Sunday, August 17, 2025
Time: 6:19 PM
Song: Underground Blues
Artist: Richard Roberts, Jr.
Mode of Consumption: Listening to Midwest Revue while eating supper.
Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/61O6YQ8xGY296z8TqUdwdC?si=932cbb4d8a8540c3
This week Billy Rose had an artist in studio where he conducted an interview and the artist (Roberts, Jr.) played a few of his songs.
Roberts, Jr. lives in Quad Cities. I believe he said he arrived to the area sometime in the 1980s, deciding to stick around throughout the years.
Rose and Roberts talked about the changing music landscape in the area.
Rose: I started this show (I think he said in the 1990s) because he watched this show and that show, and the bands were always from L.A. or New York, at least that’s what they claimed, but he knew better in many cases.
Roberts talked about some different events and play-a-longs that have revived the music scene in the QCA.
Rose was enthusiastic and shared that when he was getting out of high school there were forty or fifty bars in Clinton alone, and all of them would regularly feature live music. Now there was two maybe three.
I wondered if the scene was ever that big in a town like Clinton. Granted, Clinton used to be a hub of sorts with a large factory base and the benefit of being located on the Mississippi River. Sometime in the late 1980s and early 1990s that changed, and Clinton has only recently seemed to be getting back on its feet.
The show lasted an hour and we heard it all while we prepared our meal, did dishes, prepared our lunches for work tomorrow and did other menial chores. It was a nice glimpse of a working musician in the region.
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