Search - Tail Dragger :: American People

Howlin' Wolf's voice was so gravelly, it was said he gargled nails. The Tail Dragger sounds like he starts each day with thumbtacks. But he is more than Wolf lite; the Tail Dragger is his own artist. With several guests from the contemporary Chicago blues scene--Rockin' Johnny, Billy Branch, Eddie Shaw, and Jimmy Dawkins among them--his music is solidly contemporary. His sound was groomed in dark Chicago clubs, and he draws out his material with plenty of club-inspired jamming. "You Gotta Go" is sung to a neighbor, made powerful by the intimacy of the line "Your son is selling dope, your daughter on the corner too." The guitar is Mississippi delta-inspired, and the saxophone wails like a swinging cat still in the 1950s. Tail Dragger sings Howling Wolf's "Ooh Baby," and his voice is uncannily like the original. You ever gargled thumbtacks? --Robert Gordon