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The Paul Byrd Band
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I've been
voted the "Best Band in 2003&2004" by the kind folks at the "Blues Dragon Club"
in Cardiff, Wales Quotes:
" From the first note I heard, I knew Paul Byrd was a very special Bluesman.
His music is rooted deep in the tradition of Albert and B.B. King, and travels
straight to your heart. His songwriting is humorous and contemporary, and his
stage presence endearing. Come back soon Paul....... "
Nick Dow BBC Radio Lancashire 'Lancashire Bluenotes'
" Paul Byrd seems to have all he needs to do what he wants; a rich southern
bluesy voice, a cookie jar full of licks and the intelligence to use them
tastefully...............Oh and a rare 1961 Cadillac "
Nigel Rose - Blues Matters / Issue 15
Review : Paul Byrd- Warrington Blues Club - 18 Nov 2005
An excellent gig, an excellent review; I said that Grahame would come up trumps
and write a proper review and here it is --- nice one mate, thanks ......
One of this year’s most eagerly awaited gigs for me, was the return of the
superb Paul Byrd, from Fort Worth, Texas – and at Warrington Blues Club he again
gave the crowd a magnificent display of ‘blues from the heart’ – with his
top-notch guitar playing, coupled with his great, rich voice.
As ever the tour has been put together by Chris Lomas, who handled the bass
duties, with the band completed by Fred Skidmore on keyboards and Micky Barker –
on one of the smallest drum kits I have ever seen! No such problems about a
dodgy pick-up band with these guys on board!
Two brilliant sets included several covers from the three Kings – BB, Freddie
and Albert, along with songs from Paul Byrd’s latest release – “Without Further
Adieu”. The all-round nice guy was on top form and by the end of the night had
the dance floor in front of him full.
He knows how to pace his sets and early treats were the rollicking “Owe, Owe,
Owe” of his own, and a great, funky reading of the chestnut “Key To The
Highway”, done Freddie King style, with a glorious rendition of Bill Withers
“Ain’t No Sunshine” featuring some stunning guitar and heartfelt vocal.
The pace was taken up for the rocking “Sugar Free, Sugar Mama” – probably the
nearest he gets to a pure Texas shuffle in the show – with some sparkling
playing from Fred Skidmore – who was give ample opportunity all night on both
organ and piano.
Second set highlights included Percy Mayfield’s often-covered “Serves Me Right
To Suffer” and an absolute stonking version of BB King’s “Sweet Little Angel”,
with his black Les Paul firing out the BB-style licks. Nods were given to both
Freddie King, with a take on his “Boogieman”, and Albert King, with a fluid,
emotion-filled “I’ll Play The Blues For You”.
A top night was rounded off with a brace of encores, concluding with a romp
through Louis Jordan’s “Let The Good Times Roll”, with the latter part of the
song featuring some dynamic slide playing – recalling classic Duane Allman.
For a classic straight blues show there is nobody to beat this guy – as I have
said before he should be on main stages at the major blues festivals in this
country – Gary Hood get to it!
GRAHAME RHODES
CHESTER, UK
PAUL BYRD
Warrington R&B Club at Warrington Town F.C.
Friday September 10th 2004 by Grahame Rhodes
The supremely talented Texan guitarist, Paul Byrd, on his fourth visit to these
shores, stopped off at Warrington for the first time, and gave the excellent
turn-out a night of fantastic blues to remember!
The man from Fort Worth is a powerful performer – a master guitar player and
also a great singer, who knows how to work a crowd with his laid-back charm very
evident – picked up from many years on the road back home.
Backed by a great Midlands trio – Chris Lomas (bass), Fred Skidmore (keyboards)
and Carl Hemmingsley (drums) – he delivered two knockout sets of classic blues –
many from such masters as BB, Freddie and Albert King, together with songs from
his current “Without Further Adieu” album.
The night kicked off with the rollicking “Sugar Free, Sugar Mama”, with its wry
lyrics, before the first dip into the Albert King catalogue with the classic
“Don’t Burn Down The Bridge” – with Byrd firing off some classic guitar lines,
his face a picture of passion for the music and straight from the heart!
