Alligator Walk? Lousiana Stroll? Where The hell are we? „Don’t you dare use,“ I was told, „Don’t you dare use the old cliché. You know, the one about Blacks and Whites and blooming cotton fields etc. etc.“. Well I probably wanted that as much as roasting a chicken with its feathers. And still it is generally a strange, questinable idea, in a country packed with musicial history like Austria to think of traditions which have their origins and cultural roots so many tricks and ways of explanation out of the bag – it would still consist of clichés. But the story is much, much simpler than that. And it startetd off in a council flat in Vienna’s eight district. There somewhere underneath an impressive collection of relevant records and souvenirs, must be that guitar. The one which Erik Trauner first strummed some 1 ½ decades ago. The one on which he studied the basics. He used to listen to Hans Maitner’s long-since dropped radio show on OE3, picking up ideas tor the first still-clumsy blueprint, trying to reconstruct the chords which were both so familiar and enticing. That programme was called „Living Blues“. Erik Trauner took that expression for his life’s motto. „It seems“ he says without any trance of coquetery „That there are always some people around who live their whole life in awe of a musical language that is not ther own“. Without doubt, Erik Trauner has made this language his own – a socond mother tongue. He speaks it with all its slangs and dialects – the traditional Chicago Blues, the swingin’ Rhythm & Blues, the Boogie Woogie and even the Cajun- and Zydeco Music from the Louisiana Swamps. And he speaks it like no other in Austria. But he’s not alone. A very lively group of enthusiasts has rallied round Erik Trauner, a playful communion of tradition and options fort the presend and future of the genre: THE MOJO BLUES BAND. „It’s all about“, Erik Trauner says, „developing your own handwriting. There is no room for messing about“. And the quintessence of the Mojo Soul? „Your life must speak through Blues. The older we get, the better we get“. The part ist he goal. And „ALLIGATOR WALK“ is once more a Stepp in the right direction, the most effective method to move forward. Especially if you don’t take the shortest cut on this rocky difficult terrain. And it’s quite obvious that the Mojo Blues Band are prepared to take their time. (Walter Gröbchen)