Blues Highway snapshots

 

Haircut

Time for a haircut in Sterkspruit! Or maybe not. Downtime on the Lesotho border is never complete without a visit to the taxi stands, the muthi shops, the street vendors. "Are you bad luck? Financial problems? Sexual problems? Lost love? Lotto?" Surely I can find something here for the blues tour: something secret: something strong enough: strong enough to do The Trick: to let me dance on the edge: to rub on the neck of my old National guitar: to ingest with the rest of the dust, the cheap liquor and Savannas. Free State and KZN: South Africa shows picking up this week as my Secret Stories Blues Tour continues to move across the country.

The Big Merc has continued to suck money. The muthi guys didn't have anything I could pour down into her greedy gullet. It's a bit of a ragged tour this time anyway: Secret Stories: a lot of distance: big, open spaces: long moments alone with thoughts. A new set of tyres. Will they outlive the Tour? I hope not– I want another ten or fifteen years of this: this music: this life: I want those tyres, those ball joints, to be an investment that pays off: that covers my ass across the Great Karoo, and the wilds of Long Street. But who knows? The main bearing could fail at any time: mine or the Merc's! Meanwhile, I'll try and play every show as though it might be my last. It might be. Another shout out to all of my friends who do extra things to help make all this happen.

And finally, another farewell. RIP Dion and his legendary joint, The Sinkshack. He was a good friend, we had some wild times, and he shall be missed. Sinkshack was my favourite stop on the road to Mozambique. Cold drinks. Hot neon. Cheap conversation. Bikes. Guitars. Corrugated steel. The whole thing, a work of art, a world of strange beauty.

One Battery, One Starter, One Beer: Secret Stories Launches in SA

A rough start, or rather a "no start" to the Tour in Cape Town! A late night breakdown in the airport parking lot lead to a couple of expensive tow jobs. One starter, one battery, one alternator, one beer, and then I was rushing over to Plumstead to visit my pals at Paul Bothner Music.

For almost a decade of shows across South Africa I've been happily partnered with Paul Bothner Music, better known across the land as Bothners. Africa's biggest music retailer, these folks have provided me with the quality production gear I need to roll across the country playing show after show in places big and small. Wayne Shelver is my promotions guy who sets me up every year. Here we are at the Bothner's warehouse facility reviewing bins and banners and cables before I head out into the Little Karoo. The new, 15 inch Thumpers are the lightest bins I've ever carried– and they sound great. They pack even better in the Merc than the R&R's we've used in previous years.

I must say I like the Nomad stands, and the cool bags they pack in. My North American tours never seem to have these– and I'm thinking that I must get some of these for ease of carry on that side. The nice thing about these carry bags is that they also hold the mic stands– and their whole mess of floppy feet– and it all carries in and out gracefully. When you play as many shows as I do, small things like this can add up to save hundreds of carries over a tour, and the gear packs neatly and easily. If you can save two carries a day over an eighty show tour, believe me– you're very grateful! Security being what it is, sometimes the production gear is moved three or four times daily. 

From Bothners, it was a just in time journey out to Matjiesfontein. Get off the National Highways, and the roads get smaller, and dustier– and the places and the people become more interesting, too. From here, I pointed the Merc south, into the near outback, for a show at Vlieland. I knew I was taking chances with the tyres as I spent hours driving on the gravel in 38 degree heat. Even on the blacktop bits between the trails: these roads are hot: sticky: you can burn yourself touching them: and your tyres can separate into masses of torn belts and twisted rubber. I'd already pushed mine through Ladismith, Calitzdorp, over the Rooiberg Pass to Van Wyksdorp, onward to Oudtshoorn, and beyond, towards Willowmore before that happened. Well, one tyre– but that was more than enough!

The Rooiberg is, I should add, a beautiful Karoo drive.

This time around I knew that the spare took different bolts than the regular wheel– and I actually had these bolts in a bag in the glovebox, too! The change went smoothly when the wheels were blocked down tight. It's amazing how fast one can change a tyre when it's hot desert, and you've got guitars and a PA system piled next to you on the side of the road. I knew it was time for new tyres, but the excitement of replacing the starter, battery, and alternator had got in the way. The people at TyreMart, Aliwal North, installed a new set of tyres for me a couple of days later. I got some high end tyres for about a third of the price they would have cost me in North America: thank goodness! It's a pretty nice drive now, and I've got a few more bits on order from The Old Merc Guy in Port Elizabeth.

Ah, here we are! Packed in at the Overlander Bush Pub, and now looking for Savanna! Show ready. I'm a red wine guy, but when I blow in to set up on a hot, South African afternoon: Savanna! Damn, I could use an endorsement deal with them!

And doing what I actually do best! Songs and stories! My Secret Stories tour continues. This pic taken at The Station, in Calitzdorp.

