Frank Bang

Willie Dixon once said, “The blues are the roots and the other music's are the fruits.” As true as that is, it still doesn’t explain the blues, because the blues cannot be explained.

When one thinks of the blues it’s easy to think of Robert Johnson, B.B. King, John Lee Hooker, or Muddy Waters. Connoisseurs of the genre will mention Son House, Blind Lemon Jefferson, and Leadbelly. Others will mention Keith Richards, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix, Paul Butterfield, and Eric Clapton. All would be correct.

The blues is raw. It knows no culture. Its brutally honest and uncompromising. It’s your worst feelings and your best moments all at once.

The blues will never apologize. Nor will Frank Bang. And he doesn’t need to. He is the nicest guy you’ll ever meet, but when he picks up a guitar, he’ll slice your throat, woo your woman, make you cry, and might even make you dance. Ultimately, he will just make you feel. Something or everything. The real shit.

Born with the Bohemian Irish name of Frank Blinkal into two generations of Chicago police officers and a mother that often worked three jobs, Frank learned at an early age about the grit and sometimes stark reality of the world he was born into and turned that into his own brand of the blues – weaned from years of trying to learn everything he could by putting himself into the middle of everything that the Chicago music scene had to offer. And it paid off.