Kevin Thorpe
Barry Middleton (BM) Interview with Kevin Thorpe (Kev) - July 2010
(got to mention everyone). The set really sounded great but I wasn’t sure where to place it….I’ve moved back towards the Blues with my new band Tipping Point. Tipping point is me Dominic Hollands on guitar, Paul Mallatratt on bas and OOTB stalwart Nigel Lobley on drums. We’re recording an album of originals should be out soon.
BM: Does singing the Blues come from experience?
Kev: I think you begin emulating the greats but the real turn on is expressing yourself with your own voice. I certainly write from
experience….note there are no songs about sheep!
BM: What were your first experiences of the Blues?
Kev: Well I guess that would have been through John Mayall with the ‘Beano’ album. The BluesBreakers with Clapton. I wanted to play blues from the moment I heard it but didn’t know where to start. It was only when I got a John Lee Hooker album out of the library presto… the light came on… I can’t remember which one but it was a late 50’s early 60’s release, just acoustic and raw.
BM: You were off the blues scene in the UK for a few years, what experiences from when you were in the states, helped get you back on the road?
Kev: Out of the Blue were a busy band. I lost the plot a bit towards the back of the ‘90’s due to one thing and another. I’d done a few things in the States in the 90’s once with Paul Rishell and Annie Raines (we even formed a house band with Ronnie Earl for a night at the House of Blues in Boston) and with Eugene for dates in South Carolina. Then I got involved with working for our label at the time, Armadillo. Was good to work with other artists like the Nimmos, Eugene ‘Hideaway’ Bridges and Rocky Athas but producing ain’t playing.
When I was in Austin in 2004 producing Eugene’s Comin’ Home album, Ray Wylie Hubbard asked me to do a live spot on his radio show in New Braunfels, San Antonio. I sang some country blues tunes and got great feedback….so was encouraged to look at doing something with the tunes. While I was in Texas I caught some exotic lung infection which laid me low for about 18 months….Eventually I recorded a set of stuff as Big Blue and The Dive Club with a load of mates…Dale Storr, Jeremy Meek, Mark Flanagan from Jools Holland’s band, Wayne Proctor, Johnny Dyke, Nigel Lobley, Alan Fearn and Simon Sparkes
BM: What was the first gig that you played?
Kev: In Bawtry at a pub that was called The Glasby Arms.
BM: Do you think that Blues needs to evolve to stay relevant?
Kev: It can’t help but eveolve. The British invasion of the states was a leap in evolution that still has ripples. My main influences were the artists affected by those times and who reflected those times. Little Feat, the Stones, Paul Butterfield, the Doors. Great writers have always brought something new…Larry Garner, Lucky Peterson. In the UK Ian Siegal is amongst the best we’ve got.
BM: Aims for the future and what do you hope to achieve within the Blues?
Kev: I’ve got a new sound….just want to keep writing and playing and hope I can be still relevant.
BM: Why do you feel that young people are not as attracted to the Blues as other Genres?
Kev: It’s great to see young players like Virgil, Oli Brown and Scott McKeon embracing the blues….the audience for them has a young element as well as the old brigade. I’m singing about the road well trodden and from the perspective of an old blues lag….some of the younger ones can dig it… but it’d be nice to have more young acts singin’ about their own journey.
BM: What other styles of music have you drawn inspiration from?
Kev: Country…Steve Earle. I was also a big Stax fan, great singers and writers. Check out Peter Guralnick’s book ‘Sweet Soul Music’.
BM: You are a singer/songwriter. What drives your song-writing?
Kev: Relationships and their ups and downs and downs and downs. I have a political streak but don’t like preachiness.
BM: If you had the opportunity to play with any blues artist dead or alive live on stage who would it be?
Kev: Like to play with Ronnie Earl lots…would try to be a sponge.
BM: What do you do to relax when you have some spare time away from music?
Kev: I find it difficult to think about much else. I listen to Radio 4, TV and have a few glasses of the old red.
Thanks Kev I will have the drinkl when I see you
Barry Middleton
Nottingham Blues Society
BM: When did you start playing (guitar)?
Kev: When I was 15.
BM: How would you like to see music change over the next 10 years?
Kev: More small venues. An end to X Factor fame factories.
BM: If you wasn’t a musician (in a band) what would you be doing?
Kev: Trying to get it out another way and drinking too much.
BM: What’s your advice to a young person just starting out?
Kev: Don’t do it for the money….
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