First heard the Paul Butterfield blues band early in the summer of love 1967. We lent the record among our crew. For us they were something of a sleeper among the tremendous abundance of creative bands at the time. Certainly different in that they were closer to the roots of street expression - more so than some of the crimson and chiffon butterfly "psychedelicists" that were about. That year I caught on to Taj Mahal, Canned Heat, the Dirty Blues Band and the Butterfield Blues Band, whose lead guitar player, Mike Bloomfield, was a very big notch above anyone else on an instrument that was coming to define the era. He was the first rock guitar hero, ahead of Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix, and held the mantle, Mickey, at least for a while. When I re-imagined Black Orpheus ( itself a reimagining of Orpheus in the underground) I imagined Mike Bloomfield as the Pan-like protagonist, probably having learned by then that his guitar was the transcendental and evocative...
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