The timeless “Key To The Highway” was delivered in a funky groove, the way the
late, great fellow Texan, Freddie King, used to play it, before the tempo was
taken up for his own “Owe, Owe, Owe”, with its Jimmy Reed feel.
A much longer second set kicked off with Otis Rush’s “Cut You Loose”, with
keyboard man Fred Skidmore given ample opportunity to solo, as indeed he was all
night – having seen him many times in different bands, this was probably the
best I have seen him play!
Two standouts in the second set were the great “The Hustle Is On”, from another
Texas legend, T-Bone Walker, with more fantastic guitar from Paul Byrd; and the
lovely jazz song, “Funny How Time Slips Away". Another highlight was the
Latimore song, “Straighten It Out” – his interpretation of this r&b hit from
1974 featured possibly the most intense vocal performance of the night.
A great medley featuring “Driving Wheel”, “So May Roads, So Many Trains” and
“Help The Poor” saw some blistering slow blues as Byrd stood tall at the front
of the stage and let rip some quite stunning guitar.
A raucous end to a truly great night saw an audience sing-along on “Downhome
Blues” with the whole room joining in, and a romp through “Sweet Home Chicago”
which saw the dance floor full.
Many thanks must go to Ray and Barbara O’Hare for bringing such a great artist
to the area – this is a man who should be on main stage line-ups at festivals –
promoters please take note! Come back soon Mr. Byrd – you are the real deal!
Here's a review reprinted with permission from Blues
Matters magazine - The U.K.'s #1 blues publication.
PAUL BYRD @Alexander's, Rufus Court, Chester.
Thursday, 1st May 2003
Like many Americans, Paul's politeness was disarming
and immediately initiated a warm audible response from
the audience who unanimously agreed with the idea.
Starting, as BB King had for many years, with Memphis
Slim's 'Everyday I Have the Blues', established the
mood for the rest of the first set. After a tasty solo
Paul graciously handed over the second to guitarist
Mark Shaw with "C'mon boy play that guitar" before the
whole band gave the piece a big freestyle finish.
At this point, the band went into a brief discussion
about what next. This was the first night of Paul's
second UK tour and the guys had only been able to
briefly get musically re-acquainted during the sound
check, so tonight was about musicians going to their
knowledge and experience and for me there is nothing
better. Paul has a new CD out, 'Without Further
Adieu...', and the next two songs provided a suitable
taste: 'Sugar Free, Sugar Mama' and 'Owe, Owe, Owe'
both written by Paul. Since I've been writing reviews
I have devised a few tricks to get myself out of
trouble, one is to note down a particularly
distinctive phrase from a song if I don't immediately
recognise the title. It paid off tonight because for
'Owe, Owe, Owe', which advised us on the dangers of
spending too much money, I had noted the words
"...brand new matching hat..." which I subsequently
located within track 2 of the CD. Next two of the
three songs on the CD not actually written by Paul,
'Key To The Highway' and the uncompromising
'Straighten It Out', followed by Albert King's 'Cross
Cut Saw' and 'Life Ain't Worth Livin' from Paul's
first CD 'Paul Byrd and The Escalators'. A flick knife
guitar intro cut through the stage lights into 'Poor
Man's Pride', taking us on a long and sorrowful
journey; Paul's voice veered deep towards the raw edge
of its range to delivery the songs tough message of
poverty and ultimate redemption.
If you check out Paul Byrd's website, either directly
at www.paulbyrd.com or via www.hoodoomoon.com,
you
will see that he is the proud owner of a rare 1961
Series 62 4-Window Cadillac Sedan and the next song
'Cadillac' was a citation to the vehicle. As the first set concluded I was keen to check out Paul's Cherry
Red 'ES335' which turned out to be the 'Epiphone'
variant to which he had fitted authentic Gibson
humbucking pickups and a Bigsby 'vibrato' arm, which
he never used but it looked good with the Marshall
amplifier. Incidentally, why do Fender still refer to
such attachments as 'tremolo' arms in their
catalogues? The second set started in a more Albert
King-y sort of way with 'Walk Down A One Way Street'
and 'Call My Job' after which 'Never Gonna Let You Go'
revealed another side to Paul's versatility with a
distinctive Rockabilly vibe and jump style vocal. A request for Stevie Ray Vaughan gave us 'Pride and Joy'
followed by BB Kings 'Never Make Your Move Too Soon'.
