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Burnishing the metal on the blues

Twin Dragons returns with two guitarists 'who can play anything'
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By Darrell Jónsson
For The Prague Post
April 23rd, 2008 issue

COURTESY PHOTO
Cane, second from left, bulked up for this tour by adding survivors from Venom, the Plasmatics and Black Sabbath.
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Twin Dragons


When: Friday, April 25, at 8
Where: Exit Music Hall (Koněvova 219, Prague 3-Chmelnice)
Tickets: 250 Kč in advance through Ticketstream, 300 Kč at the door

The well-traveled bass player and vocalist Azariah Cane (aka Nathaniel Peterson) has worked with a respectable list of blues-rock heavyweights that includes Howlin’ Wolf, Eric Clapton, Keith Richards and Savoy Brown. Cane was no small factor in Savoy Brown’s deep excursions into blues roots on the 1999 CD The Blues Keep Me Holding On. He also made noteworthy contributions to Hubert Sumlin’s 2005 Grammy-nominated About Them Shoes. And Cane’s bass and vocal work on the 2007 B.B. King/Freddie King/Albert King tribute DVD Walking With The Kings had some people calling him a “prince of the blues.”
As co-founder of Twin Dragons, Cane has tweaked a few blues purists’ eyes and ears by affiliating himself with former members of Venom, Carcass, the Plasmatics and Black Sabbath. Yet for Memphis-born Cane, his music and his life are one continuous weave where “everything has been changing.”
Discussing the Memphis/Detroit/L.A./European tightrope he walks between heavy metal and the blues, Cane says, “Some people might call it metal, but I call it the transition of the world. It’s the sound that reacts to the way the world is, with all this anger about war, rebellion and drug dealers, where up is down and down is up. Our music reflects the chaos of the world. It has to sound chaotic for people to accept it. But if you listen to the lyrics — the lyrics will strengthen your soul.”
Cane’s variegated approach to music reflects his background. “I started with jazz and R&B, and from Mitch Ryder’s band went into rock ’n’ roll,” he says. “When I was 21, I started playing with blues masters. But I couldn’t play the blues, because I did not have their plantation and work-farm experience. You know, I grew up in the ’60s and ’70s. I saw the changes when rock ’n’ roll and the hippies came in, Woodstock and all that.”
To chart where Cane and Twin Dragons are going, a better reference point is the man who personified the crossover from ’60s R&B to experimental rock, from Wilson Pickett’s “Funky Broadway” to Electric Flag’s “Another Country” and Band of Gypsies’ “Machine Gun:” the late drummer and vocalist Buddy Miles.
Asked about his friend Miles, Cane takes a deep breath and says, “When you meet someone going down the road that came from where you came from, and you jam together, it’s like magic. Our sound checks could go on for three hours or more; Miles just simply refused to stop playing.
“As a bass player, when you have a really good drummer, you don’t have to think. And the magic of the stage is about not having to think, but just letting the music come through your soul. With Miles you didn’t have to think about nothing, because he would put the right thing in the right place every time.”
Cane says that he’s found a similar near-telepathic connection in Twin Dragons with the Italian guitarist Fabio Cerrone. Playing with Cerrone, Cane says, “is like jammin’ with Miles — you don’t have tell him what key it’s in, he’ll find out.” On this tour, Twin Dragons has also added the tasteful metal riff maestro Martin Mike Hickey. “Now I’ve got two guitar players who can play anything,” Cane says happily.
With former Plasmatics drummer T.C. Tolliver along, it’s hard to say exactly where Twin Dragons’ current incarnation will emerge on the blues/metal map. If previous shows are any indication, the material will range from the potent proto-metal of the early Jeff Beck Group and Band of Gypsies to the spiritual blues of Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac.
Whatever they play, it’s always an entertaining ride on what Cane calls his “blues foundation and rock ’n’ roll journey.”

Darrell Jónsson can be reached at features@praguepost.com


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