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LIL’ ED & THE BLUES IMPERIALS
Lil’ Ed Williams, although small in stature, is a true giant of the blues, and among the very last authentic West Side Chicago bluesmen. From smoking slide guitar boogies to raw-boned Chicago shuffles to the deepest slow blues, Lil’ Ed Williams is a master bluesman. A gifted guitarist and a remarkably gritty and soulful vocalist, Williams, along with his blistering, road-tested band, The Blues lmperials, has been tearing up clubs and festival stages all over the world for almost 25 years. Not since the heyday of Hound Dog Taylor and The House Rockers has a Chicago blues band made such a consistently joyous, rollicking noise. Between the band’s wonderfully untamed music and Ed’s flying leaps, his back-bending, his toe-walking the audience and his sliding across the stage on his knees, it’s no wonder The Boston Globe called Lil’ Ed and The Blues lmperials “the world's #1 house rocking band”.
The band’s sound features Lil’ Ed’s romping sizzling guitar and his rough-hewn vocals, his half-brother James “Pookie” Young’s thumping bass, Mike Garrett’s feral rhythm guitar, and Kelly Littlejohn’s unpredictable yet bone-crunching drumming producing a modern blues firestorm steeped in tradition. The variety of sounds – from stomping, house rocking slide workouts, to deep, slow blues, to blues-ified country – is equally successful in the studio, (as evidenced over the course of 8 albums), as it is in live performance.
The Washington Post described Williams' music as “contagious wildness.” The Philadelphia Inquirer expressed it as “raucous and hugely entertaining.” But no matter how you describe it, Lil’ Ed’s seriously inspired music will take you on a fast trip from your chair to your feet. Lil’ Ed and The Blues lmperials will continue to shake, rattle and roll into the hearts, minds and dancing shoes of old-school blues fans everywhere.
