We sadly note the passing of Wilson Pickett and our prayers are with his family, loved ones, and all whose lives he touched. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. Here is his obituary
from the Washington Post. (Might seem kind of funny source but he had lived in Reston, Virginia for years...). There's a slideshow at the Washington Post site that looked good but I had trouble getting it to work right.

As a sort of tribute I respectfully submit an MP3 of my old band, the StratoLoungers, performing "Funky Broadway" in 1992. The StratoLoungers were an 8 piece bar band with horns based in Adrian, Michigan, and we mainly played at a wonderful roadhouse out in the Irish Hills called Jerry's Pub. Jerry's is still going strong and is about my favorite bar in the world, and they have good Italian food too. On race weekends over at Michigan International Speedway the place was jammed. They'd have all these goofy checker flag pennants hanging up, and boats would pull up out in back on Wampler's Lake. Sweat dripped from the rafters, my microphone would wave back in forth in front of my face because the floor was shaking from the dancers, and Big Barb the imposing bouncer would come up and sing "Town Without Pity". Barb saved me from getting beat up in the parking lot one night.

I was one of the last people out of the bar and my '90 Civic was sitting out in middle of the gravel parking lot. I picked up my antenna, which somebody had broke off, and muttered "***hole!" From the other side of the parking lot some crazy local came tearing over and asked me what I called him. I tried to avoid him but he was pushing me around, and all the sudden Barb came busting out and grabbed us both, me on one side and him on the other. She was about a head taller than either of us and quite a ways around, too. She told the guy, "Jerry here is a friend of ours, don't you be beating him up! Now apologize and shake hands!" and the guy mutters an apology and we shake hands like a couple of fourth graders. It was great.

For me the original inspiration was to play "Soul Finger" by the Bar Kays and "Last Night" by the Mar Keys but we ended up doing Steely Dan, Was Not Was, Gary Glitter, Traffic, and all kinds of good stuff. Wilson Pickett tunes were the motor of the band, though - I think we did about six.

Boy those were the days. I just can't believe looking back how much arguing we did and how much time we put into it.

BTW the URL for the Dean Solden Trio with Surry Scheerer has changed to http://home.comcast.net/~soldenscheererjazz. Right now the next gig we have scheduled is April 29, but I'm sure stuff will come up.