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HELLO
from TERESA
JAMES BILLY WATTS...................guitar & vocals DEBRA DOBKIN.....percussion & vocals TONY BRAUNAGEL........drums JERRY PETERSON....saxophones TERRY WILSON......bass, vocals |
| TERESA JAMES......keyboards & vocals | ||
| BIG, BIG.....really BIG NEWS
Teresa has been nominated for Contemporary Blues Female Artist of the Year! We want to thank everyone at the Blues Foundation for nominating Teresa...... this is certainly a huge and great honor and everyone here at Rhythm Tramp Headquarter is excited and thrilled about the news. The 2008 Blues Music Awards will be held on Thursday, May 8 at the Grand Casino Event Center in Tunica, Mississippi presented by The GIBSON Foundation. Anyone can join up and vote......and please do. So........join the Blues Foundation and help support Teresa by voting for her. Go to https://www.blues.org/members/ and check it out. It's a great way to support the blues and to help out some good causes too. Hey......we've just got home from Delbert's Sandy Beaches Cruise '08....the 14th cruise. This was the first out of San Diego.....we went through Cabo San Lucas, Matzalan and Puerta Vallarta. We got to see our cruiser family again. Lots of returning cruisers that keep coming back year after year. Lots of jamming going on every night......Especially the last night jam with the final hang being with Teresa and Jimmy Hall belting out ...."Stand By Me" with Delbert on piano, Kevin McKendree on B-3, Rob McNelley on guitar along with our very own, Billy Watts on guitar.....Lynn Williams on drums and Terry on bass......then the BMI writer of the year.....Then Teresa did Dusty Springfield's "I Only Want To Be With You" before Jeffery Steel came out and finished off the night fronting the band with producer, songwriter Tom Hambrick taking on the drummer's chair with the band. Our personal new cruise band fav this year had to be James Hunter and his band out of London. Great singer....great tunes and band. Check'em out. Old school R n B..... Hey, and also........the Blues Foundation
has a new shirt out to buy and support the arts ....and help out
some good people. For this one.....they've used a line from a song
of ours....."Since I found the blues.....I've been in the pink!"
Please go and check out www.blues.org/tickets
. We want to thank all the djs playing
our music. If I'm forgetting somebody here...........please send
me the info so I can put it up. Thanks.........the editor. BLUESVILLE XM RADIO We want to thank Blues Revue Magazine and Art Tapaldi for the wonderful review of The Bottom Line..........if you haven't seen it? Go out and buy it and support the blues. Our good friend and part time Rhythm
Tramp (when he's not out slamming with Mr. Tom Jones.......) Herman
Matthews has his debut cd called "HOME AT LAST".....check
it out at www.hermanmatthews.com
Tell him we sent you....Teresa's on it.....Terry's on it too. It's
a great cd.....some very nice grooves, but you'd expect nothing
less from a groove master like Herman. Some great songs and you'll
hear Herman carrying to the upfront vocal thing nicely. Reminescent
of Pops Staples at times was our first thought here at Rhythm Tramps
headquarters. Go buy it and support good people doing great music. The
"Rocking The Boat" film/ documentary that director Jay
Curlee has put together will be at the 16th Woods Hole Film Festival
(Cape Cod) on Aug 1 at 7pm. This wonderful film is about the music
on the Sandy Beaches Cruise of Delbert's. So much really amazing
music on this ship that got captured on this film....Delbert, Jimmy
Hall, Tommy Castro, Stephen Bruton, Marcia Ball, Wayne Toups, Rodney
Crowell, Mingo Fishtrap, Al Anderson, Gary Nicholson, just to mention
a few along with our very own Rhythm Tramps. The work he captured
and the work Jay has done.is kind of mindblowing and overwhelming.
The songwriting...the musicianship and the musical history walking
around on this ship. Anyway....keep
your eyes and ears open for "Rocking The Boat" by Jay
Curlee..... Other
news Terry and
Tony Braunagel have completed Jodie Siegal's
new cd called "Stepping Stone".
John Porter mixed it and it sounds simply great. Teresa is on the
new STEPHEN BRUTON cd called "FROM THE FIVE"
She's also been in the studio wtih SPENCER DAVIS helping
out on Spencer's upcoming CDs...Terry finished Cynthia Jones debut
cd a while back........and engineer Steve McHale is in the middle
of mixing it right as we speak. Billy Watts is in the studio working
on.a new MOJO MONKEY
CD. Hopefully it's going to be ready soon - finally! We will keep
you posted on other Rhythm Tramp news as it breaks... Rhythm Tramps
alumni JERRY PETERSON and JAMES CRUCE both were in the studio with
the man.....ERIC CLAPTON recently working on his
new cd being produced by JJ CALE........ can't
wait to hear this. Can't help but be fans of both of these guys!!
