Yesterday at work, me and my coworker were discussing about how so many musicians go broke and how . My maternal grandmother was a music manager who worked at Alligator Records in Chicago. She used her sister’s name to work because she was embarrassed by her first & middle name, her given name is Johnnie and her middle name is an archaic traditional Mexican name.
My grandpa’s band was in heavy debt to their record label & was blacklisted from a lot of avenues for broken contracts. He take advances from shows, spend all the money on booze, junk food & hookers and not show up to the event. When she first started to manage my grandpa’s band, she had the band do free shows, playing tours in Europe, & apologize ALOT similar to how Henry II of England did a public penance after he was excommunicated .
She told me about how she had to manage my grandpa’s money and negotiate his bands’ contracts. My grandpa, through marriage was the lead singer of The Son Seals Band, Son Seals. Their debut album established him as a groundbreaking new blues artist.
Son's audience base grew as he began to tour, playing colleges, clubs and festivals across the country. His 1977 album, Midnight Son, was his true breakthrough.The album received widespread acclaim from every major music publication. Rolling Stone called it "one of the most significant blues albums of the decade." He has a Wikipedia page entry about him.
My grandma is mentioned in the article, too: I remembered when my grandma shot him. I was like 6 or 7 then.
