Mike Harrison, Hamburg Blues Band

These two great vocalists you should hear

Mike Harrison, Hamburg Blues Band

Harrison has an astounding, captivating, frightening and expressive voice that can be angelically smooth and wistful one moment and as devilishly grainy as high grade sandpaper the next.

He can take any song and make it sound as if he’s lived the lyrics, a neat trick for someone who isn’t a composer. Many of Harrison’s most memorable performances were with 60s/70s blues rockers Spooky Tooth, including their incendiary take on “I Am the Walrus” (on “The Last Puff”), the Armageddonish “Moriah” and the heartbreaking hymn “Holy Water” (both from “You Broke My Heart…So I Busted Your Jaw”).

Harrison also gives an emotional performance on “Like a Road Leading Home” (from his “Rainbow Rider” album).

Jim Capaldi, Traffic

Jim Capaldi, Traffic

It had to be tough for Capaldi to be a singer in a band that had the gifted Steve Winwood as its front-man. As a result, Jim Capaldi only checked in with three leads during his years in Traffic, but two were on the band’s best album, “The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys”: “Light Up Or Leave Me Alone,” a tongue-in-cheek rocker and the reggae rump-shaker “Rock N’ Roll Stew.”

Capaldi displayed a knack for R&B and touching torch songs through a dozen solo l.p.s. Notable tunes from Capaldi’s solo efforts include: “Eve,” a buoyant break up song; the gospel rocker “Open Your Heart” (both on “Oh How We Danced”), “The Game of Love,” a lament for a fractured love affair (“The Contender”) and the soul-searching “Wild Geese” (“Electric Nights”).