Fathead (band)

Fathead
L-R: Papa John King, Bucky Berger, Bob Tunnoch, John Mays, Al Lerman
Background information
Genres	Blues, Canadian blues
Years active	1992 (1992) – 2016 (2016)
Labels	Electro-Fi Records
Website	fathead.biz
Past members	Bucky Berger Mike Fitzpatrick Tony Flaim Chuck Keeping Papa John King Ted Leonard Al Lerman John Mays Darran Poole Bob "Omar" Tunnoch Hayden Vialva Ed White
Notable instruments
Bass Guitar, Drums, Harmonica, Rhythm Guitar, Saxophone

Fathead is an multiple Juno Award and Maple Blues award-winning Canadian blues band, founded by Al Lerman and originally formed with members Mike Fitzpatrick, Ted Leonard, John Mays and Bob Tunnoch.

Fathead originally from Havelock, Ontario and Toronto, Ontario, where a working band from 1992 until 2016. They are multiple Juno Award and Maple Blues Award winners. There distinguished musical career was so honoured by the Juno Awards as early as 1999 and again in 2008. They were awarded their first Maple Blues Award as early as 1997 for Electric Act of the Year. Fathead came together in the late 1980s with no intention of becoming a permanent band, they were a pick up gig. Lerman worked for close to a year with a variety of musicians, he noticed it was the same musicians coming out to play each time, that was when they all realized they were onto something. They became the long-standing members of the newly formed band Fathead in 1992, which Lerman would name the band Fathead after a recording he had by David Fathead Newman.

John Mays (born 1941) in Georgia grew up with southern Gospel music. In the 1950s he began singing Doo-wop on the streets of New York City. He entered the rhythm and blues club scene in the 1960s then graduated to Soul and Funk as a member of The Insiders in the 1970s while touring with James Brown. In 1978 he came to Toronto, Ontario to stay, at that time he was still performing all styles of music and was the co-founder of The Bleeker Street Band prior to becoming the lead vocalist for Fathead in 1992, returning to his devotion of the blues, deep soul and gospel. In 2011 on his seventieth birthday Mays would release his only solo album, I Found a Love. Mays remained with the Fathead band for twenty four years until his death in 2016, in that time he was awarded six Maple Blues Awards for Male Vocalist of the Year and in 1995 the West Coast Blues Award for Best Male Vocalist.