News, sport and entertainment from the Bournemouth Echo and Dorset Echo.

Doc's prescription will be sonic tonic

From the Echo, first published Monday 9th Jul 2001.

VETERAN New Orleans blues, boogie and R&B pianist Mac Rebbenack - Dr John to a generation of fans - is to include a date in Bournemouth on his forthcoming UK tour.

Rebbenack will play the town's Pavilion Theatre on Wednesday, October 17. Tickets cost £19.50 each and go on sale immediately.

This 60-year-old musician's musician, who has guested on hundreds of albums, rose to prominence in the late 1960s.

After working as an LA session man for people like Phil Spector and Sam Cooke, he reinvented himself as Dr John the Night Tripper and released the album Gris Gris.

His slightly sinister style, combined with a strange hybrid of Creole chants and New Orleans influences mixed with a sense of the newly emerging psychedelia, fitted perfectly with the mood of the times. A cult figure was born.

Before long (with the help of a bit of cod voodoo and a flamboyantly feathered head-dress ) Dr John was the musical pal of choice for celebrity chums like Eric Clapton, The Band, Van Morrison and Mick Jagger.

Many mainstream musical activities were to follow with "the Doctor" establishing himself as both a legendary solo performer and a sought-after celebrity session man.

The Bournemouth concert should not be missed on any account. For tickets and further information call 01202 456456.

l Also booked to play the Pavilion in October is Asian modernist Nitin Sawhney who brings his highly acclaimed mix of tabla and drum and bass to the theatre on Wednesday, October 10.

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