Page 23 - BiTS_10_OCTOBER_2023

BiTS: Yes, me too.
Elvin Bishop
MW: Yeah, it really makes the tune. I mean, it's so Elvin Bishop, you
know, I mean, he's got that sound, with the slide and the whole thing.
Certainly not like the original. The original, I guess, was Jimmy Liggins.

Yeah, and that was great. Great surprise.
BiTS: Do you have a favourite track on the album?

MW: You know, it's so hard to say. There's so many great tracks on the
album. I do really like the Ruthie Foster one, ‘Singin’ the Blues’. It's just
simple. It's just me playing piano and her singing with a little acoustic
guitar. It's a beautiful, beautiful song and I think it could be very
commercial if you went that route, yeah.

BiTS: There's a couple of New Orleans-tinged ones as well with Kenny
Neal, for example.

MW: Yeah, well, Kenny's a good friend of mine. We've toured
together, and it’s always great to work with him. We have a ball
and also Cyril Neville for the New Orleans stuff. That's a couple of
great tracks off of that. ‘Blues For New Orleans’ is one of the extra
tracks I had just in the vaults that came out, which is a great tune.

BiTS: I gather that before the record company abandoned
you that there was quite a bit of film that had been
made of this stuff. Is that going to be available?

MW: Yeah, I knew it was going to be historic, so I had
a videographer come in and do some video. We'll be
putting out like clips of it. It's not a huge amount
really, but we do have some really nice video on
some of the sessions. So I'll be posting those
on YouTube and on my website,

mitchwoods.com, as this thing progresses, as
we get it out there.

BiTS: Okay. That's absolutely terrific. How are you
going about marketing this? You're not doing gigs
with these people, I guess?

MW: No. Yeah, I mean, there's a chance I could,
depending on schedules and everything. You know,
like Cyril Neville, if I'm in New Orleans, I know will do
some dates with me. Maria Muldaur's here in the Bay
Area, and Elvin as well. But I don't have any tour
plans just yet. I'm just going to get it out there and
see what happens, [laughs] hopefully for the best.

Kenny Neal BiTS: And what about getting over here to the UK or
at least into northern Europe anyway?

MW: Yeah, actually, well, I just got back. I was in Italy
for the Umbria Jazz Festival in July, and November, I will be in Denmark at the Blues Heaven
festival, November 9th through 11th, and I'm looking to do some dates after that. I have some