Mike Cooper Oh Really!?

The guitarist and singer-songwriter Mike Cooper was a key figure in the British blues boom of the late 1960s. Born in Reading in 1942, Cooper began playing guitar as a teen in local skiffle groups. After seeing Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee perform in 1961, Cooper caught the blues bug and began to play the harmonica and formed The Blues Committee, supporting John Lee Hooker, Sonny Boy Williamson, Alexis Korner and Long John Baldry, while Cooper was also performing solo. Acquiring a lap steel guitar in 1963, he studied Blind Boy Fuller’s work and in 1965, teamed with Dave Hall to support Bert Jansch, Al Stewart and others; after releasing work on the Kennet, Sydisc and Matchbox labels, Cooper soon began incorporating country blues aspects into his work, drawing from Son House and Mississippi Fred McDowell, as well as non-blues artists such as David Bowie, John Martyn, Roy Harper and Dave Van Ronk. Then, in late 1968, Cooper was approached by producer Peter Eden, resulting in debut album Oh Readlly!? for Pye; aside from agreeable covers of Son House’s “Death Letter” and Blind Boy Fuller’s “Bad Luck Blues,” the rest of the disc is pure Cooper, with his deft picking accompanied by Derek Hall’s guitar work only on “Leadhearted Blues” and “Electric Chair.”