When I came across Seasick Steve at a festival in 2010, I believed the story that was told about him. He used to play with Tommy Lee Hooker, and did that for years. Then he found out he could also do it for himself, and started his blues on a self created guitar made of a wooden box and three string less. The image I’m getting about him now is that this story is mostly fabricated. True: he was a studio musician for many big names from the early sixties onwards. False: in 2010 he was not as old as he said: subtract the odd ten years.
It looks like much of what was told about him reads like a good story, because it is meant that way: like marketing. The music on the other hand is still as good as it ever was. Steven Leach knows how to make old fashioned Mississippi delta blues. On both the record and his concerts he can tell juicy stories about his lyrics and the instruments that he is using. Maybe I should forget about the lies and just believe it, just find the authenticity that he is supposed to represent.