Russ Tippins - Hebden Bridge Blues Festival 2013
Sprint upstairs to see Russ Tippins (Ok, The Hat doesn't do sprinting – more an elegant shuffle) playing to a full rocking room. I've said before that Russ should be playing big, if not huge venues (will some-one please book him!) as his playing totally commands the place and fills it from floor to ceiling. An extraordinary talented guitarist who seems to fit more notes into a number than most people can get into a gig and who makes well-bred ladies perspire, he can still confound his audiences by throwing in a perfectly pitched slow number, sung with grace and full of those beautiful spaces that only good musicians can leave. With John Dawson on bass and Ian Halford on drums, he is blessed with one of tightest and most talented back lines in the business and together they blew Hebden away – again – they did it last year.
To add even more thrill to the set, Russ invited the major talented Jenna Hooson up on stage to sing a two-hundred-mile-an-hour-blow-your-sox-off 'Mama Don't Allow'..(go check on Youtube). Quite rightly, his two CDs 'Elecktrickery' and 'Combustion' are making waves and the buzzing, stomping room at Hebden clearly showed that this ain't gonna stop.
