OAKLAND, CA – Recently, a casual meeting occurred in the historic environs of Oakland, California’s Jack London Square. There, in the ambient entertainment/office space of one Fantastic Negrito, (though it is said that anywhere he is, is his entertainment space), the artist formerly known as Xavier Dphrepaulezz, welcomes one of his heroines, The Queen of the West Coast Blues, Ms. Sugar Pie DeSanto.
Summing up his opinion of the Sugar, Negrito says, “Sugar Pie DeSanto is amazing, resilient and so energetic. I want to be her when I’m eighty.”
High praise coming from this youngish Blues/Punk upstart, who also counts Robert Johnson, Skip James, R.L Burnside, Leadbelly and other Blues Forefathers and Foremothers such as DeSanto his inspiration to do what he calls Black Roots Music.
At their meeting, with both their managers in attendance, Negrito launched into an impromptu number that even impressed the Queen.
“He’s very talented,” says Sugar Pie, of Negrito’s speculative audition. This comes from the woman who, in the course of her career has burned stages with superstar intensity on shows with James Brown, Jackie Wilson, Otis Redding and oh so many others. Crowned the Ambassador of the Hell, Norway Blues Festival in 2013, the former recording tag team partner of Etta James traveled to the Porretta, Italy Soul Festival on the cusp of her 80th birthday in the summer of 2015 for the third time.
She is slated to play the Hard French Dance Party in Oakland on January 30, 2016 and on March 4 lights it up at SFJAZZ Center, with possible European dates to follow.
And what of the speculation that Fantastic Negrito and Sugar Pie DeSanto are destined to share a stage together, or a recording session with a songwriting collaboration. These are certainly explosive possibilities. As of this writing there is no word from the Negrito camp. Sugar Pie’s longtime manager Jim Moore is also playing his hand close to his chest. Stay tuned. Sweet myth is made of this.
For more information on these two artists visit www.sugarpiedesanto.com and www.fantasticnegrito.com
