Alvin Draper - You Just Can't Keep Me Down

Bitrate: 320K/s

Year: 2009

Time: 35:12 

Size: 80,7 MB 

Label: BeatRecords

Styles: Blues/Electric Blues

Art: Front 

Tracks Listing:

 1. Alvin's Mellow G Shuffle - 2:25

 2. Skippin' Blues - 3:34

 3. Green Onions - 3:53

 4. Please Please - 3:44

 5. In The Open - 3:19

 6. Call It Stormy Monday - 5:09

 7. My Girl - 3:46

 8. Smilin' Shuffle - 3:17

 9. Confessin' The Blues - 2:54

10. San-Ho-Zay - 3:06

To listen to Alvin Draper, is to truly feel in the presence of one of the great original Blues men. He speaks it, lives it and definitely plays it. In his music you can hear the authenticity of the living Blues, its heart and soul.

But don’t be fooled, just when you feel like you’ve time-traveled into the 60s and 70s and must be listening to some down home Blues in the South, you hear his highly original and futuristic sounding solos in the middle of a classic standard.

Alvin has a particular style of picking his strings when he solos, he adds complex sounds, that resemble computer sounds, more like experimental new Jazz and his strings begin to speak a new language. And then he blends it all right back in, that’s when you realize you’re in California and it’s the 21st century. Alvin Draper has the music lover’s attention every second.

Alvin Draper was born in Lubbock, Texas, but raised in Goree Texas, where his mother lived. They had a big café where everybody who worked on a farm would go on the weekend, to have good time from Friday through Sunday. Alvin was just in diapers when the musicians in town came around to the café to play.

Almost incredibly, most of the musicians were related to his grandparents. Lightin’ Hopkins was his grandmother’s nephew and Alvin’s dad was a great guitarist and vocalist. His name was Richard Draper. He taught the musicians that came through, so Richard Draper was pretty good, one can tell by just taking a look at some of his pupils: Sonny Boy Williams, Little Walter, T-Bone Walker, Gate Mouth Brown, John Lee Hooker, and many more.

At the age of fourteen Alvin's parents were divorced and he had to drop out of school to take care of his siblings. He worked at an auto shop and played his guitar in nightclubs. He loved music, but didn’t rely on it because times were hard and one didn’t get paid very much for gigs, so he always kept a 9-5 job. Alvin married his first wife at the age of 18, and moved to Palo Alto, CA. in 1968. His wife passed away in 1975. Alvin played all over the Bay Area Peninsula, and his first band was called Alvin and the Challengers.

Alvin has played with many well-known legendary musicians, to mention a few: Sam Cook, Little Willie John, T-Bone Walker, Bobby Bland, Etta James. His major musical influences were: James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Jimmy Reed, and Tyrone Davis. Alvin’s mom kept the young Alvin in church most of the time, and pretty much all day on Sundays.

As an adult he didn’t go very often but did play gospel music and attended church every now and then. One of the churches he attended was Zion in East Palo Alto, where the preacher asked him to play for the Lord. Alvin considers himself to be spiritual, and he believes that when he plays music people are healed whether it’s at church or in the nightclub. And as Alvin says: “If I know you guys love it, I’m happy too!”.

You Just Can't Keep Me Down