Blaze Foley is one of those eternally dropped names, usually by the hip or the famous (often both) musicians with tales to tell of the late and largely unheralded Texas troubadour and roustabout. Here is a veritable bushfire of fans, friends, acolytes and disciples, all keen to peddle his music to a wider public. If you have heard the name, now’s the opportunity to put his mouth into those of others, ahead, maybe, of risking the real thing.

Michael David Fuller, as he was born, in December, 1949, grew up in a musical family, singing gospel, as part of The Singing Fuller Family, with his mother, brother, and sisters. Childhood polio left him with a limp, and the sort of chip on his shoulder that predisposed toward the same sort of vices that beset his friend and co-conspirator, Townes Van Zandt. Although it was clear to see his songs were strong and sound, he was often his own worst enemy in his self-promotion thereof. A, let’s say, colorful career was demarcated more by setbacks and disappointment, with wider fame always one step ahead of him. His premature death, at 39, shot dead under never quite fully agreed circumstances, left him more as a memory than his meagre lifetime of recordings could ever provide. Sittin’ With Blaze isn’t the first tribute set to his dedication, but is certainly of higher profile.
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