It was the year America landed a man on the moon. Richard Nixon became president. It was a year of high living and getting high, with movies such as Midnight Cowboy and Easy Rider splashing across the big screen, Simon and Garfunkel’s Mrs. Robinson won a Grammy Award and cocky quarterback Joe Namath predicted his New York Jets would win the Super Bowl. He was right.
The year was 1969. It was also the year that a psychedelic spitfire solidified her standing as the greatest rock singer of that decade when Texas blues singer Janis Joplin tore up the stage at the infamous Woodstock concert, still considered the penultimate rock event. Joplin was the soul of San Francisco group, Big Brother & the Holding Company, lifting them from the ranks of the ordinary to legendary status when the group performed at the ground-breaking Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, when her vocal delivery of Ball and Chain left the audience stunned.
By the time Joplin recorded her final album, Pearl, in 1970 with a new group of backing musicians known as the Full Tilt Boogie Band, with hits such as Me & Bobby McGee, Mercedes Benz and Get It While You Can, she had reached a peak of excellence cut short by her tragic death before the album’s release. But now Janis lives again.
Finally, after others have tried in vain, Houston singer Myrna Sanders has captured the spirit, the sweat and the vibe that Janis brought to her music. With her band Kozmic Pearl, Sanders recreates the full Janis Joplin concert experience, from the psychedelic costumes to the vintage instruments to the hell-bent-for-blues attitude that made Joplin famous. A two-hour show includes all of Joplin’s hits and the soul-rock groove that others have tried to recreate but never come close to matching. For a kozmic musical experience of epic proportions, ladies and gentlemen, we give you Kozmic Pearl: Myrna Sanders (vocal and cool vibe); Paul Nussbaum (guitars), Greg Barr (bass guitar and vocals), David Thomas (drums).
I caught Kozmic Pearl at House of Blues (Houston) and loved the show! More photos coming soon!
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All photos were taken by Rhonda Meredith Photography who maintains the copyright - unless credit is given elsewhere. In any case, expressed written permission must be granted before these photos may be reproduced.
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