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   A year or two went buy without making much advancement on the instrument until one day in 1964 a day, which a lot of us who were around then will never forget. The Ed Sullivan show 1964, the Beatles burst upon the scene and nothing, and I do mean nothing, would ever be the same again. Suddenly there was nothing cooler then being a guitar player or being in a band, never mind that most of us could not play very well, if at all, at the time. Everyone wanted to play guitar and I was hell bent on being in a band and being famous, well at least be in a band anyway. So I figured I had better start taking this guitar playing seriously. Noticing early on that playing guitar made it very easy to attract girls sure didn’t hurt one little bit either! I had tons of incentive now, so I sent out on a path to become a “real” guitar player. My Father seeing that I was serious or more likely he was just tired of the unturned, loud ruckus, racket which I called “practicing”, thought that it was time for some outside help. He found a guy in our small town who at the time was the closest thing to a guitar legend around named Johnny Pierce. Johnny had a working band called the “DawnBreakers” they were the only true working professional band around and were enjoying good success as a musical group. My father discovered that Johnny was giving guitar lessons on the side part time; this was my opportunity to learn! So, guitar lessons it was and I always give Johnny credit for teaching me the basic roots of guitar playing which enabled me to advance and to become a true musician.. Thanks Johnny, I’ll never forget those early years!

   Several guitar lessons and a year or so later found me in my first working band, well working when we could find anyone willing to pay us anything to play. I was then a freshman in high school but all of my spare time and much time I did not have to spare was spent practicing and trying to emulate my music heroes of the day in every possible way. Sometime this was not such a good idea, maybe, but it sure was a hell of a lot fun! Through the remainder of the sixties I was playing in one band or another, soon I begin to see some level of success and a little recognition; this only added fuel to the growing fire in me to be a musician! Those years saw flower children, Woodstock, Monterey, and all the things that the sixties entailed come and go.

   During those years, our band played many performances at a collage town, which is now legendary for its partying prowess, Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green Kentucky. We would play many performances there for all the fraternities and sororities around, If you have ever seen Animal House then you may have a tiny idea of what playing those gigs was actually like. The good news is I am still alive to tell the tale; it was during this time that I was also exposed to a local musical phenomenon of sorts in a town very close by. This venue was a very large club in Lebanon Kentucky called Club 68. Still today, many musicians I meet have heard of this well-known musical hot spot of that era. Many well known and some semi well know artist of the day played this mind blowing musical hot spot! Starting at a very young age, to young to be admitted legally actually, I saw many famous acts of the day perform there! Unbelievable as it may sound I saw acts such as The Ike & Tina Turner Review, (Can you imagine the impact that Tina and the Ike-ets had on a fourteen year old white boy standing not more then a foot from the stage looking up those long legs. whoooeee!) Jerry Lee Lewis, Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels, James Brown, The Kingsmen, Atlanta Rhythm Section, Stepinwolf, Mag-Seven, James Brown, as well as Exile and many other great acts of the day. I still meet people from all over who know of Club 68! It was very unique in that it was centrally located in the middle of five or six dry counties, making it the only place to legally buy and drink alcoholic beverages at that time. As a result, Lebanon became, through the '60s and '70s, more or less a Wild West town right there in South-Central Kentucky. The crowds were always big and very wild, it was so popular that people would have to wait outside until someone either left or was just “tossed out”, usually for fighting. Thankfully, the band was usually exempt from the aggressive behavior; well usually, that was the case anyway!

   Something else about "Club 68" was the range of ages of the audiences. People anywhere from 14 to 60 years old would be listening to the same music side by side while nursing their favorite brew, 68 had its own set of rules too, as far any age or I.D. was concerned! The choice of libation was not necessarily always alcohol either. On many occasions, you could see joints passed around openly. Lebanon's mayor, Hylene George, was the owner of Club 68 and the packaged liquor store next door. Talk about your monopoly! I suppose he could get away with anything he wanted to at the time, back then no one asked any questions!

