Blues Rock

It began in a swamp. Well, in a Tipi in a swamp, with a telephone attached to an ironbark gum. This is not fiction. This is the cold smoking truth. The bearded man was born. Many years passed to the sounds of Tom Waits, AC/DC, Tim Buckley, The Black Keys, Pantera and Springsteen. The young bearded man moved to a bigger swamp filled with smoke and bars and girls. A land of knife fights and drug dens and muscle cars and rock’n’roll. He lost his way and began to despair. Half drowned in Jack Daniels he prowled his new domain.

The Fabulous Thunderbirds are a blues-rock band, formed in 1974. Their original line up included guitarist Jimmie Vaughan, the older brother of the influential electrical blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan. After performing for several years in the Austin, Texas blues scene, they earned a recording contract with Chrysalis Records and later signed to Arista. The first two albums released in 1979 and 1980 (with Keith Ferguson on bass and Mike Buck on drums), did not initially sell well, but are now regarded as successful white blues recordings.

Born and raised in Galveston, Texas, Hamilton was first hooked on music through his parents’ extensive collection of blues, rock, and soul records. Hamilton honed his multi-instrumental chops early, learning drums, piano, guitar, bass and harmonica by his early teens, and performing as part of his family’s doo-wop group.

Any list of awesome Aussies should include Anni Piper. An outstanding bassist in her own right, she's an authentic roots blues rocker that possesses a voice to die for. It has even been touted that an appropriate compliment would be that she sounds 100% American! Anni remembers with clarity the first time she heard the blues back in her school days. “It was Paul Butterfield Blues Band playing ‘Born in Chicago’ - I knew straight away that this was the direction I was heading.” she says.