Mike Nolan

Mike Nolan was born in Joliet, Illinois, home of Jake and Elwood Blues. When he was a little boy, Mike saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. He saw the screaming girls, and got himself a Git-tar. He put it in tune; he was rockin' and rollin' soon.Mike played in an array of bands with an array of embarrassing names throughout junior high, high school and college. During a stint in the U.S. Navy, Mike met some southern boys and formed a ship's band playing country music. During a cruise to Africa, the band was detached from duty aboard ship and was sent off on a tour of the African USO and Peace Corps facilities. Occasionally, when there was no official facility, the band would be booked into a local nightclub, where they traded sets with early Senegalese, Kenyan, and Nigerian musicians. Mike dug the Juju and High Life, his African brothers dug Hank.Mike returned to the States and landed in Nashville, stumbling into a career as a session guitarist. He worked on a lot of forgotten recordings, and was lucky enough to participate in late night jams with legends like Dicky Betts, Neil Young, and John Lennon. Around that time, Mike bought his first pedal steel guitar.The session scene paled and the drinkin' scene was getting a bit out of control, so Mike drifted, landing in New York City, despite the fact that Buck Owens wouldn't live there if they gave him the whole damn town. Mike wrote and performed music for film, theater, and television. Now he is producing projects for his label, Gridley Records, and playing steel guitar and/or lead guitar in several bands. The current roster is Sweet William, The Erin Hill Band, Wicked Felina (featuring guitarist extraordinaire G.E. Smith), and an occasional side project with the great Garth Hudson