The Red Devils myth is entwined with several venues — the King King, of course, but also London’s Borderline, the Moulin Blues Festival stage and, don’t forget, Planet Hollywood.
But for a few minutes in 1994, the Devils seemed to be the go-to band at the then-new House of Blues on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood.
First up: The gang opened for Aerosmith on April 22, 1994, at a private event for HOB investors. From the April 25 Daily Variety:
Jonny Ray Bartel revealed some details to No Fightin’ back in 2011:
We were offered the warming slot for Aerosmith on the opening night of Hollywood’s House of Blues on Sunset Blvd. We’d already played at our good friend (and HOB investor) John Paul DeJoria’s wedding in Malibu the prior year (that’s a whole ‘nother story as Cher & Roger Daltry jammed with us). Anyway, we got the gig mostly because of John Paul and partly because Joe Perry had heard “King King” and liked us. It was a great night. I remember playing fearlessly even though Aerosmith was up next. Sadly, I’ve never been able to track down any audio or video of it …
With the big-spenders taken care of, it was now time for the House of Blues to flesh out its calendar for the riff-raff. The Long Beach Press-Telegram on April 27 shared an upcoming lineup of “a wide range of performers such as John Mayall … the Brian Setzer Orchestra, The Red Devils, Junior Wells, Youhu Yindi, the Les Paul Trio, Ali Farka Toure, NRBQ, Charles Brown, and Johnny Clyde Copeland. An American music night will feature the Five Blind Boys of Alabama, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, the Phil Alvin Band, and James Harman, while Sundays will include a gospel brunch.”
Ultimately, The Red Devils would be the first band to play for HOB investors, and the first band to cap off the opening week on Saturday, May 7. Again from the Press-Telegram, April 29:
House of Blues, located at 8430 Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood, opens its doors to the public Sunday with The Isaac Hayes Band. The restaurant/club will feature a great selection of music from the blues, gospel, world beat, country and rock, for instance: Booker T & The MG’s with The Jeff Healey Band and George Thorogood on Tuesday; The Red Devils on May 7; The Skatalites on May 11; Asleep at the Wheel on May 14 and Ali Farka Toure on May 15. Tickets for any shows at House of Blues may be purchased through Ticketmaster locations. Call (213) 480-3232 for tickets. For information, call (213) 650-0247.
But this ad from the LA Weekly really captures the moment, first by awkwardly mashing together the tagline from “The Blues Brothers” movie and a Stevie Ray Vaughan song title, then by promoting The Red Devils, along with Hook & The Hitchhikers, as the “Bad Boys of Blues.”
It’s definitely not a full-time blues club, but you can’t argue with the bookings of Etta James, Otis Rush, Koko Taylor, Junior Walker, Little Richard, Little Milton, Jimmy Rogers and many other real blues artists.
House of Blues doubled-down on The Red Devils’ hype a few weeks later in the May 19, 1994, LA Weekly, to promote a May 21 bill with C.C. Adcock and The Blazers … “By Overwhelming Demand, The Return of The Bad Boys of Blues.”
The House of Blues franchise was born of the DNA of the Hard Rock Cafe chain, offering a sanitized blues experience for a crowd of wannabe juke joiners. But for all of the club’s sacred imagery, there were some sins: The commercialization of pieces of America’s complex legacy (such as decorating the place with “corrogated metal from a gin mill in Clarksdale, Miss.”); the promotion of the fantasy of Robert Johnson “selling his soul” for blues magic; and the elevation of key investor Dan Aykroyd into the lineage of blues giants.
Most controversial, however, was HOB founder Isaac Tigrett’s 1996 lease of the cabin Muddy Waters had lived in on the Stovall plantation, where Muddy was first recorded by the Library of Congress. Tigrett had the shack removed and taken on a promotional tour around the country.
The cabin was eventually restored (with help from the House of Blues) and put on display in 2001 at the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale.
Ironically, Muddy’s sharecropper cabin lasted much longer than the House of Blues in L.A.: The Sunset Boulevard location closed in 2015, 21 years after The Red Devils marked their territory.
But we’ll leave the last word on the matter to Gutbucket Slim (aka Robin Davey of Beaux Gris Gris and the Apocalyse, The Hoax and DVL) with help from George Carlin and the Muddy Waters band:
No Fightin' 