RobK Redux

  One of the most significant achievements of the recent urban alt-blues music boom has been it's concerted effort at seeking out the living practitioners of the older musical styles. Chief among the newly found representatives of the art of the talking blues is Rob Kennedy.

  "Like rob Kennedy I'm gonna move off to Hawaii"

  This line from a 1999 Japanese collection of Jon Spencer Blues Explosion outtakes contributed directly - though most belatedly - to the rediscovery of an enigmatic figure who has fascinated collectors for years. As the result of a handful of outstanding recordings made during the 1980's with his band, the legendary Workdogs, RobK had acquired near cult status among fans of the talking urban blues and a legion of devout admirers. Then, sometime during the decade that followed, Kennedy slipped out of sight. Had it not been for the endeavors of a young French blues enthusiast, Gilles Marchand, RobK almost certainly would have remained anonymous on the Island of Hawaii for the rest of an uneventful life. When Marchand finally did locate him, thanks mostly to the mention of Hawaii on that one recording, Kennedy no longer even owned a bass. Further, the singer was highly skeptical of Marchand and entertained the impression that his discoverer was from the "police or FBI or New World Order or something like that."

  When provided with an instrument to determine whether he still could play, Kennedy "plucked a bit" while muttering to himself that he "hadn't done anything wrong." Eventually he agreed to accompany Gilles Marchand to New York City, not really knowing what to expect but feeling that if he refused he would be forced to go anyway. He went "voluntarily."

  An older man, many times given up for dead, long forgotten by most, he is still vigorous, spry and talented. Rob Kennedy is self taught, uses no picks and is stylistically indebted to no one. He does mention an older blues singer who played electric guitar, Ruff Cosmar, but doesn't appear to have absorbed much from him.

  Running out of money mid-pacific, spiraling out of control after his abrupt departure from New York in the nineties, Kennedy apparently washed ashore on the Big Island of Hawaii and took up his former career of carpentry in an effort to survive. Thus ended his brief, but memorable, long ago career as a recording artist. In the intervening years Workdogs discs became prized items, able to draw high sums from serious collectors. (To which RobK replies in surprise, "You know, I heard about that, but I didn't believe it - I never saw one cent.") During this period he worked anywhere he could in order to make ends meet, "I built strip malls, worked in high rises, painted houses, moved stone. I worked for richer and poorer, mostly poorer."

  And this was his lot until Gilles Marchand found him on Hawaii building a woodshed for one hundred dollars a week. After his rediscovery, things moved swiftly and sweetly for Kennedy. Befriended by Marchand and reunited with his former manager, Yves Bisquet, he was recorded as soon as possible. The results prove that he not only has lost nothing as an artist but, to the contrary, has gained in artistic stature and maturity. His bass playing is better than ever and his voice is possessed of an even finer quality than it had in the eighties. He is an infectious performer, his good humor evident on his pleasantly gnarled countenance. Well tanned, usually performing in a loud shirt, his rocking motion and syncopated bass deeply touch every audience for which he has performed. And to all this, one must add that Kennedy is an excellent raccounteur and a most extraordinary master of ceremonies.

  In his small, handmade cabin in Volcano, Hawaii, he writes his blues and plays his bass, often accompanied by his local friends and their ukuleles. He reminisces about his life before meeting Gilles Marchand, "I was right here in Volcano the whole time," Kennedy says, " They tell me they were looking for me in Florida but I was right here in Hawaii the whole time. Never moved."