Vintage Trouble are putting a new twist on a trusty old sound

Ed Power, talks soul, segregation and sense of family to Vintage Trouble’s front man

TY TAYLOR has a complicated relationship with the past. The frontman of proudly old-school blues ensemble Vintage Trouble naturally adores the music of the 1950s and ’60s. But, as an African-American, he understands it would be foolhardy to romanticise the era. It was the age of Otis Redding and Sam Cooke — but also of institutionalized segregation and state-sanctioned racism. Taylor wouldn’t go back even if he could.

“I couldn’t dive into those decades and feel comfortable,” says the singer, from his home in Los Angeles. “The music that my parents grew up listening to — back then, I would have had to go in by the ‘back door’ to listen to it.”