Bontaj Roulet - Bonnie Raitt and Taj Mahal

Two of the great blues artists tour the US and you can catch it on YouTube

The joint tour of a white, blues lady and a black, blues gentleman is turning heads all over the US. BonTaj Roulet is a first pairing of Bonnie Raitt and Taj Mahal in 25 years.

When I heard that Bonnie Raitt was touring with Taj Mahal in the US I thought – dang! I’ll never get to see them. Then people started writing about how hot the two of them were and it was double dang!

Thanks to all the fan videos on YouTube we don’t need to fly south – the music is there for us.

I am pretty partial to Bonnie Raitt and mad that I missed her when she came my way. Who doesn’t like a good looking girl who plays mean and dirty blues. Bonnie Raitt is one down right sexy redhead.

She is the daughter of Broadway star John Raitt who starred on Oklahoma, Carousel and dozens of Broadway musicals. Gordon MacRae had Raitt’s roles in the movie versions of Oklahoma and Carousel.

Bonnie Raitt learned to play blues and bottle neck style guitar back in the 60s and 70s. She learned her chops with some of the great blues artists but didn’t see commercial success until Nick of Time in 1989.

That CD with the hot videos. I got the laser disc – you know before DVDs – and it blew me away. She was smokin on songs like Nick of Time, Have a Heart and Thing Called Love.

They brought it out on DVD later but it has been discontinued. Blues is not a big money maker like Rock. Blue artists just play the blues and tour which is what she is doing with Taj Mahal.

Taj Mahal is someone I have always appreciated but never purchased. He is not a blues star and doesn’t get a lot of attention. Ry Cooder who wishes he had Taj Mahal’s soul is more popular. Cooder makes his money doing movie scores not plugging CDs.

Perhaps the most famous Taj Mahal song is Fishing Blues and his version is copied by every aspiring blues guitarist. Enough of word. Here’s the two of them smoking She Caught the Katy on Craig MacPherson’s show.

Here’s a super video of just the two of them delta blues style.