And this just in from the UK of a review of "THE BOTTOM LINE" from BLUES BUNNY.COM Teresa has come up trumps again with this release. The band are right on the money here and gel perfectly with Teresa's voice throughout. With great production, a full-bodied sound and stunning performances from all concerned this one's a real winner. The opening track, "All Time Low", is a superb start to proceedings with the horn section taking a prominent role. "I Know Handsome When I See It" brings us to the perennial blues favourite of infidelity as Teresa laments her lack of judgement. While with "If Momma Don't Dig It" we are treated to a more subdued mid-tempo blues, and "Whet My Appetite" is in a similar vein. A bit more of a 'rockier' sound is provided by "Next Big Thang" and "In the Pink". The two standout tracks are "The Bottom Line", and "How Am I Gonna Stop Loving You". The former opens with a wailing harmonica before dropping into an understated yet incessantly throbbing beat that carries you along; and with "How Am I Gonna Stop Loving You" Teresa delivers a wonderful ballad which, with the Hammond B-3 in the background, almost has a gospel feel to it. Finally we come to a close with the bar room piano driven up tempo "I Do My Drinkin' on the Weekend" - a great fun way to finish. What can we say? The husky voiced vocals just seem to keep getting huskier, the blues get that bit bluesier and the horns just get hornier! Teresa and her tramps have given us another rhythmic work of art in shades of blue.
"Roadhouse
rock- a Stonesy, satifsfying combination of blues, rock 'n' roll,
country and R & B-is a popular yet underrepresentd style. Perhaps
it's best-known practitioner is Delbert McClinton, and though other
artists have made roadhouse music their chosen metier, reliable
specimens of the form are difficult to come by. "The Rhythm
Method", by Los Angeles vocalist Teresa James, lives up to
strict roadhouse rules. “The Rhythm
Method is a must-have for all Southern roots music enthusiasts.”
The rest is in Dutch and we didn't get
much of that in school in Texas........ so, we'll have to find someone
to translate. BLACK
& TAN NEWS "From the opening notes of the bottleneck slide to the first entrance of her gutsy, soulful voice, it's clear that Teresa James knows where she's going and that the ride is going to be an exciting one. 'Oh Yeah' is another fine workout from LA stage and studio veteran James, her bassist and husband, Terry Wilson and assorted local pros (our very own Rhythm Tramps). First, they swing the blues with conviction, then they turn and romp through some searing rock licks with equal abandon. When called for, James slides from swampy to skanky to sultry, all in the space of a few lines...The sound, the energy, the support, the songs, they're all there." From
BLUES REVUE August/September From BLUES MATTERS (UK). Sent to us from a blues mag in Vienna, Austria. Do not know the name of magazine. Teresa James is from Texas, and if you
didn’t already know that, the briefest of listens to her third
and latest CD would give you a pretty good idea anyway. Now based
in Los Angeles, she is a gutsy, convincing singer and a rollicking
piano player with a leaning towards the funky side of New Orleans
music (and Professor Longhair in particular, to judge by her piano
style), and her band, the Rhythm Tramps, are perfectly in tune with
her direction… and this is a direction that runs from the
Robert Johnson styled slide guitar intro to the opening track to
‘I Want It All’, with it’s Longhair piano, Robert
Ward inflected guitar and mariachi band horns all thrown into the
musical pot – and the result is delicious! The call and response
vocals add a strong gospel feel to many numbers and occasionally
Teresa will move into rock ballad territory (‘All That I Am’)
though no-one should get too upset about that – and try ‘High
Maintenance Man’ for the kind of throbbing, pulsating rocker
that could only come from a musician out of the Lone Star State. BDC Distribution out of Portland, Oregon is handling our distribution now for JesiLu Records. Our "Whole Enchilada" and "Rhythm Tramps Live" CDs are available to order through their catalogue. If you are a store.........you can call this # 503-231-0876 and ask for a sales rep and they will get you set up. fax # 503-231-0420 3647 / SE 21st Portland, Oregon 97202
To contact us via email or
if you want a CD, you can reach us here! For those of you, who are going
to be in Southern California anytime soon, check out our dates Also, we have a new snail mail address: P.O. Box 1307, Santa Clarita, CA 91386-1307 if you'd like to get in touch with us that way.
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