Doyle Bramhall

Born in Dallas during 1949, the singer, songwriter, and drummer absorbed the local airwaves as a youth, absorbing generous helpings of Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, and Bobby Blue Bland alongside the rock & roll programming, as well as the hometown group the Nightcaps, among the nation’s earliest white electric blues ensembles. While still in high school he entered the Chessmen, soon joined by guitarist Jimmie Vaughan; the band supported Jimi Hendrix’s inaugural American trek when it reached Dallas. After relocating to Austin in 1970, he and Vaughan launched Texas Storm, later trimmed to Storm and at times augmented by Jimmie’s younger sibling Stevie on bass. Doyle subsequently assembled the Nightcrawlers alongside Stevie, now handling lead guitar, who would later cite Bramhall as a chief vocal inspiration. Around the same period the pair composed “Dirty Pool,” which appeared on Vaughan’s first album, Texas Flood. Doyle supplied or shared writing credit on seven additional tracks across later Stevie Ray releases and contributed to three numbers on Family Style by the Vaughan Brothers, an album that also placed Bramhall behind the drums.

While keeping time for Marcia Ball and Mason Ruffner during the early 1980s, Bramhall accumulated a cache of solo material that finally surfaced as his long-delayed debut album, spotlighting both Vaughans plus his own son, guitarist Doyle Bramhall II, previously of the Arc Angels. Around that time he launched a notable partnership with pop vocalist Jennifer Warnes. The arresting Bird Nest on the Ground emerged in 1994 via Discovery, with Fitchburg Street arriving in 2003 and Is It News in 2007, both issued by Yep Roc. Bramhall passed away in his sleep on November 12, 2011, in Alpine, Texas, at the age of 62.