Unknown Hinson

(Above) Unknown Hinson poster that was on the door. Click any image for larger view.

(Above) Unknown Hinson last night, photos by John Foster. Click any image for larger view.


Click any image for larger view.


Click any image for larger view.


(Below) Unknown Hinson at Stubbs in Austin. Performing “Silver Platter.” This was a private NAMM show sponsored by Tascam and Coffin Cases.






UNKNOWN HINSON IS A FELLOW NORTH CAROLINIAN, THOUGH TO CLAIM A CONNECTION TO HIM IS WELL, SORT OF FUN... I GUESS. MAYBE? My buddy Bob and I went to hear him perform last Thursday night at Mad Art Gallery in St. Louis, and the KING was rocking down the house. Yes, I said THE KING, baby! With just his 3-piece group—Unknown is one weird, straight ahead, hard rocking, hellava Rickenbacker-playin’ SOB!

How would I describe this Carolina cat? Hmm-m-m. He’s a conglomeration of many things—rockabilly, tent evangelist, “ladies man” vampire maybe? I like to think of him as something one would hope to stumble onto while on a road trip.

Here’s the scenario: You and you best buddy are traveling through the South... how about North Carolina? You get off the highway to take a back road to save time. It’s late, almost midnight and you find you are low on gas. Hoping to find a station open— you now wish you hadn’t committed to this back road! Hoping against hope, and finally driving on fumes, the car dies. Dammit! You pull over. It’s dark as pitch and kind of creepy when... you hear… music!! There must be a club nearby, someone there can surely help. The sound of an electric guitar is rifting across your ears—and not from down the road, but from across the tobacco field to your right. The music is intoxicating —what’s that? Was that a gunshot, or were you just hearing things??

You start walking through a red clay tobacco field and after about 15 minutes—finally—you see lights—looks like a little clapboard house or club of some kind. About a dozen cars are there—all of them beaten down redneck crappy cars and trucks, most with gun racks. There is a man with no shirt passed out in the bed of the first truck you pass as you step up to the screen door of the club. Yikes! You exchange glances with your friend and both of you know—this is gonna be interesting.

The sound inside is hard rock and deafening, and there are whoops and hollars and catcalls coming from the inside.

Anyone want to finish this story line for me? Just go to comments!

Rockabilly Legend Billy Lee Riley Dies

ROCKABILLY MUSICIAN AND BLUESMAN BILLY LEE RILEY PASSED AWAY LAST WEEK, August 2. Billy Lee recorded at Sun Studios between 1956 and 1959, and he has many fans who believe he was one of the best to ever record there. Rolling Stone journalist Robert Palmer called BLR, “the unsung hero of Sun rock & roll.”

Born 1933 in Pocahontas, Arkansas, Riley spent his early years living on plantations near Osceola and Forrest City — small rural towns in the Arkansas Delta region near the Mississippi River. Riley’s father, a house painter by trade, would work in the cotton fields to feed the family during lean times.

Young Billy Lee began playing harmonica at age six, and learned blues guitar in his early teens. “Blues is the music I grew up hearing on the plantation. There were black families and white families all living together, far from town. We were poor, and playing music was our main form of entertainment.”

Enjoy this rocking recording by Billy Lee Riley (1933 -2009). RIP.