Lance Lopez spent the early years of his life gigging around in blues and cover bands in New Orleans and southern Florida until the age of 17, finally settling in Dallas, TX. Around that time, he began his dues-paying journey, backing up soul legend JOHNNIE TAYLOR and eventually Verve blues guitar maestro LUCKY PETERSON. After a few years together, Peterson convinced Lopez that it was time for him to strike out on his own. The network of musical contacts that Lopez had discovered through extensive tours led him to none other than BAND OF GYPSYS drummer Buddy Miles. "We immediately just gravitated toward each other," Lopez remembers. "I came off the road, and he moved down to Texas. So, we hooked up. Initially my first disc was going to be Buddy on drums and Chuck Rainey on bass. Chucks just a legendary session player; hes played with just about everybody. He along with Bernard Purdie and Cornell Dupree were the band back in the early 70s on just about everything! So me, Buddy, and Chuck were gonna do a disc, but somehow it fell through. But there was a lot of writing that happened between me and Buddy at that time. Eventually Buddy hooked me up with a young drummer that he had kind of taken under his wing there in Fort Worth. I had a kid [bass player] that went to school with me in Dallas. The BAND OF GYPSYS had always been our gospel, man. We always talked about how cool it would be to have a band with Buddy Miles on drums, me on guitar, and him on bass. Well, finally I was living at Buddys house in Fort Worth! So I gave him a call and he came running. I brought Buddy in to produce the first record actually."

But somehow, tensions between Lopez and Miles killed the project before it was complete. Although the two recorded a number of tracks together, Lopez shelved the sessions and took a 6-month break from recording. It seemed they may never see the light of day.

Lopez's next step involved his good friend Jay Newland, a veteran recording engineer whose impressive roster included famous blues and gospel artists like BB KING and CLARENCE "GATEMOUTH" BROWN. Although Lopez had decided to shelve the Miles recordings indefinitely, Newland convinced him to come to NY to meet with him and see if the recordings could be salvaged. It turned out to be a success. "Jay came in and fixed a lot of stuff, pulled out the best tracks," says Lopez. " I went in and did one or two takes, singing em. Jay took them back to NY, mixed and mastered them. He totally salvaged that project. Thats actually one of the ways he met NORA JONES in New York. Shed just left Dallas, and he told her about this kid from Dallas hed been working with! He gave her a copy, and now theyre doing badass! (laughs). But the fact was, he came and saved that record. It did really well in Europe at the time. Im talking to a couple of people about a possible re-release, with some bonus live stuff - I had a ton of live stuff recorded from that tour. The record was called First Things First and it came out in September of 1999. It went out of print about three years ago."

Lance with Jeff Beck. "I'm telling you Jeff, the TV doesn't even have to be on when you program the VCR."

A European tour followed release of the "First Things First" disc. Previous tours with LUCKY PETERSON had created quite a buzz for Lopez in the European market. The combination of European momentum and the dawn of the internet sent copies of "First Things First" flying out all over Europe. Lopez toured that year with the likes of JEFF BECK, ALVIN LEE, MICK TAYLOR, and STEVE VAI, among others.

Upon his return from Europe, Lopez began writing new material with longtime friend ERIC GALES. The writing duo was contacted by representatives of the Experience Hendrix label for a special project. " Originally what John McDermott and Scott Carlson had come to guys like Buddy and Eric to do a big section of the album with a BAND OF GYPSYS tribute, but featuring original music," Lopez recalls. "They were gonna use SLASH, VERNON REID, along with BUDDY MILES and BILLY COX. But Buddy and Billy didnt just want to redo the same old HENDRIX stuff. They wanted new, modern BAND OF GYPSYS material. So McDermott and Carlson kinda put it to me and Eric as the young, hip guitar players to write material on this thing. Its like, what do you do? They knew that Id been a long-time scholar of the stuff. So we I went to Memphis forever, and we wrote all this music. Then it turns out, it all fell through. They went and got all these different people and made it a JIMI HENDRIX tribute and put it out."

As luck would have it, Joe Romangola from the Grooveyard Records label happened upon Lopez around this time. Joe was interested in releasing a LANCE LOPEZ record with guest appearances from Gales, as well as Lance's friends from Texas power trio KINGS X. "So we used some of the Memphis material on the record," Lopez remembers. "Stuff like 'I Dont Want No More' and 'Quarter, Nickel, or a Dime'. Theres still a bunch of it that we havent used. Eric used some on his latest record, too. So thats how the 'Wall of Soul' record came about. I had this tune Time that was really heavily inspired by early KINGS X and that whole vibe. So I was on the phone with Joe from Grooveyard, playing it acoustic. Hed said, 'I hear Dug Pinnick singing that! Can you get ahold of him?' Well, Dug lived right in Katy, so I gave him a call and he shot right up to record the track. It was great to have Dug, Eric and me all on the same track. Its just crazy, because Id seen KINGS X open for AC/DC when I was in the eighth grade! I was just completely floored by Faith, Hope, Love. It was right around the time that ERIC GALES and I had met, because not long after that Eric was touring with them. I remember they did the whole Faith Hope Love record, just about with the three-part harmonies. Dug had a twelve-string bass, and they just mesmerized the entire arena. When they left, it was like, 'AC/DC who? I just wanna go home and go to bed!' Anyway, it was wild thinking back to that time in the eight grade while we were laying Dugs vocals down."

