Copy editor, “Live on Stage” columnist
Maryland Beachcomber
You can’t keep a baad man down. So says blues man Tom Larsen
in the title to his band’s most recent album. “That’s basically how I managed
to make it for 23 years,” Larsen said. “You have a little bit of an attitude
that what you’re doing is legit, and you keep taking it out there and take
it to the people and keep it real, and they recognize that. “So I guess that
makes me a baad man,” he added with a laugh. Larsen has indeed been at it
for 23 years, having started off back in 1979 as a solo musician. Eight albums
and numerous band configurations later, the Somerset County native recalled
how his life as a professional musician began. “I was playing an acoustic
solo act at the old Talbot Street Cafe, and one time I just decided to bring
in a couple of my friends to back me up and play just one set of electric
blues. And the response was so good that I decided that I wanted to give it
a go and see if I couldn’t make a full-time living making music. “It was kind
of a radical idea,” he added. “But when I tried the electric stuff, more people
could get up and dance, and I had to give it a go. So I gave it six months,
and if I could pay my rent and bills in six months, I would keep going. And
if I couldn’t, I had tried it, and I would be able to rest a little easier
if it didn’t go.
“But at the end of six months,
it was catching on in a lot of different areas. And six months turned into
a year, two years, five and 10, and here I am going on year 23,” Larsen said.
Beyond his longevity in a business known for one-hit wonders, Larsen has another
thing that makes him unique in his field. “We do 100-percent originals,” the
musician said with a note of pride, calling his music “funk blues.” As for
the subjects he addresses in a genre known for concentrating on broken relationships
and broken-down lives, Larsen was quick name a few. “Sex, alcohol, alcohol,
sex, classic blues themes, women, whatever,” he said, adding a laugh at the
end of the statement. “No, I’m being facetious here,” he quickly noted, more
seriously. “Just classic blues stuff, stuff that I’ve experienced or people
around me have experienced.”
Those originals are not only
the material he and the band draw upon at their live shows, but the makings
of those eight albums and a ninth that they’re currently preparing to record
— as soon as they find the time, that is. “We’ve got all the new songs ready
for a new release. We just haven’t recorded it yet. We should be doing that
within the next month or so. We’ve got 12 brand new, all-original, never-recorded-before
songs and we’ve been working on them, playing them out in public and getting
them all tight, and we’re ready to record as soon as we get to it,” he said.
They’ll have ample opportunity to tighten up those songs over the next few
months, with regular appearances at Harbour Lights in Bethany Beach, Del.,
and a resort gig May 24. “Friday, we have something in Ocean City. It’s a
new place down on the Boardwalk, Backwater Barbecue
and Blues; that’s Friday, the 24th,” Larsen noted.
That band currently includes
bassist Charles Calloway, from Middletown, Del., whom Larsen described as
a “bassist extraordinaire,” and drummer Mark Vance, a Philadelphia native.
“One thing that gives us our identity, the reason that I call it ‘funk blues’
is that it’s all up-tempo, danceable — that’s always been a trademark of what
I’ve done — and I’ve got really good musicians playing with me, and we’ve
really worked at getting people up and into the show and moving on the dance
floor. And not all blues is that way. So that’s what I focus on,” he said.
That show has impressed a large number of the people who have seen him perform
over the years, and he’s ready to take that following to the next level. “We’ve
had a cult following for years, and I’m trying to take it to a wider audience.
This coming Saturday, we’re at the Chesapeake Bay Blues Festival, which is
just a huge deal over at Sandy Point State Park at the foot of the Bay Bridge.
We were there last year, and there we about 10,000 people. So it’s some real
good exposure. “And we are headlining the stage that’s called the Best of
the Bay on Saturday night. So it’s nice to get recognized for being among
the best of this region,” he said with a note of pride. “And it’s real cool,
because the festival is spread out over a large area, but they’re going to
have cameras on us and everybody in the whole place will be able to see us
and hear us. So that’s a pretty big amount of exposure for just one evening.
“And I’ve been having some good luck getting into other festivals,” Larsen
added. “That’s where I’m trying to go these days. A lot more people know what
blues is. And there’s a lot of blues festivals all over the place. I’m trying
to get a little more onto the festival circuit, and I’m having some success
with that. We’ve got a good-size festival coming up in June, and another one
in September in the D.C. area.” The band’s appeal and reputation isn’t limited
to this region, however. Their range is increasing across the nation as word
spreads. “A real cool thing is that we’re headlining a music festival out
in Oregon in September, and they’re flying the whole band out. We’re headlining
the Friday-night festival, and we’re smack-dab in the middle of the blues
festival on that Saturday afternoon. In a three-day blues festival, we’re
playing two of the nights and headlining one of them. “So, I’m baad, I’m nationwide,”
Larsen said with a laugh. “That’s pretty cool to finally get some national
exposure, and I’m hoping that this is just the beginning of plenty more.”
Beyond the exposure, Larsen is clearly pleased simply to be able to do what
he loves as his profession.
“I still have never gotten
over the thrill that people would actually give me money to do something I
enjoy so much. So I feel very blessed to be able to do my own music and have
people come out and see us. It’s pretty cool,” he said. And Larsen tackles
the task like any job, if an enjoyable one. Even based in a resort area, they
play every week, year-round. “This is how we eat, and we like to eat,” Larsen
said, adding one of his frequent laughs. “We play three or four days a week,
every week, throughout the year.” Besides all the exposure and the simple
joy of being able to make a living at what he loves to do, the love of the
lifestyle comes back to his love of blues. He recalled teaching himself to
play all those years ago and the musicians who influenced him back then. “A
couple of the more traditional blues guys — I really liked a guy from the
’50s named Guitar Slim. And I really liked — and still do like — Johnny Winter,
a lot. “And Johnny Winter was pretty cool because — I guess I’m actually known
as a songwriter more than anything else, if I have any kind of national reputation
— Johnny Winter recorded one of my songs, so it was really cool for me to
sit around with his record when I was learning how to play and steal a lick
here and there.
“And then a few years down
the road, he heard one of my tunes that he liked and he recorded it, and I
got to play it with him like six or eight times. So that’s one of the cool
things about what I do,” he said. Winter isn’t the only blues legend with
whom Larsen has played or for whom he has opened. “There were a lot of people
who I listened to and learned from when I was teaching myself how to play
that I ended up getting to play with,” he said. “I got to play with Howard
Collins, Albert King. I got to play with James Brown, Junior Walker — all
kinds of blues, soul and rock-and-roll people I managed to open shows for
and play with over the years.” And, with a true note of pleasure, he added,
“I’m playing with Bo Diddley at a real big festival in Richmond next month,
also. He’s one of those guys who I always heard and liked when I was first
coming up and I never had the chance to play with him.
“I’m playing with Bo next month,” he repeated, like he could barely believe it himself. For the Mt. Vernon native, it’s been a long ride through some pleasant territory, and that’s only the beginning of the road.