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Article published Jun 20, 2008 Blues man Burks feels the pinch at the pump
By Steve Wildsmith of The Daily Times Staff
They call him the "Iron Man," but unlike the fictional comic book character who was tops at the box office recently, he doesn't run on rocket fuel or sophisticated technology or jet boots.
He relies on pure old petroleum -- gasoline -- and with the state of the economy and the prices at the pump, Michael "Iron Man" Burks is facing the same problem that many touring musicians are these days: how to get from point A to point B as cost-effectively as possible.
"It's hurting me quite a bit," Burks told The Daily Times this week. "I'm paying three times for fuel as a couple of years ago. It was tight then, but it's even worse now, man. We're having to go up on the prices of our shows and our CDs. We got to make up the money some kind of way, and I don't like having to do that."
Fortunately for Burks, his skill on the guitar and his booming voice -- like a younger B.B. King -- is such that fans of his and of the blues in general don't mind paying a little more for the entertainment value he gives them.
He comes by his talent naturally -- his grandfather played acoustic, Delta-style blues guitar in Arkansas, and his father, who moved the family to Milwaukee where Burks was born, worked in the steel mills and refineries by day and backed up blues musicians in the city's clubs at night.
When Burks was 2, his father began teaching him how to play, and by the time he was 5, the older Burks would bribe his son with a dollar for learning how to play a song while he was away. By the time Burks the elder came home from work, his son had mastered the selected track and was hungry to learn more.
He climbed on stage for the first time at the age of 6, joining his cousin's band at a family reunion gig in Arkansas, and not long after, his whole family moved back South, and Burks and his siblings helped their father build and run the Bradley Ferry Country Club, a 300-seat juke joint that gave a stage to various blues and R B greats over the years. Burks got his start leading the house band there, and when it closed in the 1980s, he gave up the blues for a steady 9-to-5 job for the next decade.
His love of the blues stayed strong, however, and in 1994, he formed a new band and started playing clubs and festivals. His debut album, "From the Inside Out," was released in 1997, and his lifelong dedication to mastering a traditional style of blues won him fans among the public and critics alike.
In 2000, he was nominated in the Best New Artist category at the Blues Music Awards; a year later, he signed to Alligator Records and released "Make It Rain," followed by "I Smell Smoke." His most recent album, "Iron Man," was put out earlier this year. It's an album that showcases Burks in all of his blues firepower and glory, recorded live in the studio.
"I had so many fans that wanted me to do a live album, so to give it more of a live feel, we did everything live in the studio -- no overdubs," he said. "The songs on it are a wide range, from old R B and soul songs to the blues, from the old stuff to the new stuff. We've got songs on there for everybody."
When he returns to Brackins Blues Bar in downtown Maryville tonight, he hopes to sling a few of those CDs, if for nothing else than to pay for his way back home. It's not easy being a touring musician, but Brackins has always been good to him, he said.
"The cost of going somewhere and coming back home is just killing my pocket," he said. "You have to drive several hundred miles one way to get to a show, and you still have to pay the band, and I got to be paid some way, and after all of that, you've still got to have fuel to get to the next show or come up.
"Brackins has always been good to us, though. We always have good shows there and have a great response, and it always relieves a little stress when you can play in a place like that."