Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Get Well Soon, Jeff Healey

Over the holidays, Canadian blues icon and guitar god Jeff Healey was diagnosed with lung cancer and had surgery to remove cancerous tissue from both lungs. Luckily, the disease was caught early and the prognosis for his discovery is very good

Jeff was a big part of my youth. I saw him in the early 80s when he first came to Victoria, B.C. It was $3.00 to get in and my girlfriend said there was this wild blind guitar player from Toronto who played guitar flat across his lap that we couldn't miss.

He blew the room down, and there was a fight that spilled onto the dance-floor. Broken beer-bottles were involved and the girl-friend and I got the blood of one of the combatants on our clothes. For one night, Jeff Healey and his band turned a half-assed Victoria disco into an Honest-to-God blues joint.

So hang tough, Jeff! The country needs you.

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