Suicide Jack

The details of how Suicide Jack came to be are sordid enough to be fodder for one of their own whiskey-soaked, heart-wrenching ballads. Founding member and original pianist Robert Lee Mitchell was acquainted with a stripper who went by the stage name Nadine. She was looking for someone to record a sultry version of the Chuck Berry song Nadine for her routine. As fate would have it, vocalist/drummer C.T. had just moved to Seattle from San Francisco and Mitchell asked he and bassist Dark Marc Brown to record the track with him ( it can be heard on the Suicide Jack debut, In Churches & Saloons). The three went on to co-write two albums worth of low-down, hard-luck songs melding rhythm & blues, country-soul, rock, and honky-tonk.Suicide Jacks current lineup ranges in size from 4 players (C.T.s Skeleton Crew) to 9 players and reads like a "who's who" of great Seattle musicians, including founding member C.T. (lead vocals, drums), Ron Weinstein (Hammond B3 organ), Dave Keenan (guitar), Keith Lowe or Jeremy Lightfoot (bass), Mike Stone (drums), Micah Hulscher (piano), Seattle sax stalwarts like Craig Flory, Skerik (who handles sax duties on both albums), and Hans Teuber, guest trumpeters like Casey McGill and Billy Joe Huels, and percussionist Bryan Cook.