Tony Bayliss's drumming really drove this piece along
with caesium clock accuracy and just emphasised what a
really neat outfit he, Chris and Mark are at the
moment. It was obvious that Paul and the band had now
settled in as he gave away another solo to Mark
imploring him to "Do it, do it" - just for the record
Mark "Did it". During 'The Woman I Love', I was riveted by Chris's cascading bass line, which is
cryptically credited to a guy named 'Stoney' Bass on
the '...Adieu' CD. 'I'll Play The Blues For You' was followed by Ike Turner's 'Please Stop Leading Me On'.
It had been a long couple of days for Paul and with
fourteen more gigs in the next sixteen days we were
happy enough with just one encore, Freddie Kings 'Big Legged Woman'. Paul Byrd seems to have all he needs to
do what he wants; a rich southern bluesy voice, a
cookie jar full of licks and the intelligence to use
them tastefully ...Oh... and a rare 1961 Cadillac. I suspect that after this seventeen day tour he will
have something else - a shed load of British
enthusiasts. The authoritative way Paul effortlessly created a 'Blues Club' atmosphere was masterly and
with his experience of opening for the likes of Jeff Healey, ZZ Top, Otis Rush and the Fabulous
Thunderbirds I keep visualising him on the stage of a
major UK Festival. I always repeat play the relevant CD's as I write reviews so it is no wonder I took my
time writing this one. Band Line-up Paul Byrd, guitar
and vocals: Mark Shaw, guitar: Chris Lomas, bass: Tony
Baylis, drums.... Nigel Rose
Individual's review:
Paul Byrd, Katie Fitzgearald's ( Downstairs Bar ) Enville St. Stourbridge, West Midlands. Friday 11th October 2002.
Paul Byrd is from Fort Worth, Texas and he's a blues guitarist. Go see him; because this man, at around 30 years of age has a voice and a demeanour that belies his age.
Although I think it's fair to describe him as unknown in the UK, Paul has paid his dues in the blues clubs of Texas, but also in that little known hotbed of the blues - Anchorage. His residency in Alaska saw him eventually opening for mainstage acts such as ZZ Top, but having played to stadium-sized audiences he went back to Texas and worked in the small clubs and as a side-man once again. His years of playing night after night have given him a confidence and ease with his material, and a solid platform on which to be both inventive and generous to the other musicians he works with. His sound is clean and, although he does include a couple of Texas shuffles, his material varied. He may well be influenced by BB King and Stevie Ray Vaughan, but he's absorbed those influences and now shows himself to be as comfortable when he's coaxing a slow emotional cry from the guitar as when he's on a full throttle rocking twelve-bar. And it's not only in his playing you feel King's influence, but in the confidence with which he bestrides the stage, with the authority in his presence.
Tonight, in Stourbridge, he was backed by the powerhouse of bass player Chris Lomas, drummer Tony Baylis (both billed as ex-Parker's Alibi) and pianist Fred Skidmore (ex-Vincent Flatt's), a combination that can best be described as a house band for the promoters, who play with all their visiting artists. The fact that this was only the third live gig that Byrd and they have played together was impossible to discern, there was hardly a note out of place and it was quite obvious that there was a chemistry between frontman and band, noticeable in the swapping of lead breaks between Byrd and Skidmore, that felt as if it had taken months on the road to gel.
What promoters Hoodoo Moon have got here is a near faultless rhythm section, and it's one thing saying that it consists of ex-members of other bands, what it really needs is a name of its own, a name that sets it up as the force that it is. We need to be able to identify what we are dealing with because, on the strength of what happened tonight we will soon be able to say that because someone is working with this backline they are bound to be good - we will soon be going to see artists on the grounds because these guys are working with them: their presence will be a kitemark for acts that are unknown in the UK. Forget the ex -, here we have a hex that's putting magic into Hoodoo Moon promotions, and playing with visiting artists the likes of Paul Byrd, they can only get better.
Details of other Hoodoo Moon promotions can be found at www.hoodoomoon.com
Reeves Fitzjoseph.
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