Last year when I watched Madison harmonicist Westside Andy Linderman bring 11,000 Wisconsin Badger fans at the Kohl Center to their feet three nights in a row performing with the UW Varsity band (of all things!), I was reflecting on 20 years ago when I wrote a review of Andy's band, Shakedown, for the Mad City Music Review. They had just played a midnight show on WMTV in Madison, and I was very impressed. Well, the other guys in the band gave me a lot of grief about the review, because I said so little about Andy's playing. I realized I was trying to hide my bias as literally his earliest fan. Blown away I was, and always shall be, as it should be. Andy and I grew up together on the west side of Madison, and I clearly remember when we were about 13, a friend played Oh Susanna for us on his harmonica. I saw a light flick on in Andy's eyes, and from then on, we had to put up with him playing his damned harp wherever we went. And that light has gotten nothing but ever stronger with the years.
In those days of the mid to late '60's, Chicago harpists Paul Butterfield, Corky Siegel (Siegel/Schwall), and Pat McBride (New Colony Six) used to play in Madison regularly. Andy would insist on hanging around the stage door until the artist would exit, and turning on the charm, would try to score a priceless harp lesson from our heroes. And not a bad result. Butterfield encouraged him, McBride gave him a harp, and Corky said after a short listen, "I won't give you a lesson, but why don't you come up and play with us!" And he kept him on stage for the whole set.
Andy was a versatile musician from the start. One of our early bands played Sergeant Pepper's from front to back. He found a way to add harp to the Beatles, and really looked cool in that Nehru jacket, too. It wasn't long, though, before the rest of us got up the nerve to play the blues, and from the beginning, he was a driving force, long before it seemed anyone in our audience knew what they were listening to.
After high school, Andy and I started a band called Nite Owl, which gave rise to him being known for years as The Little Nite Owl (sorry to bring that up, Andy). I ran off after a short time to chase Buddha, but that band was hot, and became a mainstay at The Nitty Gritty, which, back in the '70's, was one of the premier blues venues in the Midwest. In those years, Andy really paid his dues, playing in probably hundreds of clubs, and seeking his own 12-bar nirvana.
The years have gone by, and Andy's toured with and jammed with most of the great blues players of our era. The Buddha still eludes me on my path, but when I see Andy play on stage (and I make the pilgrimage a couple times a year from San Francisco to do so), I recognize that he's remained true to his course, and is inexorably becoming another star in the firmament of the harp plane. This has been recognized on another side, too. He is and has been an official endorsee of Hohner Harmonicas for over 10 years, and has helped Mike Holland of Holland Amplifiers design the "Westside 35" harmonica amplifier (Andy says it's the best amp he's ever played through, and so does Gary Primich, who also plays a Westside 35), and it finally made him retire his cherished Fender Bassman, and to me that says a lot.
The title "Westside" was dubbed on him by Tate, of the venerable Tuesday night jams at O'Cayz Corral down on Mifflin. In a town where the artists took pride in being east side denizens, Andy has stood fast in the place he loves, close to a Lake Mendota boat dock, on, would you guess it, Madison's west side, with his wife, St. Donna of the Green Thumb. Who could argue that the wife of a full-time harp player would have to lean towards sainthood?
It's there, on the far west side, in a land called Middleton, at The Club Tavern, where the Westside Andy / Mel Ford band holds court every Thursday night, drawing visiting musicians and fans alike, week after week a great show.
Dan Aykroyd once respectfully described him as "one of the great distorted harmonica players of our time". Well, take it from one who knows him well, if he's distorted, then I say we need a few more like him. A class act and a joy to know. And though Andy can play raunchy with the best, when he plays sweet and clean, especially on the chromatic, it knocks me out.
For those of you who haven't heard Westside play, and established devotees alike, give a listen, and get ready to shake your head like decades of fans have done before, and say "lord, how the hell does he do what he does when he does what he does with that thing?"
---Bio provided by Bob Harris, Corporate Objects, from westsideandy.com