Michael Messer & Chaz Jankel

• Virtuoso slide guitarist & songwriter Michael Messer (favourite of Johnny Cash) and  multi-instrumentalist songwriter Chaz Jankel (Ian Dury & The Blockheads) release  their debut album, Mostly We Drive – a finely crafted, lyrically inventive collaboration  via Knife Edge Records/Proper on January 19, 2024   These two superb songwriters wear decades of combined musical experience lightly, as the  eleven original songs here display a freshness of approach and add new twists to their  foundational influences in Blues, World, Funk, New Wave and Rock. This exhilarating and  accessible collection bears comparison with the finest work in either of their garlanded  careers.  Michael Messer’s reputation as an innovator in the blues genre and master of slide guitar is  well known. For forty years and ten albums Messer has been unafraid to incorporate  Reggae, African stylings, Hindustani classical music and even turntablism into his individual  vision of the Blues. Messer’s album ‘King Guitar’ topped the US Living Blues chart, while his  latest Call Of The Blues, garnered airplay in over 50 countries. Johnny Cash ‘The Man In  Black’ even professed himself a fan and wrote the liner notes for Michael’s award-winning  collaboration album ‘Rhythm Oil’.  “What I hear here is the real thing. This record carried me away to a long time ago, down a  Delta dirt road to a land of my musical good-old-daysing.” Johnny Cash - TN, 1992  In 1973 Chaz Jankel opened his account, placing a track on a Long John Baldry album.  Later in the ‘70s he joined Kilburn & The High Roads and started writing with Ian Dury.  Jankel’s partnership with Ian continued through The Blockhead years and beyond, writing  stone-cold classics such as ‘Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick’ and ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock &  Roll’. In the 1980s, as well as having success on the US dance scene, Chaz wrote ‘Ai No  Corrida’, a hit for Quincy Jones. Jankel also has composer credits for soundtracks, including  D.O.A. and K2. He continues to release solo albums, and tour with The Blockheads.

Tickets £15 pbf