Mikey Junior
It Ain't Hard To Tell
8^th Train Records ©™
(2010)

Singer/songwriter/harmonica wizard Mikey Junior is a native of Trenton, NJ who grew up across the Delaware River in Bucks County, PA. He came to the blues via his musician father’s record collection and by his early twenties (he just turned 30) he was a full time musician leading his own band up and down the East Coast. Three of his most important harmonica influences are Steve Guyger (Jimmy Rogers’ former harmonica player is native Bucks Countian), William Clarke, and Clarke’s mentor George "Harmonica" Smith. Mikey combines Clarke’s visceral lyricism, Guyger’s dynamic subtlety, and Smith’s muscular thunder (on chromatic) in his ever developing style. The impetus for Mikey’s sixth album was his desire to measure his progress as a musician with a combination of originals and personal favorites like Jimmy Roger’s "What Have I Done" (a long time staple of Steve Guyger’s repertoire) and George Smith’s signature slow blues "Telephone Blues," one of Mikey’s most dramatic performance pieces, for covers. (Smith is also the source for the funky instrumental "Hawaiian Eye," an obscure detective show of the early Sixties and the precursor to "Hawaii Five-O" and "Magnum P.I."). Mikey is no one trick pony as a songwriter either as evinced by the rollicking "Cheapskate" with its witty self-deprecation, the brawny Berryesque rocker "You All Alone," the wry grinder "Pocket Full of Money," and the fire and fury of burning love with the sinewy title track. Mikey Junior has talent, taste, and plenty of soul – it ain’t hard to tell!

-Thomas J. Cullen; Bucks County Blues Society Director and Blues Revue Contributing Editor