Fame Is New but Blues Are Old Hat for Texan

His debut album on Alligator Records is called “Long John Hunter: Border Town Legend.” And Hunter, who plays at B.B. King’s on Friday and Saturday, got the apposition the old-fashioned way. He earned it.

Hunter, 65, cut his musical teeth in the border town of Juarez, Mexico. A Texan, Hunter crossed the border into Mexico, where he worked in the Lobby Bar for 13 years straight starting in 1957. This was hard-core dues-paying where union rules did not apply.

“The Lobby was not your ordinary club,” Hunter said. “It was seven nights a week, from 8 at night till you don’t know when.”

And the crowd at the Lobby Club was not your average weekend golf and tennis crowd, but rather a very well-oiled, rowdy group of cowboys, soldiers from Ft. Bliss, ranchers, frat boys and tourists.

“Always a packed house, it was a place to have a fight, get bloody, wipe it off and keep goin’.” Hunter said. “If we didn’t have 10 fights, it was a bad night.”

Just to keep the audiences focused on the stage, Hunter would sometimes resort to rather large gestures. Word spread of this wild blues man who would swing from the rafters while playing the guitar. Many music celebs, including Etta James, James Brown and Albert Collins, crossed the border to see for themselves and wound up sitting in with Hunter and his band.

The Lobby closed in 1970, after which Hunter continued to work almost exclusively in Texas. He finally released his first album nationally in 1992 and, suddenly, he was a “new” voice in the blues, after playing music for over 40 years. How is Hunter taking all this attention?

“Better late than never,” Hunter said. “I’m late, but I think I’m right on time. If it happened when I was younger, I may not have been able to handle it.”

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Corey Stevens, another guy who can’t get off the road promoting his CD, also plays at B.B. King’s, only this show is on Tuesday. This former grade-school teacher and his band have been on the road continually since April. Last week it was Michigan and Wisconsin, and the week before that, North Dakota and South Dakota. Stevens called me from his Michigan motel room.

“It’s been cold and snowy,” he said. “You get to see the Packers on TV, and you see all these people walking around with cheese on their heads.”

This stop in Los Angeles will include their first days off at home in quite awhile.

“Supposedly, we were off in September,” Stevens said. “But we did a couple of gigs in Detroit and Corpus Christi [Texas], and we did the ‘House of Blues’ radio show with Dan Aykroyd in San Francisco. So, it’s wasn’t much of a month off.”

But all the roadwork seems to be paying off. Stevens said that his album, “Blue Drops of Rain” is getting airplay in some larger markets such as Minneapolis, Detroit, Kansas City and Pittsburgh.

Stevens, 42, taught third grade in the Los Angeles Unified School District from 1985 to ’95. Even then, he was playing music. He self-produced his album “Blue Drops of Rain,” which later was picked up by a small independent label. The label, in turn, was taken over by Discovery Music, a subsidiary of Warner Music.

Warner “has been so great,” he said. “I like the way things have been going.”

He spends his days doing newspaper and radio interviews and his nights performing--either headlining smaller venues or opening for bigger acts in bigger venues.

“I’m married and I have an 8-year-old daughter--that part is really hard,” Stevens said. “But the rest is pretty easy.”

Also the tour has given him a chance to see some of his childhood idols up close and personal.

“Rick Derringer sat in with me, and he told me that my album was great,” Stevens said. “I was like a 15-year-old again.”

* Long John Hunter plays Friday and Saturday, $12 cover; Corey Stevens plays Tuesday, $7 cover; at B. B. King’s Blues Club, at Universal CityWalk, 1000 Universal Center Drive. Call (818) 622-5464.

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Show Band: When Larry “Fuzzy” Knight was a young man growing up in St. Louis, he was musically turned on by the R & B big band sounds of Ray Charles, James Brown, Ike and Tina Turner and others.

Knight’s group, Blowin’ Smoke, which is playing at Cozy’s on Friday evening, is an 11-member musical tribute to those ensembles of the 1950s-’70s.

“People are shocked to hear how big the band is,” Knight said. “But I come from a time and an era in St. Louis. I saw this big hole in the style of music I grew up loving.”

Blowin’ Smoke is as much a show as a band. Knight--decked out in white fedora and pinstripe suit, with a carnation in the lapel--acts as ringmaster. The band, which includes four horns, piano, drums, bass and guitar, has played on Saturday nights at Harvelle’s in Santa Monica for the last two years. Featured are the Fabulous Smokettes, three women who share the singing chores with Knight, who also plays bass.

Knight and the three women--Terri Brinegar, Christina Vierra and Carolyn Basley--all have different singing styles, which gives the act a variety that includes straight blues, R & B, gospel and swing numbers.

The four trade lead vocals and backup duties. Blowin’ Smoke performs original tunes as well as their own interpretations of rock and soul music classics.

Knight has been a professional musician for over 25 years. He has toured with Albert Collins, Chuck Berry and others, and he was the bassist in the rock band Spirit for over 10 years.

While it probably should not be compared to the planning of the D-Day invasion or the liberation of Kuwait, the logistics of keeping an 11-member troupe well rehearsed, on the road and on time to gigs are formidable. Knight handles all the management duties himself. And he thinks the benefits outweigh the hassles.

“The sound we get to make,” Knight said, “is the sound other bands don’t ever get to make.”

* Blowin’ Smoke plays Friday at Cozy’s Bar & Grill, 14058 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks. $8 cover. Call (818) 986-6000.