Headphone Highlights – Jeb Loy Nichols: Southern Soul Special

When you hear Jeb Loy Nichols’s tender rendering of rock & roll, soul, blues and folk, all guided by his warm country drawl, you’d be forgiven in thinking he’s lived his whole life strumming guitars on Southern porches in the humid afternoon sun. But Nichols is a nomad in music and life, and his stories are woven deep into the fabric of his sound. After leaving Missouri for New York City, where he worked in Record City selling afrobeat and soul to regulars like Brian Eno, David Byrne and Prince Paul, and danced to Larry Levan at Paradise Garage, he hopped on over to London, where he shared a flat with Ari Up of The Slits and Neneh Cherry, and bonded with dub engineering avant Adrian Sherwood at Jah Shaka’s incendiary reggae dances.