The Shadows of Knight were an American rock band from Chicago, Illinois, that played a version of British blues influenced by their native city.
When they began recording in 1965, the band's self-description was "the Stones, Animals and the Yardbirds took the Chicago blues and gave it an English interpretation.
We've taken the English version of the Blues and re-added a Chicago touch," to which rock critic Richie Unterberger commented: "The Shadows of Knight's self-description was fairly accurate.
Whiz Winters, a friend who worked for their manager, Paul Sampson, in his record shop, came up with the name "The Shadows of Knight" to tie into the British Invasion in music of that time, and because four of the band members attended Prospect High School in Mt.
[4] After performing in and around Chicago's northwest suburbs in 1964 and 1965, The Shadows of Knight became the house band at The Cellar in Arlington Heights, Illinois, owned by Sampson.
[4] They attracted more than 500 teenagers every Saturday and Sunday at the "Cellar" for more than six months until Sampson began booking other bands, giving them a break.
(A recording of a Shadows of Knight performance at The Cellar was released in 2018 by Sundazed Music as Alive in '65, showcasing the five original members of the band.)
This simple change overcame the prevalent AM radio censorship of the era and got The Shadows of Knight's cover version of the song onto the playlist of WLS.
Hawk Wolinski also left the band to form Bangor Flying Circus with Schiffour and guitarist Alan De Carlo.
By mid-1967, the only original member of the Shadows of Knight remaining was vocalist Jim Sohns, who trademarked the band name and inherited the groups's legacy.
In 1969, the second generation Shadows of Knight released "Shake" on Buddha's short-lived subsidiary Team Records;[4] the track eventually climbed to No.
That album, Shadows of Knight is today regarded as a distinct recording oddity, being an attempt to mix punk and bubblegum music.
The Shadows of Knight enjoyed renewed public interest during the 1990s, significantly due to the 1998 release of their first two albums, remastered by Sundazed Music.
The album is also noted as containing "a wonderfully blistering guitar-laced extended version of Willie Dixon's 'I Just Want to Make Love to You'", which is nearly twelve minutes long.
The song selection of this set should also please fans of one of the most famed '60s garage bands, captured here at a club in their home turf of Chicago in December 1966.
On May 27, 2020, classic-era members Jimy Sohns and Jerry McGeorge teamed up with producer/musician Michael Weber to release their first new single together in 53 years, "Wild Man.
The single includes two garage / psychedelic songs, "Born Again" and "Isis Calling", both written by Marco Conti and Fabio Porretti of the Technicolour Dream and Jon Povey.
[citation needed] Lead singer and original member James "Jimy" Sohns (born on August 23, 1946, in Chicago) died of complications from a stroke on July 29, 2022, at age 75.