James Bullard

I was always around music and my folks were always spinning records. I picked up my first guitar at the age of twelve and started my first band in high school. What started out to be a grunge influenced band turned into a blues band. Our biggest opening spots were for James Brown, Paul Rodgers and Cheap Trick. We received a lot of acclaim in El Paso and as senior year approached everyone went their separate ways. I decided to move to Los Angeles.Upon arriving in Los Angeles and full of exuberance, I formed a band and played such venues as The Whiskey, The Roxy, Genghis Cohen, The Mint, and quite often The Gig. I collaborated with a guy named Ron Rogers in Burbank who did pilot music but was also working with Denny Freeman at the time. We did a track called Runaway that I’m still proud of. I’d go down to the Joint on Pico & Robertson and watch Waddy Wachtel and Terry Reid. Terry would come by Genghis Cohen sometimes and sing with me. Soon, there was a band of musicians that I teamed up with, among them were Austin Hanks, Tonya Watts, Waylon Payne, Levi Kreiss and Travis Howard. As fate would have it, Hanks was instrumental in getting me a role in a film called Ken Park directed by Larry Clark. That project got me into SAG and I began to balance music and acting. I met up with Bruce Flohr and David Geffen but I was only 18 and my songs and voice weren’t quite up to their standards, and eventually made it back to Texas.I moved to Austin and met Gary Clark and Jay Moeller. I’d first seen them play at Jazz and Joe’s Generic Bar and was hooked on the blues again. Eventually I sat in at Antone’s and was a prospect for a compilation album of young guitarists their label was putting together. That fell through but I continued to play at places with various musicians. Shawn Pittman was another musician I worked with. I was playing bass for Gary and Jay for a while every Wednesday at the Continental Club. We also were the supporting act for Jimmie Vaughan’s fall tour of ‘04. That was a definite highlight for me because I really got to see the road.Currently I’m working on my first solo record and also collaborating with other musicians in the Austin area including Marc Benno, Jeff Dyer, Gary Clark Jr., Jay Moeller, Scott Nelson, Shawn Pittman and many many more.