Blue Steele Is Born

I played in the Ernie Steele band for several years. I became known as Ernie "the Hurricane" Steele. The name stuck with me from the result of a Washington Post newspaper review of the band. We were playing the Psychedeli in Bethesda MD during a hurricane. The article stated there was a hurricane blowing outside and a hurricane blowing inside the Psyhcedeli by the name of Ernie Steele. Even today people still call me the Hurricane. The Ernie Steele Band was a huge success, but it came to an end. I left the band and it went on to become Doctor Goodfoot and the Toxic Socks, the band was short lived after I had left. The band changed from a premiere Blues Band to a Funk - Variety Show Band, the Blues left it and so did I. I took the time and practiced day and night like I had from the beginning just jamming along with blues records. I was in and out of many bands for years, I even played in a country Band. I joined the church Choir and sang every Sunday. Between the Church Choir and the country band I was in I learned to sing. The Country band taught me how to sing three and even four part harmonies. I sang tenor in the Choir and I always got the high parts of any harmonies in the country band. I remember the organist/Choir Director and myself with her playing piano and me playing the harmonica doing an instrumental version of Amazing Grace during a Sunday's Church Service. At the end of the song the entire congregation were on their feet applauding, some even cheered. I continued to play in and out of several different bands none of which was truly a Blues Band. One day I was calling musician ads in the Baltimore City Paper, It was a blues guitarist looking for musicians. His name was "I Michael" or IMike for short. IMike and myself got together and the blues we played was magic. We became an Acoustic Blues Duo, with IMike playing guitar and singing and myself playing harmonica and singing. The two part vocal harmonies were incredible. We needed a name so we came up with the idea of using my last name and the word blue for the blues. The acoustic duo Blue Steele was born. We played out many gigs for several years. It was hard getting bookings in clubs being an acoustic Blues Duo especially being two white guys. So we decided to turn the duo electric and became a full Blues Band. We auditioned drums and bass and even a second guitar. We finally found what we were looking for a Blues Band. We kept the name Blue Steele. We played a few gigs and then IMike quit out of frustration saying were weren't good enough. I continued with the band and we did become good enough. We practiced and gigged and kept the name Blue Steele. IMike and myself did write a song as a duo, an instrumental called Jazz Jump. We carried it forward to the electric Blue Steele. The new lead vocalist and lead guitar player wrote some lyrics to go with the music and we renamed the song to "We're Gonna Move". Here is that song that we recorded on Blue Steele's first album "Hot Wired." Please enjoy We're Gonna Move aka Jazz Jump: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUYpSzVnFKE