Billy Bragg & The Blokes

about

Billy Bragg released the album William Bloke in 1996 after taking time off to help raise his son. Around that time, Nora Guthrie (daughter of American folk artist Woody Guthrie) asked Bragg to set some of her father's unrecorded lyrics to music. The result was a collaboration with the band Wilco and Natalie Merchant (with whom Bragg had worked previously). They released the album Mermaid Avenue in 1998 and Mermaid Avenue Vol. II in 2000. A rift with Wilco over mixing and sequencing of the album led to Bragg recruiting his own band, The Blokes, to promote the album. The Blokes included keyboardist Ian McLagan, of Small Faces, Bob Dylan, The Faces and Rolling Stones fame - on Hammond organ and piano, with Ben Mandelson (lap steel guitar and bouzouki); Lu Edmonds (electric guitar and vocals); Martyn Barker (drums) and Simon Edwards (bass). The tour worked so well it was inevitable that The Blokes would be a permanent band, playing with Bragg in the U.S. and the rest of Europe. Following the release of Mermaid Avenue Volume II, Bragg moved home from London to Dorset, in the south-west of England. It didn’t, however, take him long to involve himself in the politics of the area – just before the UK General Election in June 2001 Bragg launched a tactical voting campaign to unseat the Conservative MP in Bragg’s Dorset constituency. Bragg also turned his attention to campaigning for reform of the House of Lords – the UK’s second chamber – by writing and publishing "A Genuine Expre

top songs

albums

England, Half English

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Must I Paint You a Picture? The Essential Billy Bragg

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Shining Bright : The Songs of Lal & Mike Waterson

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Billy Bragg, Vol. 2

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Must I Paint You a Picture? The Essential Billy Bragg Disc 2

Take Down The Union Jack

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Mermaid Avenue Tour

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England, Half English Disc 1

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Light of Day: A Tribute to Bruce Springsteen

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England, Half-English

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England, Half English Disc 2

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Cool As Folk

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