West saloon on “Church of Fools,” and Miss Peggy, proprietress of the Pic-a-Rib Café, where a teenage runaway Gustafson was first entranced by the rhythm and blues helped shape his destiny.
Call us today to create an experience at your meeting, convention, trade show, exposition, concert, club, casino or special event 202-369-1063.
