Todd Wolfe has had an amazing career, jamming with everyone from two editions of the Allman Brothers to songwriting and touring with Sheryl Crow which lead to jamming with Eric Clapton, so he knows his blues.
He is bringing his trio back to Lethbridge, (including drummer Roger Voss and bassist Justine Gardner) Aug. 16 at the Slice.
He said the band has improved a lot since they first played Lethbridge back in February.
“I think Justine had just joined the band. In the past six months, we’ve toured Europe and we’ve really started to gel. And Justine has started to sing back-up vocals, so it has really started gelling.”
In between tours, they have been working on new music for a new CD to be released in 2012.
“Some of the songs are old and others are quite new,” he said.
“ I was brought up on rock and roll, but there are a lot of the blues in the new songs,” he said.
Back in the day, even before he met Sheryl Crow when she was touring in Michael Jackson’s band and began writing with her, later recording with her, he opened for southern rock luminaries including the Allman Brothers and the Dickey Betts band. He opened for the Allman Brothers with Dickey Betts and Warren Haynes as well as the Warren Haynes, Derek Trucks versions.
Playing with heavy hitters like Eric Clapton, Dickie Betts, Warren Haynes and Derek Trucks doesn’t throw him. It’s all in a day’s work.
“It didn’t really affect how I play,” he said adding was just part of the band in these cases.
He got to play with Eric Clapton as part of Sheryl Crow’s band.
He is also a good friend of Leslie West, best known for being part of ’70s rock juggernaut Mountain.
“ West appears on a couple of Wolfe’s CDs and Wolfe returned the favour on one of his. They have toured Europe together and played a couple times in New York as well.
“He’s a big influence. He’s not a lot of fun to work with because he really likes things done his way,” he said.
“But we have a lot of fun just hanging out. We both like shopping,” he said adding they are good friends. He noted the highlight of his career is playing with Eric Clapton three times, even though it was just as part of Sheryl Crow’s band.
“ Eric Clapton is a huge influence on me. So it was off the hook,” he enthused adding Sheryl Crow was in charge of that as far as telling her band what to do and play.
“ She has a set way of doing things, so she’d dictate to us what to play,” he said.
His current tour is part of an extensive tour which includes multiple gigs on the same day in different states. Luckily they are all close to his New York home.
“ There’s 4-H events and family gatherings. I’ve been touring for six and a half weeks, and the wheels on the bus go round and round,” he observed from New York. It’s all part of it,” he said.
After playing the Slice, he has a two day run at the Blues Can in Calgary and six days at Blues on Whyte in Edmonton.
They are putting the final touches on their latest record which drops in October.
They are currently touring in support of “the Todd Wolfe band “Live,” DVD which was released in late 2012 and the ensuing live CD which they released in early 2011.
“We got a lot better reviews on the album, than the DVD,” Wolfe said, adding respected blues publications Blues Revue and Living Blues gave it favourable reviews.
“The reviews to the DVD were mixed. The response has been good, but not great,” he said adding the footage resulted from two hand held cameras, so it came out a little disjointed.
“ The live CD got a lot off great favourable reviews,” he said.
— By Richard Amery, L.A. Beat Editor
