Tao Lao had emigrated to the US (California) in the mid-1940s and worked as an attendant at the train station in Fullerton, right across the street from a guitar factory.
Over the years, he became friends with some of the factory workers because, during the early days, they used the public bathrooms at the station.
They shared similar working time-tables and too many a night they would call it a day smoking one last cigarette at the station before taking the train back home.
Tao became buddies with the guys at the wood shop, who sometimes would give him broken pieces of instruments to use as firewood during the winter.
They knew Tao had left his family back in China and as the proud father would explain, his son was a very passionate young guitar player.
On Christmas eve of 1950, Tadeo, one of workers making necks and bodies, gave Tao a guitar in pieces (disassembled inside a carton box) which was going to be thrown into the dumpster. It had a body painted in white colour and looked pretty complete.
Tadeo told his Chinese friend, “Here, this is a test prototype which we won’t use. You can send this to your son as a Christmas gift”.
Of course, Tao sent the guitar to his son, and this would become the young guitar player’s main instrument for life.
Every year for Chinese New Year’s Eve, Tao Lao would send his son a pile of records on what he called “fun guitar music”. Xiao Tao was raised on blues and rock, and he became a better player as his ears became trained with that magical sound coming from his dad’s records.
But as he soon found out, life wasn’t easy for a rock/blues guitar player in China during the 1970s.
Out of desperation, he moved to southern Guangdong armed with his old guitar and a few RMBs in his pocket looking for a brighter future. He had left his home up-north months ago, hoping to make it at the southern night club circuit.
For months he struggled to make a living in the Shenzen club scene but gigs were barely paying the rent. His guitar playing seemed to impress no one.
One night the bar tender told him his luck could change and gave him a card with a Hong Kong address. The next day he took the ferry to the back side of Lan Kwai Fong. Somebody was already waiting for him at the dock.
The following day he was back and played his usual gig at the Shenzen club. The place was packed and there were hundreds of people waiting outside... He had his old white electric guitar with him.
His fingers were flying up and down the fretboard and his music suddenly had a magic spell. The crowd went crazy with his new captivating style.
As promoters started calling, he became very popular and he started playing most of the best clubs in Shenzen. The poor aspiring Xiao Tao, never crossed the Sham-Chun river again, and became Blues King Tao.
He drove audiences wild with his lightning riffs but as a rule, he never played an encore. Night after night, while his band kept playing the last number, he rushed backstage with his trusty old electric guitar and disappeared into the dark Guangdong night. Blues Tao has left the building.
One night he was asked to play a private gig in HK. He initially declined but the money was too much to turn down. They sent a car to pick him up.That night he did play an encore.
He was never to be seen alive again.
He was found dead near the river banks, with his cold hands stuck to the neck of his faithful white electric prototype guitar and a note in his pocket.
Ni hui shi wode dao shitian jintou.
You’ll be mine till the end of time.
His mother could barely pay for the solitaire funeral. He was buried with the guitar.
From the eastern banks of the mediterranean coast of Spain, rooted in the ancient city of Valencia. This new band hits the global music scene by storm, offering a creative new take on traditional blues with oriental flavour, cooked in the land of world-famous Paella and seasoned with the best Texan tradition.
Their first single is You´ll be mine, an epic fable on everlasting love, fait and a long-lost mysterious electric guitar.
Ni-hao-hao-hao.
