Lazer, AKA “Israel’s King of Blues Rock,” kicked off our brand new Blue Wednesday series back in February. He was such a hit, we just had to let him come back on his early winter pass through the South. Our very own T.A. James and Chuck Cotton will be backing Lazer again!
If you missed it before, don't be among the uninitiated again. Come out and show Lazer Lloyd, who's traveling all the way from Israel, how we do a good old bull-snortin' Durham welcome!
Lazer Lloyd is a genre-defying artist whose self-titled new CD on Lots of Love Records topped the blues-rock charts through the summer of 2015 bringing comparisons to Santana at his best from Elmore Magazine’s sage Jim Hynes and “Muddy Waters on electric steroids” from veteran Canadian music & arts journalist, Bob Mersereau. Downbeat Magazine praised Lazer’s “exuberant vocals and razor sharp guitar.” Vintage Guitar magazine featured him as a talent to watch “showing off his chops on tough blues-rockers, soul ballads, and funky Hendrix-inspired rock”.
Whether smoking hot or meditative, Lloyd’s unique style is forged through the white-hot furnace of his three insatiable loves: songwriting, guitar, and communicating with the audience. At the core he notes is, “Blues, roots rock, folk, it’s real; it’s about everyone’s life story and it heals.”
The trailblazing singer/songwriter’s live shows and his brand of blues and psychedelic roots rock are legendary in his home base Israel. He is now blowing down the doors of clubs and festivals worldwide. Major influences include BB King, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Johnny Winter, Santana, and Middle Eastern oud.
“It’s one thing to be a student of the blues, which began as gospel, and it’s another to be able to release the emotion to make it authentic. Lazer Lloyd does both.” Tim Parsons, Editor “Tahoe On Stage”
“Fasten your seatbelts!” wrote 1970s Rolling Stone rock music sage Gary von Tersch, “I’m impressed by Lazer’s tightly composed compositions”, “deeply expressive writing, plangent vocals and crackerjack guitar and harmonica work”.
Lazer Lloyd was born in New York and raised in Connecticut surrounded by his father’s jazz and blues records. Family trips to jazz festivals and concerts, including Santana and Stevie Ray Vaughn, inspired him to follow a musician’s path. By age 15 he was playing lead guitar along the East Coast with his first band a garage rock unit called Legacy. He started singing and writing songs while a music major at Skidmore College and studied under greats such as Ellington’s bassist Milt Hinton and Blood, Sweat & Tears’ Randy Brecker.
After graduating he formed The Last Mavericks and scraped together funds to produce a demo. An A&R exec at Atlantic Records heard it and organized to send Lloyd to Nashville to record with producer Garry Tallent (E-Street Band). However, his life took a vastly different direction when Lloyd was moved to accept an invitation by singer/songwriter Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach to relocate his life and musical career to Israel.
In 1994 Lloyd started a decade of performing and recording with the psychedelic Israeli jam band Reva L’Sheva. Continuing solo work on the side, Lazer began to attract international attention with his self-released folk-rock CD “Higher Ground” in 2004. His blues-rock power trio Yood expanded the ripples capturing fans with “Passin’ Over” (2007) and “Real People” (2008). In 2011 he put out “Lazer Lloyd Unplugged”, “Blues in Tel Aviv”, and the Hebrew song collection “Haneshama”. Then Lloyd’s 2012 “My Own Blues” electric release was named best blues album by the Israeli Blues Society and sent to the Memphis International Blues Competition.
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