Popa Chubby at the Loft at City Winery

In the Bronx, New York, a 13-year-old Ted Horowitz began playing drums until his parents told him they were too loud. His dad then took him to a Chuck Berry concert, at which point the youth committed himself to playing guitar. Inspired by classic rock and blues guitarists, he started playing in rock bands by age 15. Horowitz's first professional gigs, however, were in the downtown punk rock circuit as a guitarist in a horror-movie inspired show by performance artist Screaming Mad George. In his early twenties, Horowitz also backed punk rock poet Richard Hell. Returning to the blues, Horowitz took on the name Popa Chubby and started the Popa Chubby Band in 1990, which became almost the house band at blues club Manny’s Car Wash. Chubby gained national attention after winning the New Artist of the Year award in a blues talent search sponsored by a public radio station in Long Beach, California, which led to an opening spot at the Long Beach Blues Festival in 1992. Since 1994, Popa Chubby has released 26 studio albums, the most recent being 2017's Two Dogs; an anthology entitled Prime Cuts was released on September 21, 2018.

Popa Chubby was an imposing figure at the Loft at City Winery. Fixed to his stool for the entire two-hour performance, Chubby's oversized frame was accented with a shaved head, tattooed arms, a long goatee, and a red bandana that barely tied around his thick neck. To the left of his neck, Chubby's guitar strap displayed a large upright middle finger at the audience. As he started to sing, his husky, soulful vocals were acutely commanding. Then he leaned back from the microphone, grimaced his jaw, closed his eyes, and wailed speedily and fluidly on the strings of his guitar. Original songs and cover songs received similar treatment, flying alternately from clean running guitar melodies to chunks of gritty wah-wah-laden chords. The trio of keyboardist Dave Keyes, bassist Paul Loranger, and drummer Tom Curiano tempered the blues boogie, keeping an eye out for cues from Chubby directing them to lighten or tighten the stride. Chubby's performance did not break new ground, but instead preserved and showcased a species of late-1960s blues rock not often heard anymore. Cubby accomplished this, like much of what he does, in a big and brash manner.