Larry Taylor obit

Canned Heat’s Larry ‘The Mole’ Taylor has died aged 77

 

He was not on the list.

Larry ‘The Mole’ Taylor, a founding member of Canned Heat has passed away at the age of 77.

Larry was the bass player for Canned Heat. Before Canned Heat he was the session player for The Monkees and before that Jerry Lee Lewis.

Larry played on Tom Waits albums from ‘Heartattack and Vine’ in 1980 through to ‘Bad As Me’ in 2011. He was on John Mayall albums from ‘Empty Rooms’ in 1969 to ‘Rock The Blues Tonight’ in 2012 and all of The Monkees records from ‘The Monkees’ 1966 through to ‘Music Box’ 2001.

He played on albums for Albert King, Solomon Burke, Buddy Guy, Wanda Jackson, Tracy Chapman, Kim Wilson, Charlie Musselwhite, JJ Cale, Ry Cooder, John Lee Hooker, and Boyce & Hart.

Canned Heat were announced to play at Woodstock 50 last week but the show was cancelled.

Before joining Canned Heat he had been a session bassist for The Monkees and Jerry Lee Lewis. He was the younger brother of Mel Taylor, long-time drummer of The Ventures.

Taylor played bass guitar in The Gamblers, one of the first rock groups to play instrumental surf music. Its personnel also included Elliot Ingber, a future member of Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention, Fraternity of Man and Captain Beefheart's The Magic Band; Bruce Johnston, half of the Bruce and Terry duo with Terry Melcher from 1962–66 and longtime "sixth" member of The Beach Boys, for a time brother Mel Taylor, and guitarist-songwriter-bandleader Derry Weaver, who would record and perform in several capacities during the early 1960s. The Gamblers had a local hit in the Los Angeles area with "Moon Dawg" and Taylor played on the recording.

In 1970, when John Mayall moved to Los Angeles, Taylor and Mandel quit Canned Heat to join him in the Bluesbreakers. Taylor served the longest tenure as a member of the Bluesbreakers in the 1970s (1970–1977). After the Bluesbreakers tours in 1977, Taylor played briefly with the Sugarcane Harris Band (later called Pure Food and Drug Act).

In 1972, Larry joined his brother Mel's band to play on the Ventures album Rock and Roll Forever. Canned Heat member Harvey "The Snake" Mandel also played on the album.

In 1974, Taylor became part of The Hollywood Fats Band led by Mike "Hollywood Fats" Mann. The pair joined Canned Heat for a King Biscuit Flower Hour concert in 1979. The bands history started around 1973/1974 when Hollywood Fats met Al Blake, Fred Kaplan, Jerry Smith and George "Harmonica" Smith, who were the touring members for Muddy Waters at the time. Fats was invited to be Water's sideman. Fats soon invited Taylor to replace Smith, and the band started touring as "The Hollywood Fats band". It was the first professional band Taylor played upright bass in. Taylor and Fats also returned to Canned Heat for two years (1978-1980). The Hollywood Fats band ended when Fats died tragically of a heart attack in 1986, aged 32.

When he left John Mayall in 1977, Taylor started studying playing upright bass. Taylor became a leading exponent and practitioner of the acoustic upright bass in the contemporary blues scene. He was quite prominently seen with his upright bass in the live blues film, Lightning in a Bottle. He started playing upright bass with Rod Piazza, eventually cutting ties with him when Honey Piazza started getting involved as he thought that "she couldn't play" and "she was horrible"