By: JIM TRAGESER - Staff Writer | ∞
Candye Kane
Although a regular draw on the national and international blues circuits, to hear Oceanside's Candye Kane tell it, her new CD, "Guitar'd and Feathered," is her first real blues album.
"I hadn't done anything with a hard-core blues producer," said Kane over a cup of coffee at an Oceanside cafe.
Having former Muddy Waters guitarist Bob "Steady Rollin'" Margolin produce the new CD will cause deep blues fans take her music more seriously, Kane said.
"I do hope after this record comes out, it will help."
Kane has been belting out a roadhouse mixture of rock, country, blues and burlesque since discovering the blues of Elmore James while married to Tom Yearsley, then a member of San Diego blues trio the Paladins.
"It was the first time I really started listening to the blues," she remembered.
Kane said listening to James' blues made her realize that "hillbilly music and blues had something in common: Both musics were born out of oppressive circumstances."
Growing up in the Highland Park area of Los Angeles in the 1960s and '70s, Kane said she was "one of the only white girls in my school; I learned to speak Spanish young."
She described her father as an amateur musician who played guitar and flute and specialized in songs such as "St. James Infirmary." Growing up the middle of three children, Kane said her first exposure to popular music came via what she calls her parents' "very eclectic record collection," which she recalled as having everything from Patsy Cline and Bobby Darin to soundtracks and Japanese Kabuki theater recordings.
She said she sang for her parents' friends as a young girl, songs such as "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head."
"I found out early I could get attention from strangers with my voice."
As she came into her teens, she also found that good singing provided a certain amount of protection in a sometimes dangerous neighborhood.
"Music soothes the savage beast," she explained.
Entering talent shows in high school led to an appearance on "The Gong Show" when she was 16.
"I didn't get gonged," she said. "I was pretty good, but I lost to a Chinese dog act.
"I've had far worse experiences since then ---- that was not the low point of my career."
Still, she said it was a few more years before a career in music seemed a realistic proposition to her.
"It was not until I was in my 20s that I realized I could make a name for myself" through music.
Still living in the Los Angeles area in the early 1980s, she began going to shows during an exploding Southern California music scene in which punk, roots rock and other styles existed comfortably side by side. She listed the late bluesman Top Jimmy, Latin rockers Los Lobos, country's Dwight Yoakam, punkers Black Flag and the Circle Jerks as bands she became friends with.
"It was a great time to be in music."
She began singing in public herself, performing a country-punk style somewhere between the Blasters and X ---- and got signed to a record deal with CBS/Epic in 1986.
But she said her manager canceled the deal when she refused to stop swearing in public ---- a development that Kane says worked out for the best: She ended up pregnant and "I couldn't have gone on tour."
While pregnant and then caring for a newborn, she immersed herself in exploring her new-found love of the blues. Still, she had no thoughts of switching to the blues.
"I thought for a while that you had to be black to sing the blues."
Then she heard San Diego's Ruby and the Red Hots, and "I started doing research and studying blues women.
"I knew I was at home."
While she doesn't believe that the mainstream of the blues world has embraced her nontraditional approach to the blues, she said she feels strongly that she's been a great ambassador for the blues.
"I have cultivated an interesting audience," she said, listing the gay and transgender communities and plus-size women as significant constituencies of her fan base.
"I bring new people to the music, people who don't identify themselves as blues fans."
Candye Kane
When: 5:30-8 p.m. April 20
Where: Belly Up Tavern, 143 S. Cedros Ave., Solana Beach
Tickets: $5
info: (858) 481-8140
Web: candyekane.com
When: 9 p.m. April 21
Where: Tio Leo's, 5302 Napa St., San Diego
Tickets: $8-$10
Info: (619) 542-1462
When: 7 p.m. April 22
Where: Calypso Cafe, 576 N. Highway 101, Leucadia
Tickets: Free
Info: (760) 632-8252
First name only. Comments including last names, contact addresses, email addresses or phone numbers will be deleted. All comments are screened before they appear online, so please keep them brief. Comments reflect the views of those commenting and not necessarily those of the North County Times or its staff writers. Click here to view additional comment policies.
Today's Stories
Advertisement
Escondido
(760) 745-6611
207 East Penn. Ave.
Escondido, CA 92025
Oceanside
(760) 433-7333
1722 South Coast Highway
Oceanside, CA 92054
The Californian
(951) 676-4315
28765 Single Oak Drive, Suite 100
Temecula, CA 92590
Fallbrook
(760) 728-6116
1112 S. Main Ave.
Fallbrook, CA 92028
