JIM McCARTY
Jim McCarty (born June 1, 1945) is an American blues rock guitarist from Detroit, Michigan. He has performed with Mitch Ryder and The Detroit Wheels, the Buddy Miles Express, Cactus, the popular Detroit rock band The Rockets, the Detroit Blues Band, and more recently, Mystery Train. He also recorded with Jimi Hendrix and Bob Seger. He plays in a heavy blues-rock style that has inspired fledgling guitar players for more than 40 years. In an August 2006 interview on VH1 Classic, Ted Nugent remarked: “I’m the only guy in rock ’n’ roll that plays that hollow body jazz guitar, and it’s because in 1960 I saw Jimmy McCarty creating those big fat full chords like I do on ‘Stranglehold’; I learned that from Jimmy McCarty. Remember the name Jimmy McCarty. He is as important as Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry and Les Paul . . . a god on guitar.” (More from Wikipedia)
Besides the rhythm section of Vanilla Fudge – Tim Bogert (bass guitar) and Carmine Appice (drums) – the line-up in Cactus was rounded out by Jim McCarty (guitar), formerly with Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels, and singer Rusty Day from Ted Nugent’s early band Amboy Dukes.
Cactus albums were never big sellers, but they worked fast, recording two more albums in 1971, Restrictions and One Way . . . or Another plus 'Ot ’n’ Sweaty the following year in a revamped line-up after Jim McCarty left.
(April 2014)
