Arrow-right Camera
The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Salgado returns to Wallace for annual blues festival

Curtis Salgado headlines the Wallace Blues Festival. (Courtesy photo)

Since playing the first Wallace Blues Festival in 2012, Curtis Salgado has been through a lot. He’s battled lung cancer, he was signed to Chicago-based blues label Alligator Records, and he released a new album titled “The Beautiful Lowdown.” The festival is now in its fifth year, and the vocalist will hit the festival stage with his band on Saturday night.

“I can’t wait to get back to Wallace,” Salgado said. “I’m just honored they’re having us back.”

Salgado, who’s based out of Portland, has been a major force in the blues world since the 1970s, when he befriended John Belushi and partially inspired the comedian to create the Blues Brothers. He’s been touring for years, both as a member of the Robert Cray Band and as a solo artist, and Salgado likens life on the road to being in “a gypsy caravan” or “a traveling medicine show.”

“You’re basically a rolling record store,” Salgado said. “We’re in a van with seven guys in it. You pull up, you set up equipment, you go back to the hotel, get ready, turn around and go back to the gig and play it. And scramble that omelet a thousand different ways. It’s night after night after night.”

Those years of touring have seeped into Salgado’s recorded output. “The Beautiful Lowdown,” released in April, was put to tape in Portland and Los Angeles, and it has the looseness and energy of a hardworking band hitting its groove.

In discussing the album’s production, Salgado is quick to credit his collaborators, including producers Tony Braunagel and Marlon McClain, horn arranger Brian Harris and vocal arranger Margaret Linn. Salgado also worked closely with former Huey Lewis and the News guitarist Chris Hayes, who co-wrote the song “Nothing in Particular (Little Bit of Everything).”

But collaboration has always been a major component of Salgado’s creative process. Ideas come quicker, he says, when more musicians are involved.

“Somebody else plays piano far better than I do,” he said. “I can hear it in my head, but I’m going to sit there and waste a lot of time trying to find that chord.”

All of the tunes on “The Beautiful Lowdown” most readily identify as blues, but elements of funk, old school rock ’n’ roll and even a little reggae creep in. That’s pretty typical of Salgado’s work, which is always branching out into different genres.

“If you get the other albums, one might lean more toward one genre than the other,” Salgado said. “It might be hard to pinpoint, but they’re all basically rhythm and blues records. … Blues, funk, soul, rock ’n’ roll, gospel – it’s all from the same tree. It just leans this way or it leans that way.”

Nearly all of the tracks on “The Beautiful Lowdown” are originals, save for a cover of Johnny “Guitar” Watson’s “Hook Me Up” that closes the album. Salgado says he’s always penning new material, but this album represents the first time that he’s received a writing credit on every original song.

“Songwriting is getting up, pouring a cup of coffee, sitting down and writing,” Salgado said. “You draw from the news. You draw from something you or a friend of yours has experienced. Or you just make it up.”

Salgado is currently touring with a four-piece backing band – he takes care of lead vocals and some harmonica licks – and he says their versatility allows them to stand out from your typical blues ensemble.

“We don’t mess around. I don’t think we’re like a lot of other bands out there, especially in this genre,” Salgado said. “We certainly know how to play blues, and we do everything under the rhythm and blues umbrella. These guys are deeply soulful players. … I wouldn’t want to follows us, let’s put it that way.”