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When someone calls you a “reincarnated Jimi Hendrix,” it might create unreasonable expectations, but that’s not the case with guitarist Gary Clark Jr. Austin’s prodigal son rocked the South by Southwest festival all weekend, this coming on the heels of his “White House Blues All-Stars” performance where he joined the likes of B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Jeff Beck, and Barack Obama in a memorable rendition of “Sweet Home Chicago.”


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Born and raised in Austin, Gary Clark Jr. first picked up a guitar at the age of twelve. Playing smaller gigs throughout the city, he eventually caught the eye of Clifford Antone, owner of Austin’s music club Antone’s. One of the most renowned blues music clubs in the South, Antone’s helped launched the careers of Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimmie Vaughan, among others.
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Clark’s big break came in 2010, when he played at Eric Clapton’s Crossroad Guitar Festival, performing alongside Sheryl Crow, Doyle Bramhall II and Clapton himself. That same year, he released his debut EP on Warner Brothers, simply titled ‘Gary Clark Jr.’
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Although he’s known as a blues guitarist, Clark draws on a broad range of influences, as he’s noted:
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“I grew up listening to Sublime, Nirvana, hip-hop, East Coast and West Coast, Snoop, Tupac, Biggie. I loved anything and everything that had guitar on it. It didn’t matter the style or the genre. I wanted to know how to play it. Everything was exciting to me.”
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With such eclectic taste in music, it’s hard to predict where his sound will go from here, but one’s things for sure: we’ll be listening with eager ears.