   As you can imagine, from the age of fourteen on I spent many a Saturday night there listening and hopefully learning music and most definitely having way to much fun, if that’s possible! I was always dreaming of the day when I might be performing there myself.

   A few more years passed by and before we new it, it was the 70’s and the music was hotter than ever. I was also now beginning to mature as a musician myself. Along the way, I played in several bands of various musical styles from rock to soul; R&B to even early metal styles i.e. Black Sabbath. Blues based bands of the day like Lynyrd Skynard, ZZ Top, The Allman Brothers, Atlanta Rhythm Section, Marshall Tucker, Charlie Daniels Band were all at the top of their game and Southern Rock was in it’s hay day. By now, I had found a home in this new venue of music called “Southern Rock”!

   It was at this time I was to unite with what would prove to be the one of most successful and most musically proficient group of musicians to date. This new band which would be know as Jeremiah Fox was the brainchild of longtime friend John Smith and myself. John was a former band mate, singer and guitar player who had been with me almost from the beginning. Just a few years earlier I had also meet a talented younger musician in our hometown Hank Sanders. He had expressed a great desire to be involved in any band should the opportunity arise so naturally he was the first logical choice to be considered. Ok, so now we had two guitar players and a bassist, we still needed to find a great drummer and a hopefully another guitarist. At the time, that was no small task in our small town. After a lengthy search and several failed auditions, we finally found a drummer in another small town close by, Bobby Coffey. Bobby was a talented drummer, and played with Jeremiah Fox through the early stages or the band’s career. Bobby went on to play with other bands over the years and continues to play today with a group called “Wichitaw”. Later on, a new guy in town Gary Caldwell would replace Bobby. Gary would be the final part of the puzzle, the final ingredient of the Jeremiah Fox recipe! Now it was on and the Jeremiah Fox band was hitting its stride! We rehearsed long hours and along the way, we found another young guitarist in a town close by, Randy Colvin (Now of One Shot Johnnie Fame) another very talented guitarist.

   There was something very special about this band and it showed right away. In a relatively short period of time, we found ourselves having a great following and it seemed as though we were getting better with each performance. We were now doing original material as well and we had found ourselves as a band. This was our time to shine with out a doubt; we were at the top of our game and now playing the infamous Club 68, a dream come true of sorts. We were playing along side very well known acts of that era as well as playing in many other professional venues. Meeting and playing along side artist who would go on to become very well known from Kentucky also, Grammy winning artist such as Exile and The Kentucky Headhunters, at the time known as The Itchy Brothers…

   By now, it was the late seventies and unfortunately, a new musical phenomenon was arriving on the scene, which would change the music business forever, but not for the better in many people’s opinions! “DISCO” had arrived, and with it the end of some of the very best bands and music ever written, and performed. It caught many a band and people in the business by surprise and unfortunately, our band was to be one of those.

   Everything change almost over night, clubs closed down or went disco, suddenly everyone was dancing in polyester suits under a crystal ball and DJ’s played the music, and it was over!

   The band Jeremiah Fox was no more and we all went our separate ways. We all moved on in lives over the years, had various jobs, some married, some divorced, some had children, some had successful carriers but none of us ever stopped loving music or ever really stopped playing it completely. Over the years, we all have continued playing in some from, if not professionally or on a full time basis. Guitarist Randy Colvin would go on to form One Shot Johnnie a three-piece blues band that continues to enjoy success today. I think we are all still musicians at heart and are never really very far from music no matter where we are or what we may be doing!

   At this time I am involved in a new upcoming project . I am currently writing and arranging new songs for an upcoming CD, which will be a compilation of all my musical experiences and influences over the years. It will be mostly original material, heavily blues influenced, roots music with a "Kentrucy" twist.

   Thanks for reading this and I hope you found it somewhat informing or maybe just a little interesting at least………………….