Dai Thomas

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John Peel OBE, 1939 - 2004

Dai Thomas

A few notes from Dai...

I play purely acoustic instruments. Standard guitar (Martin 0-15 from 1954, 0-18 from ‘56), two flavours of National (1933 Duolian and a 1994 Polychrome triplate), 12-string (1972 Guild F112), mandolin (1981 Flatiron), banjo-mandolin (1920 Reliance) and a self-built guitar-banjo. I use techniques that people used before electronics intervened, so I am quite loud and raucous, I also wave my arms around a lot. My material is drawn from many acoustic bluesmen, e.g. Charley Patton, Blind Willie McTell, Gary Davis, Peg Leg Howell, Furry Lewis, Robert Johnson, Robert Wilkins, Leadbelly, Luke Jordan, Papa Charlie Jackson, Geeshie Wiley (blueswomen too), John Hurt, Blind Willie Johnson, William Harris, Sleepy John Estes, and many, many more. Because there are so many good blues around, I haven't found it necessary to write my own!

I'm based in Salford, but I play festivals, concerts and clubs all over the U.K. and a couple of times in Ireland and the U.S.. I've had tracks on four charity recordings and played and sang on some tracks of the Jim White album "No Such Place" (Jim's from Pensacola, Florida and is one of David Byrne's artists). "No Such Place" is selling very well over this side of the Atlantic and has had a lot of critical acclaim. After a slow start in the U.S. it's now doing very well there too). My own CD is called “Songs From The Ragged Backside Of The American Dream”, or SFTB for short, and has 15 tracks, all recreations of songs from the pre-war acoustic era and all but three blues. It also features sleeve-notes from Max Haymes! If you want a copy, they cost £10 (including postage) from me at 42, Lancaster Road, Salford, Lancashire, M6 8AW, United Kingdom.

There is also an Old-Timey side to my music (the stuff they called hill-billy before WW2); it has an awful lot in common with the Black music of the time. To accompany this side, I play 5-string fretted & fretless banjo, autoharp, dulcimer, Dobro (a 70’s F-60 square-neck), french harp and some very bad fiddle. The remaining SFTB tracks are from this genre (but no fiddle!).

Check out Dai's article on Blues Singers and their instruments

You can contact Dai by e-mail at d.thomas@talktalk.net