Chainsaw Dupont visits Memphis, Delta in prep for next CD

Chicago "Delta Crush" guitarist Chainsaw Dupont traveled to Memphis, Tennessee last week to scout venues and gather ideas for his next CD project, which will feature Memphis-style blues, a followup to 2003's Chicago-style CD, "Lake St. Lullaby" , and 2005's "Bourbon St. Breakdown", which explores Louisiana-style blues. The Memphis project is the final part of a trilogy of "street" CDs which will tie the 3 most famous havens of blues music.

While in Memphis, Dupont visited BB King's flagship club on Beale St., jammed at Mr. Handy's Blues Emporium, with Dr. Feelgood, and paid a visit to the "legendary birthplace of rock 'n roll", Sun Studios, before heading south to revisit the Mississippi Delta, where he spent his youth up to the age of 13. While visiting Clarksdale, he sat in on Jimbo Mathus' set at Ground Zero, the juke joint owned by movie star Morgan Freeman. He also recorded some video footage, delivering commentary while driving down Highway 61, and during a visit to his boyhood home in Swan Lake, MS, where he described, on-site and on camera, the shooting which comprises the story of "Fate", a song on Lake St. Lullaby. The footage is part of an ongoing documentary project which aims to create a biographical short video on Dupont's life and music.

Dupont also stopped along the way in Champaign, IL, giving an impromptu live on-air interview with the program host at WEFT 90.1 FM, when he stopped in to say hello. A similar visit to "The Whip", WWHP in nearby Farmer City, IL included a warm howdy with the station manager, whose playlist includes several Dupont originals. Good fortune at a Memphis club also led to a chance meeting with the producer of "Beale St. Caravan", a syndicated live-music program.

Work on songs for the next CD has already begun, with some of the song ideas inspired by conversations and experiences on the trip, which was intended in some respects to "recharge" before the next creative cycle.