Last month, I focused on the blues box Shake ’Em On Down, which included a couple of songs by London-born Dave Peabody. The guitarist/bandleader has covered a lot of ground and worn many hats, including photographer and music journalist, in addition to recording and performing.

“I listened to all kinds of music, but really liked the classic jazz of musicians like Jelly Roll Morton and Bix Beiderbecke,” the 75-year-old said. “I didn’t really get into playing guitar until I was 16. A bit later, I started listening to folk via Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan.”

Then, in ’63 or early ’64, he saw one-man-band Jesse Fuller.

“It changed my life, as he was playing the kind of music I had been waiting and looking for. Within a week, I had purchased a Big Timer jumbo acoustic from a secondhand shop. It was cheap and cheerful and set me on my way. A year or so later, I purchased my first serious guitar, from Jim Marshall’s music shop in Hanwell, West London. It was a late-’20s/early-’30s Gibson Army & Navy model GY.”

The London scene of the ’60s, he effuses, was dynamic. “So much music, so much atmosphere. After hearing Jesse Fuller, I fully embraced both the folk and blues scenes. Although I was learning to play acoustic blues, I regularly went to see my favorite bands, often at Eel Pie Island – John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, first with Eric Clapton, later with Peter Green, and the mighty Graham Bond Organisation – the wildest band on the R&B scene.”

Organist Bond’s group boasted no less than bassist Jack Bruce, drummer Ginger Baker, and saxophonist Dick Heckstall-Smith.

Influenced by Big Bill Broonzy, Blind Blake, Blind Willie McTell, Robert Johnson, Son House, and Tampa Red, Peabody listened to everybody he could.

“Then I started meeting blues artists like Johnny Shines, Robert Lockwood, Jr., and later performing with Big Joe Duskin, Charlie Musselwhite, Chicago Bob Nelson, Big Boy Henry, and Neal ‘Big Daddy’ Pattman. Playing with those guys, you have to adapt your style a little bit to the way they play, and you absorb a little something from the experiences.”

Along with cuts by Jo-Ann and Dave Kelly, Mike Cooper, and others, Saydisc’s six-CD anthology Blues Like Showers Of Rain, from their Matchbox Bluesmaster Series, contains 40-odd tracks by Peabody from the ’70s. Solo and in various ensembles, or leading his band Tight Like That, they showcase his versatility as fingerpicker, bottlenecker, songwriter, and interpreter, demonstrating his vast knowledge of myriad styles, from Delta blues to jug-band to ragtimey Piedmont picking.

“Around 1968, I was playing Bunjies Coffee House & Folk Cellar, where [Blue Goose label head] Nick Perls, who was in London to sign Jo-Ann to CBS, approached me, wanting to buy my guitar. I didn’t want to sell it, but after a good bit of haggling, we agreed on a swap – my Gibson for a Martin D-18, which became my main guitar.”

The ’90s found Peabody playing electric in the King Earl Boogie Band. His magazine work was mainly with musician/editor Ian A. Anderson’s Folk Roots, across the publication’s run of 40-plus years.

“Almost all the interviews I conducted were blues-orientated,” he reflects. “My first were for Karl Dallas, who wrote for Melody Maker and had his own magazine. I was in New York City, where I interviewed Larry Johnson and John Hammond.”

Having met Dave in San Francisco, I hooked up with him in London in 1989. A blues festival happened to be going on at Queen Elizabeth Hall, and I got to tag along as Dave interviewed Mississippi bluesman David “Honeyboy” Edwards, who was a direct link to his friend Robert Johnson.

By ’89, two photos of Johnson had surfaced, but there was speculation as to their voracity. Before meeting Edwards, Dave hatched a plan to see if Honeyboy would recognize Johnson from the “dime-store photo” of him holding a guitar. Rather than just flash the photograph (because that would seem too obvious), Dave collected a stack of prints of various blues figures and showed them to Honeyboy.

Then 74, Edwards nodded as he sorted through them; “Yeah, that’s Tampa Red…,” Little Brother Montgomery, etc. But when he turned over the Johnson picture, he paused. “Who’s that?” he quietly asked. Dave said, “We’re not sure. Do you know who it is?” Another pause. Finally, Honeyboy said, “Is that Robert?”

My hair nearly stood up. Dave asked, “Is it?” Obviously, Honeyboy had never seen it. He said, “Yeah, that’s him. He had that droopy eye,” referring to Johnson’s lazy left eye.

To me, that was more validation than a hundred musicologists.

This article originally appeared in VG’s March 2024 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.