The 12th annual Bicycle Blues & BBQ festival in Clear Lake starts at 5:00 pm tomorrow evening, with three blues bands and a variety of barbecue vendors in Clear Lake’s City Park. On Saturday, there's bicycle racing, more barbecue and blues and, new this year, the brew fest. Twin Cities-based band Armadillo Jump, described as a dance band, starts the music tomorrow night,  followed by The Blue Rooster, a polished rockabilly, alternative country and smooth south Texas soul band.

Friday night’s headliner, Tweed Funk,  features horn-fueled, Memphis-flavored blues, roots and soul. This Milwaukee six-piece soul-blues revue is fronted by Joseph “Smokey” Holman, who recorded under Curtis Mayfield in the early 70s, and has been on the cover of Big City Rhythm & Blues Magazine, as well as on Elwood’s Bluesmobile, Dan Aykroyd’s radio show.

Bike racing begins Saturday morning, with a seven-mile time trial starting and ending at Lions Field north of Highway 18. Barbecue and criterium races begin at 11:00 am from City Park, and continue all day, with a break at 2:30 pm for free races for kids under 10.
The Brews on the Beach craft beer festival is 1-4 p.m. on North Lakeview Drive, with VIP event at noon; general admission tickets are $30. Tunes resume at 8:30 pm with Kansas City-based Nick Schnebelen Band. A veteran of the family blues band Trampled Under Foot, in 2008, he won the Albert King Award for best guitarist at the International Blues Challenge.
Also on Saturday, there's  a workshop on the construction of the Diddley Bow, an influential single-stringed American instrument, at 2 pm, and an acoustic blues class is at 4.

The weekend ends with Sunday’s road race at 10 a.m. and awards at 3 p.m.

NW IA Band Dee Jay & The Runaways To Reunite

(Courtesy--Dickinson County News)
Fifty years ago, a band from northwest Iowa made the national music charts with a song recorded at the IGL Recording Studio in Milford. The hit, "Peter Rabbit" catapulted the group to national and international recognition. The year of 1966 took the band throughout the United States and Canada; including appearances on Dick Clark' show "Where the Action Is" which was taped on the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Forrestal docked in Virginia.
They also appeared on "Upbeat" and other national shows. "Peter Rabbit" remained on the charts for 14 weeks in 1966.
The five original members included Denny (Dee) Storey of Dickens, John (Jay) Senn of Spirit Lake, Bob Godfredsen of Sibley, Gary Lind of Milford and Dennis Kintzi of Milford. Other musicians performed in the band with the Vietnam draft taking some players in and out.
The band shared the stage with such notable artists as BJ Thomas, Paul Revere & the Raiders, The Guess Who, Bobby Vee, The Platters, Mitch Ryder, Brian Hyland and many more.
Dee Jay & the Runaways have been inducted into the Iowa (1997), Minnesota (2003) and South Dakota (2012) Rock and Roll Halls of Fame.
The original Runaways will reunite to perform on the Roof Garden stage Saturday, July 16 at the 50th anniversary for the recording studio where it all began -- IGL Recording Company of Milford.
Other IGL recording artists to perform that night will include: The Epicureans, The Dentairs, Dale's Devonaires and the Upson Downs.
Showtime will be 6-10 p.m. Other activities are planned in the Roof Garden that day beginning at 3 p.m. The Runaways will be available at that time to sign autographs and visit with their many fans.

My Column, by Bruce Wasenius--July 2016

Last month I told the story of meeting the great Willie Dixon and mentioned the fact that I have never met a blues musician that wasn't a good person, actually, I think most of all the musicians I have met have been that way from Del Shannon and Wolfman Jack, to Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Delbert McClinton. The great guitarist Jimmy Rogers played the Surf Ballroom three times,over the years and thanks to the managment of the Surf at those times Bruce Christiansen and Kevin Schoenemen I was able to spend some time with him and emcee his shows. Jimmy had come North from Mississippi to play guitar with Muddy Waters and was a member of that band for a number of years.
On our first meeting he was kind enough to autograph a copy of his current cd for me before the show. He came back a couple of years later and we were happy to see each other and talk for awhile. I had to tell him that the cd he had signed for me had been ruined and I didn't have it anymore. It was the last night of the tour and he didn't have any copies left so he went into his case and pulled out his cassette of the Bluebird album, his working copy with all the titles hand written and got it signed by everyone in the band and then signed it himself.
The last time we saw each other he had his latest cd Ludella signed and ready for me. We talked a bit about his recording with Chess records and his time with Muddy Water. One of the nicest people ever, he passed away in 1997.
One more quick story more recently involving a fortunate to meet Arlo Guthrie a few years back after his concert at the North Iowa Area Community College. Going back more than forty years I have had people think that I was Arlo, even when our hair was still dark and without beards, at concerts in Mpls. or Ames several times, people asking me for my autograph even after several denials on my part. I had promised myself that if I ever had the chance to meet him I would ask him the question that had nagged me for years, so I asked him if anybody ever came up to him and said "hey Bruce"...now, he could have told me I was an idiot and to go away, instead he smiled and answered "not yet".
One more thing about that meeting, I am still receiving copies of my Postal Union newspaper even though I retired several years ago and by coincidence the front page had a copy of the lyrics to Woody Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land, it was perfect and he signed it for me.
This summer holds lots of opportunities for enjoying some outdoor music, all over not just Iowa or the midwest but all over the country. Get out and enjoy your life.