Mike Henderson

Guitarist, singer, and songwriter Mike Henderson carved a niche for himself as a session guitarist over the years in the Nashville studio scene before he began recording under his own name with his own blues band, the Bluebloods. He began playing mandolin and moved from Missouri to Nashville. Trained as a mandolin player and flat-top guitarist, he soon found work in the Nashville studio scene as a slide guitarist. Henderson's albums on the Dead Reckoning label included Edge of Night (1994), First Blood (1996), and Oakland Blues (1998). Henderson used a stellar lineup of supporting musicians on First Blood -- Reese Wynans, Glenn Worf, and John Gardner -- making it one of the best (and unfortunately most overlooked) releases of 1996. Collectively, these musicians recorded and performed with John Hiatt, Emmylou Harris, Kevin Welch, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Mark Knopfler, Lonnie Mack, Aaron Neville, Larry Carlton, Johnny Cash, Al Kooper, Tracy Nelson, Rory Block, Sonny Burgess, and Delbert McClinton. The band got some radio attention on its second release for their song "Pay Bo Diddley," a song that addressed the inequities in U.S. record royalty laws. Not surprisingly, First Blood was recorded in the studio in Nashville over two days, with almost all the songs being recorded on the first take with no overdubs. The band lent their own spin to classic blues material like Sonny Boy Williamson's "So Sad to Be Lonesome," J.B. Hutto's "Hip Shakin'," and Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig." In 2001, Henderson toured as part of Mark Knopfler's backing band, and in 2008, he co-founded the bluegrass group the SteelDrivers. Henderson left the SteelDrivers in 2011, but continued to write songs with former bandmate Chris Stapleton; their collaborations included two of Stapleton's biggest hits, "Broken Halos" and "Starting Over." Mike Henderson died on September 22, 2023; he was 70 years old.
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