Bex Marshall

TICKETED SHOW: CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

BEX MARSHALL BAND + guest support RICHARD PERSO

Booker T – “at last, a woman who plays guitar like a goddess, sings like an angel, writes like Dylan and smiles like the devil”.

UK British Blues Award winner Bex Marshall is returning to Australia after 8 years to tour in early 2019.

Her unique style of guitar playing is a combined technique of slide, blues rock with electric ragtime and roots pickin’. Her voice is a powerful melting pot of old black woman’s heartache and rock diva soul. Bex is a writer of distinction and notability, she pushes the boundaries of blues, her songs have been called timeless, touches of genius; she is literally a musical tornado. Award nominations include best solo acoustic artist four years running 2015/16/17/18 in the European Blues Awards, and picked up an award at the UK Blues Awards 2013 for best female blues artist and best blues album of the year.

Born in Devon but now based in London, Bex is the product of two very different families, one blue blooded landed gentry, the other Irish Romany. As a child at family gatherings her uncles would always play and stand her on the table to sing. At 11 years old she was given a 1963 Gibson Hummingbird by her Uncle David (The Marauders) and started playing, she got hooked on instrumentals and classical guitar standards which stretched her fingers and gave her a great basis for her own music to develop, flamenco, ragtime, country chicken pickin’, rock and on to blues and roots where she is now in her element. She always had a passion for travelling, it’s in her blood, trained as a croupier at 18 & began her travels around the world. She hitch hiked the coast of Australia on cattle trains and always with a guitar on her back living and storing tales.

Now she is headlining some of the world’s most prestigious stages playing and singing her own music. Bex was asked to be the guest JANIS (‘Joplin’) by Big Brother and the Holding Company’s original guitarist Sam Andrews on their 2014 European Tour with all original members. Bex was also asked to sing with Darby Slick as the voice of Grace Slick (Jefferson Airplane) on her last US tour in 2018. Bex has toured USA 6 times to date & in Australia headlined Blues On Broadbeach and Cairns Blues Festival in 2010. Bex recently headlined Upton Blues Festival in UK and Bliuzo Naktsys Festival in Lithuania.

Female ‘mentors’ include Memphis Minnie, Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Janis Joplin, & Bex says her influences include “the passion” of Stevie Ray Vaughan, “the filth” of Howlin’ Wolf and “the wild abandonment” of Jimi Hendrix. Bex is often compared to Bonnie Raitt and Janis Joplin.

Bex is now sponsored by Teye Guitars, Ozark Resonators, the legendary guitar maker Chris Eccleshall who has built guitars for Clapton, Gallagher, and Bowie to name a few, Dr Strings USA, and GMF Amps.

Bex is recording a live album before returning to Oz and already has three albums to her name, Bootlace (2002), Kitchen Table (2008) and on Bex’s most recent award winning self-produced album The House Of Mercy (2012), you will find swamp blues, splashes of gospel and colourful bluegrass all with an exciting lyrical British twist. It received stunning reviews worldwide along with her recent stand out sessions recorded for the Paul Jones & Bob Harris’s BBC Radio 2 shows.

Outlaw Magazine – “…Bex Marshall’s voice draws up the ghosts of old blues women’s heartaches”.

Classic Rock Magazine UK – “deserves wider recognition for her spit & sawdust vocals & fluid resonator guitar licks”’

LA Weekly US – “Marshalls’ competent axework has Mark Knopflers feathery touch”.

Laughlin Entertainer – “Her buzzsaw vocals tear through musical complacency like Casanova rending stilled hearts. She wakes up the near dead”.

Guitar World – “Guitarist Bex Marshall might hail from Britain, but she’s managed to nail the swampy blues and grooving gospel rock of the American South on her latest album, House of Mercy. Her expressive, gutsy vocals are matched by her confident six-string style, which is exemplified on guitar workouts like ‘Love’ and ‘Bourbon Street.”.