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Joe Louis Walker

Merging the electric, urban sounds of West Coast and Chicago blues with the down-home acoustic traditions of the Delta, guitarist Joe Louis Walker never strayed far from what he calls "the real blues." In a career that spans more than 35 years, he’s balanced tradition with innovation and made a significant mark on the evolution of the genre.

Born on Christmas Day in 1949 to parents whose migrant work took them from Arkansas to San Francisco, Walker first discovered the blues via their collection of 78 recordings"a treasure trove of artists like Amos Milburn, B.B. King and Howlin’ Wolf. He picked up the guitar at age 14, and left home two years later to pursue his creative muse in San Francisco’s fabled Haight-Ashbury district. Sharing a room with guitarist Mike Bloomfield, Walker worked his way into the Bay Area blues scene. Among the more prominent spots on his beat was the Matrix Club, where he met and played with the likes of Freddy King, John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Magic Sam and other legends whose tours made stops in San Francisco.

"A lot of people think I started playing the blues in the mid ‘80s, but I was gigging in the ‘60s," Walker explains. But in 1975, weary of the lifestyle he had created, Walker took the high road and joined a gospel quartet called The Spiritual Corinthians. "I was living the blues lifestyle during a time when everything was excessive," he says. "I had to find another way to live. That’s when I immersed myself in gospel music." The Spiritual Corinthians’ ten- year trajectory included a 1980 album called “God Will Provide,” and has left an indelible imprint on Walker’s approach to songwriting and singing to this day. "I like to keep my feet in gospel," he says, "because it’s pure."

Walker’s interest in the blues reignited during a Corinthians performance at the 1985 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. He grabbed a subsequent opportunity to tour Europe with the Mississippi Delta Blues Band, then returned to San Francisco and formed The Bosstalkers. Backed by The Bosstalkers, he released “Cold Is the Night” in 1986, which marked the beginning of an ambitious touring and recording schedule that earned Walker three successive W.C. Handy Awards for Contemporary Artist of the Year in 1988, 1989 and 1990.

In 1992, Walker signed with Verve, where he released “Blues Survivor,” “Great Guitars,” “Preacher and the President,” “Silvertone Blues,” and others"all of which mixed original material with R&B standards, and showcased his lean guitar style and emotionally charged vocals. “Blues of the Month Club,” his 1995 Verve release co-produced by Steve Cropper, included appearances by The Spiritual Corinthians and the Memphis Horns. In response to the album, Down Beat critic Michael Point wrote: "Walker, equally adept in either the acoustic or electric context, is arguably the most complete bluesman on the current scene."

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Live Review

Live From Birmingham: Joe Louis Walker, Alasdair Roberts & Brian Jackson

Read "Live From Birmingham: Joe Louis Walker, Alasdair Roberts & Brian Jackson" reviewed by Martin Longley


Joe Louis Walker Pizza Express September 15, 2018 Mostly, the US bluesman Joe Louis Walker can be heard playing incendiary electric guitar licks, but this UK mini-tour offered the rare opportunity to catch him in acoustic mode, even if this dude's definition of 'acoustic' is much meatier than most. He might have been physically playing a hollow bodied instrument, but with the aid of pedals and amplification, we certainly weren't talking Charley Patton.

Film Review

Joe Louis Walker - Live in Istanbul

Read "Joe Louis Walker - Live in Istanbul" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


Joe Louis Walker Live in Istanbul MVD Visual Valutazione: * * * 2015 Un Louis Walker energico e pimpante, più giovane di vent'anni (oggi ne ha 67), è il protagonista di questo DVD ripreso a Istanbul in uno dei periodi più felici della sua carriera. Tra i protagonisti attuali del blues, Walker ha iniziato a incidere con ritardo, quand'era ormai trentacinquenne. Il motivo è noto: dopo le esperienze giovanili svolte collaborando trasversalmente ...

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Live From New York

Joe Louis Walker, Jimmie Vaughan, The Holmes Brothers & Leo Kottke

Read "Joe Louis Walker, Jimmie Vaughan, The Holmes Brothers & Leo Kottke" reviewed by Martin Longley


Joe Louis Walker/Watermelon Slim/Janiva MagnessB.B. King Blues ClubMay 18, 2010 B.B. King's Blues Club might not exactly devote itself exclusively to the 12-bar business of its name, but it's certainly the joint to head for when the big-name players hit town. The club also specializes in double or triple-bill old-style revues, where the audiences usually have to prepare themselves for a lengthy barbecue immersion. This particular triple-shot was so charged ...

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Album Review

Joe Louis Walker: In The Morning

Read "In The Morning" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Memphis barbecue...

The blues ain't the meat and potatoes they used to be. Conforming to the old 12-bar or 9-bar recipe as definition has not happened in 20 years. The brand of blues that San Franciscan Joe Louis Walker serves up on In the Morning is fine Memphis barbecue, a tangy mix of everything from Stax/Volt, Atlantic, Muscle Shoals hot sauce soul to hot and humid Clarksdale, Mississippi mud pie. All of the elements are here. Walker's band, lead by ...

