Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos

Name: Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos
Start: 2025-11-22T20:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-11-22T23:00:00-05:00
Location: Yonder: Southern Cocktails & Brew

Schedule

Sat Nov 22 2025 at 08:00 pm to 11:00 pm

UTC-05:00

Location

Yonder: Southern Cocktails & Brew | Hillsborough, NC

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos, a smokin' Zydeco/Cajun flavored blues band out of North Carolina.
Back in the 1970s, Melton went on what was intended to be a brief visit to Lafayette, Louisiana, and the trip turned out to be a life-changing experience for him. While he was there. he met, played with, and forged lasting relationships with Sonny Landreth and Cheniers Clifton, Cleveland, and CJ. After a long stint with Bayou Rhythm, Melton took time off from the music rat-race to concentrate on a chef career (another facet developed and sharpened from the early Lafayette days).
In addition to Melton, the Wicked Mojos are Max Drake, T.A. James, and Kelly Pace.
Drake has been playing in and recording with blues/R&B bands such as Arhoolie, The Excellos and the Ministers of Sinister since the '60s. More recently, he has lent his fiery fretwork to the late Skeeter Brandon and Big Bill Morganfield before joining forces with The Wicked Mojos in 2005. Drake also performs with a stripped-down nasty blues/roots band known as The Buzzkillz.
James, after a three-year sabbatical (intracontinental freight relocation), hooked up with the Wicked Mojos at the very tail end of 2007. He had spent almost 20 years as a bassist and guitarist, having spent 1995-2003 as the low-end kingpin for the Carey Bell Band.
Pace logged road and recording time with Skeeter Brandon and an earlier version of Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos (Mojo Dream) as throne man, and he has also been a longtime member of Blues World Order. Pace reunited with the Mojos in 2009.