Lastly, my product of the moment. Some things are simply too good to pass up. What you really need to keep the Tours going is Money. This "Show Me The Money" soap will no doubt keep the cash coming: brown money stuffed into duffle bags and lugged across the dusty landscape. Stay tuned as the Tour rolls across southern Africa!

South Africa Calling: Surfing the Big Merc

Secret Stories: back to my adopted homelands. A two-tone Mercedes and an open road: a small PA and an old National steel guitar: the blues is back in town. Ride with me on the world's biggest little blues tour as I visit places both strange and familiar, mild and wild. Check in here for the developing schedule, or Follow along on the Facebook and Instagram platforms.
 

Walkin' Blues in Ireland

 

Focus dark: purple the blues: play me a tune: like Rory would ya? With all the notes, eh? It's all pressed in from the little streets: little joints where the listeners are pressed up against the players: and the players can probably lean on the same table for luck. And stories! Turn it up, baby. Turn it up! I learn from Sean O'Hara, Lonesome Pete, and Stonecold, and Frank Carberry, and Dom Martin, and... Turn it up! So these 25 shows in 50 days have got louder. And brighter. And ya better have a long power cable. But all is good. It's been a grand tour of places large and small. I've made lots of new friends. I've sold out a bunch of shows in some very cool rooms. I've got good at busses and trains. I've got a little, Guinness belly to show for my social efforts. This second tour of Ireland has built nicely on the previous one– and it now looks to be part of my annual circuit.

Dom Martin and I before our show at Howth Blues Festival, Dublin.

Blues Doctors on convention in Belfast. We prescribe Guinness.

A little pub show at the Belfast Blues Festival.

This was a fun show, north of Belfast, at Whitehead. Lonesome Pete helped me set this one up.

The Railway Bar was another, Northern gig that I really enjoyed– great folks who really know about the blues, and work with most of the top Irish artists.

Johnny!!! Proud to have this famous punk rocker- painter in my corner! We've become firm friends over the last couple of years, and he's done so much to introduce me to the Cork region music people. Get Up the Yard! He's a movie star, too...

Secret Stories Tour Announced. 2024-25 Ireland/UK, Maritime Canada, South Africa...

 Secret Stories are the tales whispered up and down the Blues Highway. Mouth to ear. Generation to generation. In the parking lot. On the night bus. At the back of the left earphone on the playback, if you listen carefully. Get on board. Let go. Your secrets are safe with me. Ireland: next up. In just a few weeks time.

The Tour Blog sites take a long time for me to build, so I'm now sneaking upcoming 2024-25 "Secret Stories" tour stuff onto the 2023-24 "Jojo Man" page here. All the materials in the Media Sidebar are still the most current available. They are being updated– slowly– to the present moment, but this page remains your BEST source of quality, authorized, downloadable, digital promotional resources. Just this week somebody did a Google search and used a bio perhaps fifteen or twenty years out of date... ah, well– we all try! 

The Lost Counties of Ireland

A good dog can be a comfort on a tour such as this: in a place where strange things haunt the hedgerows, and black birds spot the sky.

I think it might of been Flann O'Brien who put the idea in my head that there are actually small, lost Counties in Ireland: secret places that don't appear on maps or on main road signs: places acknowledged in the pub by a curt nod, or a raised eyebrow: after which the conversation only too quickly moves back to the game. Anybody who has ever driven these tiny, Irish tracks knows this to be true. And once you've escaped Google, the strange, modern data vanishes: and well: there you are.

My performance was to be held in the upstairs room of a small pub in the village. It took some walking to find it. I was already tired from the weight of the guitars when I encountered a policeman at the threshold. It was quickly getting dark, and I had been nervous about finding the place, and loading in, and starting on time: and was edging for a pint of something, and for a little conversation to relax my day of travels. But he was a large man who fairly filled the passage to the door. Thick arms and legs encased in a rough blue uniform.

"I do not want to be insidious," the policeman said, "but would you inform me about your arrival in the parish? Surely you had a three-speed gear for the hills?"

"I had no three-speed gear," I responded, "the local bus dropped me up at the High Street."

The Policeman made no response to my answer, but looked at me sideways. "Musician, are you?"
He seemed to take a great interest in my hands. "Have you played for a long time, then?"

A good dog can be a comfort on a tour such as this: in a place where strange things haunt the hedgerows, and black birds spot the sky. The next Irish tour begins June 28 at the Belfast City Blues Festival. I'll continue across Ireland, playing venues large and small, popular places you've heard of– and other places, too, perhaps not found on the standard maps, perhaps only found by turning left instead of right and flagging down an aging, local bus. I'll wrap the Irish tour in Dublin, in mid-August, with shows at Arthur's Blues & Jazz and the Howth Blues & Roots Festival.