We had the distinct pleasure of welcoming Koko Taylor to our stage at the Rosemont Theater in Chicago earlier this week. She came with her daughter Cookie and Cookie's husband Lee, and it was a bit of a reunion for us, having last met up at the Vic Theater when she and Johnnie Johnson joined us for our encore there. I started out taking this photo of JY and Koko. George said, "Tommy, get in the photo too," and took the camera from me to take another picture. One by one the other STYX men came from every corner of the dressing room area for a photo. When I looked back at the pictures, each one grew by a person until it was the group shot you see here on the site. It was pretty funny, but no one wanted to miss this photo op with Koko. We're Koko CRAZY.

Koko looked like a million bucks and when she took the stage, she literally took it in the palm of her hand and for the next 15 minutes it was Koko's World. We followed and rode the wave this powerhouse of a woman stirred up as she worked the audience into a frenzy. "Sweet Home Chicago" and "Wang Dang Doodle" raised the temperature of that theater several degrees and we all came away richer as a result. As I'm writing I was thinking about the slide solo I played and was going back there. It was euphoric, coming from a place I love to be. But then I remembered JY's soloing and Lawrence's organ solo and it all came back to me just how joyous and wonderful it was for our souls. To a man, every member of STYX laid it on the line for Koko. The truth is, she just brings it out of you. I don't even think she knows how huge she is on stage. It seems effortless, yet what she brings to the stage is every bit of her life experience, and that's the power we all felt and connected to.

God bless the Queen!

TS