The Backscratchers started out as a rather disparate group of musicians and songwriters working in world, celtic, folk, rock and blues projects around Manchester. In October 1992, Mat Walklate, who was working with the late, and very great, Rob Langdown, needed to fulfil a tour of Germany due to a cancellation by the scheduled band. He enlisted bass player and songwriter Paul O'Sullivan and drummer, Paul Howley with whom he was playing in another project. The boys needed to organise everything, put a set, and show, together in just two days! The tour was an outstanding success and shot the band to the heights of the British blues scene, where further tours, radio plays on Paul Jones' Radio 2 show and numerous other engagements meant they were forced to put on hold most of the projects they had been involved in previously. Pretty soon the band came to the attention of famed Irish blues promoter, Larry Roddy, who had them playing to delighted crowds all over Ireland. The boys did manage to keep together a celtic/world project called Close To The Bone which eventually meant that all members were common to both bands. A typical week when not on tour in Europe would involve the boys playing under one name, then another the following night, sometimes even in the same day! Within months, The Backscratchers, with their blend of Chicago blues, western swing, and jazz infused tritonal melody, were the talk of the British, Irish and European blues circles and were almost permanently on tour doing the annual Irish Blues and Jazz festivals and regular tours of Germany (with Cologne based guitarist and promoter, Richard Bargel), Holland, Belgium and Britain, supporting the likes of BB King, Paul Lamb and the King Snakes, Big Joe Turner and many others. Since those days, Mat has a number of projects on the go in traditional Irish music, playing pipes, flutes, harmonicas and vocals as well as a couple of excellent blues bands and Clive is playing with Richard Hawley's band. Paul is working with Mat on a CD of his own songs entitled Desert Songs and playing with the awesome country/blues/folk band, Ash Mountain (www.myspace.com/ashmountain). Very sadly, Rob passed away some years ago and I hope that this site will offer fans and friends the chance to listen, once again, to the sheer brilliance and virtuosity of his playing. I'm very pleased to put this site together which offers the opportunity to experience the vitality and exuberance of one of Britain's most exciting jazz blues bands. Contact Mat at matwalklate.co.uk and Paul at www.paulosullivanmusic.com. Be happy and get in touch. We'd love to hear from you!
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