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Album Review

Joe Louis Walker: Silvertone Blues

Read "Silvertone Blues" reviewed by Ed Kopp


Tradition-minded newcomers like Alvin Youngblood Hart, Keb’ Mo’ and Corey Harris have spurred an acoustic-blues renaissance over the past few years. Now one of the most respected electric bluesmen on the scene, Joe Louis Walker, has opted to pull the plug on his guit.Named for the 1930s acoustic guitar Walker plays on over half these songs, Silvertone Blues is an excellent listen. Traditional without sounding antique, this 12-song collection offers a fervent mix of devil-fearing Delta blues, Mississippi-meets-Chicago ...

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Album Review

Joe Louis Walker: Preacher and the President

Read "Preacher and the President" reviewed by Ed Kopp


Joe Louis Walker is one of the most soulful cats in music, blues or otherwise. A great guitarist, Walker also sings with tremendous passion on this release, the San Francisco native's finest collection of songs. It combines blues with soul, funk, and a hint of jazz, and it features jaunty horns and the justifiably famous Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. Producer Steve Cropper helps Joe Louis forge a sound that compares favorably with classic soul purveyors Otis Redding and Sam and ...

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Performance / Tour

Joe Louis Walker Celebrates Alligator Debut with Philadelphia Performances

Joe Louis Walker Celebrates Alligator Debut with Philadelphia Performances

Source: Chris M. Slawecki

Award-winning guitar slinger, passionate vocalist and gifted songwriter Joe Louis Walker, currently celebrating the release of his Alligator Records debut, Hellfire, will perform at Warmdaddy's in Philadelphia on Friday, August 17 and Saturday, August 18, 2012. The Wall Street Journal celebrates Hellfire's “appealing immediacy" and says, “Walker's raspy, powerhouse voice is out front while his stinging guitar cuts through the uncluttered arrangements." Walker has been releasing groundbreaking music since 1986 and has toured — and continues to tour — worldwide. ...

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Performance / Tour

Blues Legend Joe Louis Walker Celebrates Label Debut with Philadelphia Performances

Blues Legend Joe Louis Walker Celebrates Label Debut with Philadelphia Performances

Source: Chris M. Slawecki

Award-winning guitar slinger, passionate vocalist and gifted songwriter Joe Louis Walker, currently celebrating the release of his Alligator Records debut, Hellfire, will perform at Warmdaddy's in Philadelphia on Friday, February 17 and Saturday, February 18, 2012. Walker has been releasing groundbreaking music since 1986 and has toured—and continues to tour—worldwide. He has won four Blues Music Awards (BMA) and has been nominated for 44 more, including a nomination for a 2012 BMA for Contemporary Blues Male Artist Of The Year. ...

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Recording

Joe Louis Walker's "Hellfire" Set for January 31 Release

Joe Louis Walker's "Hellfire" Set for January 31 Release

Source: Chris M. Slawecki

On January 31, Alligator Records will release Joe Louis Walker's Hellfire. Hellfire was produced by songwriter/drummer Tom Hambridge (producer of Buddy Guy's two most recent Grammy-winning CDs, Skin Deep and Living Proof, as well as albums for Susan Tedeschi, George Thorogood and others), From the psychedelic overtones of the title track (a harrowing and personal tale of the struggle of good versus evil) to the slow, simmering and pleading “What's It Worth" to the Stones-y rocker “Ride All Night," Hellfire ...

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Recording

Joe Louis Walker - Blues Conspiracy: Live on the Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise (Stony Plain, 2010)

Joe Louis Walker - Blues Conspiracy: Live on the Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise (Stony Plain, 2010)

Source: Music and More by Tim Niland

Guitarist and singer Joe Louis Walker has been a mainstay on the blues scene for many years, and this live album draws on the many friendships he has developed throughout his career. This album has several guest artists sitting in, but remains firmly Walker's show, and the high energy soulful blues is quite well done. Leading off with “Slow Down GTO" the group moves as fast as Walker's tale of a wild car out of control, until he abruptly shifts ...

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Recording

Joe Louis Walker's Incendiary Between a Rock and the Blues

Joe Louis Walker's Incendiary Between a Rock and the Blues

Source: Just Roots PR

“I want to be like Louis Armstrong and B.B. King. Play everywhere, all the time, as often as I possibly can. Travel anywhere there’s an audience for my music, take every opportunity, and keep playing and singing as well as I know I can.”

It’s Joe Louis Walker talking, a man who goes through passports way faster than 99 per cent of Americans, and a man who does everything he can to refresh his timeless music.

Now, with his 20th ...

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Music Industry

Stony Plain Records Signs Joe Louis Walker

Stony Plain Records Signs Joe Louis Walker

Source: All About Jazz

Stony Plain Records has announced the signing of multi-award winning singer/guitarist Joe Louis Walker and the release of his label debut, Witness to the Blues, on 9/30. Produced by fellow Stony Plain artist and award-winner Duke Robillard, Witness to the Blues features a scintillating duet by Walker and Shemekia Copeland in a reprise of the Peggy Scott & Jo Jo Benson R&B classic, “Lover's Holiday." Stony Plain Records is distributed in the U.S. by Koch Entertainment; in Canada by Warner ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Blues Conspiracy:...

Stony Plain Music
2010

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In The Morning

Telarc Records
2002

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Preacher and the...

Verve Music Group
1999

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Silvertone Blues

Blue Thumb Records
1999

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