It’s ironic that Seth Justman and Peter Wolf could combine their writing talents when the band was in the 1970s and getting hot but couldn’t keep it together in the 1980s when their tastes went off in different directions, ultimately tearing the band apart. Also worth noting, Wolfe was once married to the actress Faye Dunaway of Bonnie and Clyde fame and was a roommate of future Hollywood filmmaker David Lynch. But my favorite was their version of Smokey Robinson’s “First I Look at the Purse,” which is one of the songs that Nick Hornby features in his literary tribute to pop music called 31 Songs.īefore becoming the front man of the band known for his Cab Calloway-like vocalizing, Wolf was the fast-talking disc jockey (as well as the program and music director) on Boston’s best rock radio station, WBCN, where his moniker was the “Wolfa Goofa Mama Toofa.” Years later, Wolf was the voice for the audio version of the memoir of the great Fillmore East & West promoter Bill Graham, which was recorded after he’d died in a helicopter crash. Their premiere release included lots of great covers like John Lee Hooker’s “Serves You Right to Suffer ” blues great Albert Collins’ “Sno-Cone,” and Otis Rush and the Contours’ “Homework,” with its great refrain: “I can’t do my homework anymore!”-the song that always opened my college FM radio show. Soon they dropped the “Blues” from their name but not their repertoire as their wonderful first album, self-titled, came out in 1970 on Atlantic Records thanks to the perspicacious music-business acumen of Jerry Wexler. Geils Blues Band and that’s who they were when I saw them play a mind-blowing outdoor summer concert in Portland, Maine. Then the young men moved to Beantown and joined forces later with Peter Wolf on vocals, Stephen Jo Bladd on drums and Seth Justman on keyboards.įor their first gigs around New England they were called the J. That’s where the great guitarist met the funky bass-man Danny Klein and the bearded blues harp master known to us today only as Magic Dick. It all began in New York City, where Jay Geils was born before moving to New Jersey and then studying engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Although they’re regarded as a Boston band, that’s only part of the story.
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