Daddy Mack Blues Band - Slow Ride (2006)

Many blues critics and fans seem to marvel at the often controversial side of a bluesman’s life. The passion of his music seems less relevant than the number of times he’s been imprisoned, drunk or the number of children he’s sired. Daddy Mack Orr has never killed a man, spent a night in jail, or fathered children beyond double digits. In fact, Daddy Mack has been married to the same woman since 1965, has four children, and works as a mechanic at his own garage in North Memphis. He has the occasional beer, but I’ve never seen him drunk. This may seem less than glamorous to some, but the truth is Daddy Mack is an amiable, hard-working man who came up the hard way. Born in Como, Mississippi sixty years ago, Mack Orr was one of nine children. He chopped and picked cotton until he moved to Memphis as a young adult, and found work in construction, where he later became a heavy equipment operator. Along the way, he picked-up skills as a mechanic and opened his own garage in North Memphis. He never went to college; in fact, he only attended school through the sixth grade. Although lacking formal education, Mack’s intelligence and determination have served him well in life. He learned blues guitar in his forties and has become a highly respected blues musician. In the past few years he’s been learning Spanish. He keeps a Spanish language instruction book in his truck where the station stays tuned to Spanish radio. Mack is an open, curious man; which explains his motivation for learning another language. It also explains the reasoning behind the making of Slow Ride. After all, Mack wasn’t familiar with the majority of these songs before I proposed the idea of this CD to him. A year earlier, he had recorded “Get Back” for Fried Glass Onions