Biography
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Born
21 September 1944
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Born In
Norman, Cleveland County, Oklahoma, United States
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Died
22 June 1988 (aged 43)
Jesse Edwin Davis (September 21, 1944 – June 22, 1988) was an American guitarist. He was well regarded as a session artist. His death in 1988 is attributed to a drug overdose.
Born in Norman, Oklahoma, Davis began his musical career in Oklahoma City. His father, Jesse Ed Davis II, was Kiowa and Cherokee while his mother's side was Kiowa. He graduated from Northeast High School in 1962.
Davis began his musical career in the late 1950s playing in Oklahoma City and surrounding cities with John Ware (later Emmylou Harris' drummer), John Selk (later Donovan's bass player), Jerry Fisher (later Blood, Sweat & Tears vocalist) Mike Boyle, Chris Frederickson, drummer Bill Maxwell (later Andrae Crouch and Koinonia) and others.
By the mid 1960s Davis had quit the University of Oklahoma and went touring with Conway Twitty.
Davis eventually moved to California, where, through his friendship with Levon Helm, he became friendly with Leon Russell. He became a session player before joining Taj Mahal and playing guitar and piano on his first three albums. Davis played slide, lead and rhythm, country even jazz during his three-year stint, making an appearance with the band as a musical guest in the The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus. Davis later went on to work closely with ex-Beatles John Lennon and George Harrison, playing guitar on several of their solo albums.
The period Davis spent with Taj Mahal was the closest he came to being in a band full-time, and after Taj Mahal's 1969 album Giant Step, Davis performed session work for David Cassidy, Albert King and Willie Nelson. In 1971, Davis produced and played on Gene Clark's second solo album, White Light.
Davis recorded his first solo album when the subsidiary of Atlantic Records, Atco, signed a contract with him to record two albums with the label. The result of that engagenment was the self-titled album Jesse Davis (Atco, 1971), which featured backing vocals by Gram Parsons and appearances by Leon Russell and Eric Clapton, among others. Two more solo LPs followed, Ululu (Atco, 1972) and Keep Me Comin', occasionally listed as Keep On Coming (CBS, 1973).
Davis also added guitar to Clark's No Other album (Asylum, 1974). Davis played on LPs by John Lennon, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton, Leonard Cohen, Keith Moon, Jackson Browne, Steve Miller, Harry Nilsson and Van Dyke Parks, and was a featured guest in George Harrison's The Concert for Bangladesh on August 1, 1971 at Madison Square Garden, New York City.
In and out of clinics, Davis disappeared from the music industry for a time, spending much of the 1980s dealing with alcohol and drug addiction. Davis played in The Graffiti Band, which coupled his music with the poetry of American Indian activist John Trudell.
In the Spring of 1987, The Graffiti Band performed with Taj Mahal at the Palomino Club in Hollywood. At this show, George Harrison, Bob Dylan and John Fogerty rose from the audience to join Davis and Taj Mahal in an unrehearsed set which included Fogerty's "Proud Mary" and Dylan's "Watching The River Flow" and "Blue Suede Shoes", "Peggy Sue", "Honey Don't", "Matchbox", and "Gone, Gone, Gone".
On June 22, 1988 Jesse Ed Davis collapsed and was pronounced dead in a laundry room in Venice, California. Davis had various drugs in his system and his death is commonly attributed to as a heroin overdose. He was 43 years old.
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