The biggest influences on the music of THE GUV'NORS, would have to be BBKing and George Clinton. For the ROBERT HOKUM BLUES BAND, probably John Lee Hooker. Having said that, the list of musicians whose songs and riffs I have mercilessly abused for my amusement includes, Django Rheinhardt, Charlie Christian, Charles Mingus, Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks, Jeff Beck, John Martyn, Troublefunk, Santana, Ian Dury & The Blockheads, Taj Mahal, The Alabama 3, MacLean & MacLean........and so on. Basically, I like fat funky grooves, blues wailing guitar and witty songs.
Sounds Like
One reviewer described my music as having 'dementia praecox' - I think that means schizophrenia (correct me if I'm wrong). Come to a GUV'NORS gig and you'll get Parliament style grooves, lead guitar like an adrenal BBKing and latin percussion stuck into observational / dark / witty songs. The stageact is about 'havin' a party' y'all. For some reason we keep getting compared to the Blockheads, which is no bad thing in my book!
THE ROBERT HOKUM BLUES BAND, however, is all about sitting on classic CHESS shuffle, boogie and swing grooves.
Robert Hokum - Hooked
I've been gigging on the British Blues Circuit for several years now. The main band for my creative out-pourings is THE GUV'NORS, who play a sonic collision of hard funk, latin and the blues (with a touch of hip hop added). Purist Blues we ain't. 2008 marked the THE GUV'NORS 20th ANNIVERSARY for which a DVD 'GUV'NOLOGY' was released.
As the Guv'nors is quite a big outfit, it's not practical for many venues. So at these, I gig with the ROBERT HOKUM BLUES BAND. A 3 piece who do play Purist Blues - mainly in the classic Chess styles.
Another project is BLUES SANS FRONTIERES, a multi-cultural band experimenting with the blues on ethnic instruments (check out 'Who Do You Love').
I also perform at THE LITERATURE LOUNGE which is a collective of poets, musicians and performance artists.
The tracks on this site are all of me playing lead guitar and singing with the Guv'nors in various guises (apart from 'Who Do You Love' by Blues Sans Frontieres and the solo 'Mama' which is a JOKE! - o.k.?). Also check out the stuff at WWW.MYSPACE.COM/GUVNORS and WWW.YOUTUBE.COM/ROBERTHOKUM
The Guv'nors, Ealing Blues Party 2004
