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Hook's Combo

He's easy to recognize.... Mike (Hook) Deutsch got his nickname after losing his hand just above the wrist in an industrial accident back in the early 1970's. He had already become an institution on the Twin Cities blues scene as a bassist. Hook simply adapted, to become one of the better blues piano players in town, and perhaps the best one-handed blues pianist anywhere!

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read about Hook's Blue Loon CD

He was featured in early incarnations of the Butanes, and later in Sonny Rodgers' band, with whom he collaborated on the W.C. Handy Award-winning single, 'Big Leg Woman' / 'Cadillac Baby'. Following Sonny's death in 1990, Hook joined up with guitarist Junior Maynard to form Hook's Combo.

They recorded their 1995 Blue Loon CD, 'The Blues Is All Around Me' before a live audience at Whiskey Junction, a renowned biker bar on the south fringe of Minneapolis' West Bank district. Recorded live to 2-track DAT, and clocking at a generous seventy-plus minutes, Hook, Junior & Co. crank out some fine, biting urban blues, featuring Junior's scorching guitar and Hook's piano and vocals, along with the saxophone of special guest Rick O'Dell. Sadly, the band broke up shortly after the CD release, and it has been deleted from Blue Loon's catalog, although a few much-sought-by-collectors CD's still lurk unsold on a few store shelves. Hook, like Baby Doo Caston and Lazy Bill Lucas, has found steady work as a solo act. He plays regularly at the Malt Shop (on 50th near Bryant in south Minneapolis). Studio work has also kept Hook busy. His latest outing being a session with Rockin' Daddy & the Rough Cuts on their new CD, "Blues and Tall Tales".