Jimmy D Lane, the son of Chicago guitarist Jimmy Rogers, enjoyed his early induction into the blues. “Watching him practice around the house, man, that did a thing for me,” he says. “It struck me very curiously, and it gave me the desire to do it.
I would watch him and sneak his guitar out from under the bed to play it when he was gone. “One of those times, I broke a string! I put it back in there thinking, ‘Oh, there’s six strings – he won’t miss that one.’ He told me later that he realized what happened and knew I was curious about it.
He didn’t get on me; we laughed about it. He knew I wanted to learn.” Despite growing up around Rogers, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf and Albert King, Lane was mostly self-taught.
“I never sat down with Pop,” he says. “I would watch him and listen to records to figure it out. I was trying to figure out what the hell I wanted to do.
It wasn’t until I got out of the military that certain sounds started to catch my ear.” Like many others, it wasn’t the blues that spurred him on, but Jimi Hendrix. “I had a set of headphones and a boombox.
I remember Hey Joe came on. I’d heard it a million times – but this time, it sounded different. The only way I can describe it is how preachers know their calling.
“I only had $60 in my pocket, but I ran into a pawn shop in Chicago. I had to buy a guitar. I bought a Harmony – which a guy had carted in because he didn’t have any money – went back to the house and pra.