Brian Curran

Brian Curran is another young artist who respects the traditional roots of the blues, using its influences as a platform to launch his own brand of country blues. A fine example of this can be found in 'Bring Me Flowers', a rollicking country blues on which he pastes Peetie Wheatstraw's lyrics onto a Tampa Red influenced slide backing; Charles Brown's 'Driftin' Blues', which under Curran's auspices becomes a slide driven, percussive walking blues; Sylvester Weaver's 'Guitar Rag', which is played on slide and evokes a mesmerizing latent beauty, and Robert Johnson's 'Preachin' Blues' which is played as a slide instrumental in the Mississippi Hill country style associated with RL Burnside.
Curran's originals meld seamlessly with his covers; 'Find Me A Place' being a flowing slide piece with a reverential New Orleans feel, whilst 'Lonesome Town' is a melancholy lament with a strong Robert Johnson feel to the fretwork. 'Southbound' which melds haunting vocals with percussive rhythms, and the bouncing country blues 'Love Bug', replete with fine harp (Jon Erblich) and spoons and foot tambourine (Marty Spikner), are further delights on this fine set.

'Made Myself Lonesome' offers more of the same, with Curran supplementing his guitar playing, on several tracks, with a variety of instruments and accompanists.

The title track is an aptly titled country blues, with tantalizing guitar, and plaintive vocals that are echoed by Eric McSpadden's harmonica; 'Tuesday Night At Venice' is a percussive, Kokomo Arnold influenced slide instrumental replete with bones played by Sandy Weltman; whilst 'My First Love' is a bouncing folk blues that reminds me of a cross between Burl Ives and Mississippi John Hurt.

Curran also has his own unique way of interpreting his well chosen covers; Hank Williams' 'Mind Your Own Business' is given an infectious raggy feel, with Broonzy influenced picking and 'dustbin' drumming from Benet Schaeffer; Sonny Boy Nelson's 'Street Walkin' Woman' is a slow rocking blues with 'cakewalking' euphonium from John Wolf; 'Statesboro' Blues' takes McTell's lyrics and pastes them onto an hypnotic guitar riff over which Jon Erblich's harmonica dances delightfully; whilst Bo Diddley's 'Who Do You Love' features wild and evocative slide over more of that contagious 'dustbin' drumming.

A raggy slide driven 'Walking Blues' with wistful vocals from Curran, and a relaxed and intimate rendition of John Hurt's 'Hot Time In The Old Town Tonight' are further delights on this impressive set.

~ Mick Rainsford
- Blues in Britian

Brian Curran's debut, Straight Up Blues (Wildstone Audio 2012), features tunes by John Hurt, Tampa Red, and Robert Johnson. On guitar pioneer Sylvester Weaver's "Guitar Rag" and his own "Find Me A Place," Curran's droning style is deep and hypnotizing; his personable take on Charles Browns's "Drifting Blues" is the closest he gets to the gutbucket. Curran describes his "Bring Me Flowers" as being in the style of Tampa Red, with a lyric borrowed from Peetie Wheatstraw- a nice mix, one of those upbeat songs about death you only find in blues. Curran is unaccompanied on most songs, but you won't miss the other instuments. - Blues Review Magazine

At first, it's incongruous: you hear the raspy, smoke-filled vocals and intricate fingerpicking guitar, songs from a life saturated with tough times, good and bad women, hard work...but instead of a stereotypical, grizzled Delta bluesman, you're looking at a lanky, fresh-faced fellow in his twenties who looks more likely to head up a Lynyrd Skynyrd tribute than cover a Robert Johnson tune. (He does, however, come by the smoky vocals the old-fashioned way: some sets are equal parts playing/singing and smoking/bantering.)
Give him a minute, though, and you'll find that Brian Curran is the real deal: a masterful picker and slide player (who keeps at least three guitars onstage), gifted vocalist and devoted apprentice to the blues masters who moves seamlessly into original compositions. With a handful of other young acts, Curran is generating new interest in a homegrown blues scene that's reinventing St. Louis' storied musical past.
- Where Magazine

At the Beale On Broadway, Brian Curran is on stage. On his break he'll come over to watch Oliver Sain (at BB's). "Oliver is a legend," he says. "He goes to Germany and people know who Oliver Sain is. We have quite a town of great musicians", Curran included, according to May.

Curran plays in the "pre-war" blues style-and that's World War II. He makes his living playing at least six gigs a week, supplementing that income with guitar lessons.
On a Saturday afternoon at Mike & Mins, he sits down to talk. With long hair, a Stevie Ray Vaughn hat and an ever-present cigarette, he tries to explain how a kid who grew up in Oakville, a South County neighborhood, is now making a living playing a gritty Mississippi Delta-style guitar.

Curran has played guitar since he was 13. He grew up listening to whatever his father had on the stereo, but then he heard some John Lee Hooker, and that was that. Soon he was attending local jam sessions and hanging out at smoky bars, where the teenage Curran would play with the city's greats.

He is pleased with the St. Louis scene. "All the musicians are very supportive of each other," he says, lighting another cigarette. "Everyone is open to each other's gigs. It's cool because you get a job that pays not very much, you hang out, start talking to some cat, and they're like, 'Oh yeah, we just played this place in St. Charles. It's cool, pays $500, go check it out.' Nobody's hiding their gigs."

At the same time, he doesn't plan to spend his life eking out a living playing for the door at St. Louis clubs and making the occasional CD. "I know I'm not only going to be playing in St. Louis and a few festivals around the Midwest when I'm 30. There's no doubt about it. I want to make St. Louis my home, but I don't necessarily want to make it my career," he says. "I could make a decent living just being here in St. Louis. But then what's my music for?"

For now, it's for the patrons of Mike & Min's. Curran excuses himself, pulls an empty chair from the table and turns off the television. There are seven people in the bar, including the bartender and the cook. Curran lifts his Gibson guitar out of the case, and along with his sweet voice plays the bleating, harsh, raw blues.
During the first set, a family wanders in for lunch, not knowing they'll get to hear one of St. Louis's rising blues stars for free. When they walk out an hour later, the dad gives his little girl a couple of dollars, which she puts in a jar at Curran's feet. Curran tips his hat, smiles, then beats a steady rhythm with his boot as he plays a heartfelt "Amazing Grace."
- St. Louis Magazine