Released in 2004, "Wall of Soul" is a blues-rock masterpiece, worthy to sit with any record collector's 70s favorites. Profound, powerful numbers like "I Don't Want No More" and "Didja" are essential fare for those tired of settling for boring LENNY KRAVITZ radio fodder. According to Lopez,"It was put together really well, and with Eric there, it came out with one power trio track after another. The whole vibe behind it was to stack a lot of guitar up, lots of guitar wailin and crunchin and screamin."

Shortly after the "Wall of Soul" record's release, Lopez drifted into working with a young Dallas guitar player, Phillip Brown in the form of a short-term project, COLD DISTANCE. Reestablishing his contact with Jay Newland (now much more prolific in industry circles due to NORA JONES' Grammy success), Lopez was introduced to executives at Capitol Records for a major label release. "So we had this conference call with some guy from LA at Capitol," Lopez explains. "The guy tells me to put together this band, and I go and put together a four-piece modern rock thing with two guitars and bass and drums and all that with harmonies. I wrote a bunch of heavy, heavy music for that, put out an EP. So time went by, and I was just sitting back and thinking it wasnt what I wanted to do. They were really getting military style about it, trying to come up with a deal. The guys at Capitol were gonna do something. Anyway, the moment of truth came and I said, 'Yknow what dude, Id rather do what I love than do something and be pissed off about it every night.' So I just went off to chill out for awhile. "

After a few months of distance (no pun intended) from the project, Lopez decided to re-work a majority of the new material for a new Grooveyard release. Jaded from the COLD DISTANCE experience and the ambitious soundscapes of the "Wall of Soul" sessions, Lopez was anxious to put out a record that pulsed with the natural, heavy vibes of his live shows. "I had some songs like 'Move' and 'Stars' that came out of that COLD DISTANCE project. They were originally a lot heavier with Marshalls, Les Pauls, and humbuckers and stuff," Lopez recalls. "So I kinda took 'Stars' where it needed to be, and brought the funk and the Strat back to 'Move'. 'Day of Dreams' Id had for awhile. 'Simplify', Id had that for awhile. Originally it was a lot spacier, singing about Mars and shit! (laughs) Grooveyard wanted me to do a title track for Simplify Your Vision, so I kept the music. But I just wanted it to be heavy, driving, and loose and open as could be. 'Wall of Soul' is really produced. Eric and I were real meticulous about guitar tones on that record. We had a room full of amplifiers, and we were tweaking everything all the time. You can tell the overdubs are very polished and organized. With 'Simplify Your Vision', I just wanted to get together with a bass player and a drummer and wail, real loose, like when I play live. The guys I got on that record, they usually play around Dallas and Fort Worth doing a lot of jazz, R&B, and fusion stuff. Theres a place called the Balcony Club in Dallas above the old Lakewood Theatre. Its just the heaviest of the heavy young jazz cats that are right out of north Texas or the Dallas Arts Magnet. Lots of heavy players came out of there. So the Balcony Club has this jam on Thursday nights, little bitty place. Wes Stevenson (bass) had the house gig. Jamil usually sat in, usually a handful of just sick drummers, keyboardists, horn players, myself or Todd Parsnow (who plays with Roy Hargroves band). So I was hanging out there and doing jam sessions. So for the next record, I told Grooveyard I wanted some of these Balcony Club on my new disc. Id planned on having Jason Lee blow some sax, but they were against the horns, yknow. Thats how 'Simplify Your Vision' came to be so loose and jam oriented. You can hear it in stuff like 'Stones in My Pathway', just free form, couple of takes."

I asked Lopez about my favorite cut from the new album, the one entitled, "Shake Joint". He laughs, advising me that a lot of folks seem stuck on that track. "That's the thing about 'Shake Joint'", he explains. "Dallas is just the capital of t strip clubs! Dime and Vinnie from PANTERA had the biggest moneymaking strip club of all! Im there all the time! I go there more now during the day. Since Dime got killed, Vinnie opens the doors from noon to four, you can just come in and eat for free, drink for free whatever. But Shake Joint is just about that whole scene. When I was younger, I was all into it. Now, I just go over to Vinnies once in awhile, and if hes invited me down. Hes chilled out a lot now. Back then, hed kinda walk around pumped up, but hes chilled out now. Dime was like a brother to me. Id go over to his house and Dime would be shootin off Roman Candles in the house, playing football in the house, breaking shit. Ritad be screaming. They were just like that with everybody, but especially if you were a good guitar player. Vinnie has really chilled out a lot. He opens the doors, like I said now, drink for free. Kinda like, fuck it."

So what's next on the horizon for LANCE LOPEZ? Of course, he's got something exciting in the hopper. "Ive been working with WES JEANS. Hes a local guitar player, Texas to the bone. More ZZ TOP, SRV sort of a vibe. We all grew up together, and Wes is the youngest. Hes gotten into sort of the STEVIE RAY clone thing. Weve been touring together playing in the same band, and weve been having tons of fun. So on this record, were going back to early ZZ TOP and early JOHNNY WINTER, back to that old 'Tres Hombres' and 'Rio Grande Mud' style stuff. He went out and bought a big red Gibson Firebird. Hes looking like JOHNNY WINTER if hed gotten honed up to the right skin tone. Were going back to those 'Just Got Paid' kinda guitar riffs. Hes trying to break the STEVIE RAY clone vibe with this record. Were going to go in and start cutting this record in April. Ill have ERIC GALES down for a track, and Ill play on a couple of tracks along with Bobby Sparks, Lalah Hathaway, a ton of great players. Wess record is gonna be great."

A record that recalls "Rio Grande Mud" with Lopez and Gales contributing guitar licks? What could be better? You can bet we'll be bugging Lance incessantly until he sends us a copy. Until then, just keep checking the Peacedogman reviews page for updates.

- Peacedogman