Cash Box Kings with Lee Kanehira at The North Street Cabaret – Madison, WI

ARTIST WEBSITE | https://www.cashboxkings.com/home

Fearless, full-tilt Chicago blues…fervent vocals and soaring harmonica.” –Chicago Tribune
“Singer Oscar Wilson and singer-harpist Joe Nosek are are experts in classic Chicago grooves—perfectly evoking Muddy and Little Walter—but they also enchant with original songs both funny and pointed.” –MOJO (UK)
“Oscar Wilson’s powerful and deep voice harkens back to the golden age of Chicago blues. Nosek blows spirited, muscular harp. The Cash Box Kings serve up undeniable proof that they remain one of the top blues bands of this era.” –Blues Music Magazine
The Cash Box Kings, according to Living Blues magazine, “are one of the best blues bands in the land.” The group, co-led by real-deal Chicago blues vocalist and songwriter Oscar “Mr. 43rd Street” Wilson, and Madison, Wisconsin-based songwriter, harmonica giant and singer Joe Nosek, plays masterfully raw, unvarnished, old-school ensemble blues. Wilson’s huge, emotive vocals and Nosek’s blistering harmonica fuel their razor-sharp original songs and always incisive reinvention of obscure blues classics. AllMusic says The Cash Box Kings offer up “an enthusiastic celebration of Chicago blues in all of its electric forms…funny and smart…slow grooves and hyper-charged shuffles. The Cash Box Kings don’t merely pay homage to the past, they bring tradition into the present [and deliver] a rollicking good time.”
On their new Alligator Records album, Oscar’s Motel (their third for the label and 11th overall), The Cash Box Kings bring contemporary authority and old-school authenticity to each of the album’s 11 tracks. The band—featuring guitarist Billy Flynn, drummer Kenny “Beedy Eyes” Smith, bassist John W. Lauler, and keyboardist Lee Kanehira—opens a door into the intoxicating spirit and sounds of 1950s and 1960s Chicago-based blues, and then they bring it all right up to the minute with Wilson and Nosek’s original, instantly memorable songs.