Which musician links Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaata, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, James Brown, Robert Plant, Mark Stewart & The Mafia, Sinead O’Connor, and Megadeth?

The answer to both questions is Skip McDonald, and Skip is LITTLE AXE. Skip made his name as an integral part of the Sugar Hill house band playing on the most influential early rap classics and as part of Adrian Sherwood’s On-U Sound crew he has made some of the most adventurous and praised UK music of the last twenty years.

Little Axe is the return to the blues that Skip grew up with and learned from his father. Born in 1949, Dayton, Ohio in the USA. Skip McDonald learned to play the blues on his father’s guitar from the age of 8, but from picking up a guitar as a child, and returning to his roots with Little Axe, there has been a long twisting road. McDonald, along with bassplayer Doug Wimbish and drummer Keith LeBlanc formed the house band for the pioneering rap label Sugar Hill, providing the music for some of the most seminal records of the era by Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaata, Force M.D.’s and others. From there he worked closely with Adrian Sherwood on many of projects for the On-U Sound label, as well as spearheading the band Tackhead and working with Living Colour.

But first, back to Dayton, Ohio. Having completed his high school education Skip left Dayton with a band called the Ohio Hustlers, which broke up not long after relocating to New York City, where he met Doug Wimbish, who played in a band called Wood, Brass & Steel. In 1979 Skip and Doug teamed up with drummer Keith LeBlanc and they became the house band for Sugarhill Records. The trio played on some of the earliest rap hits such as ‘The Message’ and ‘White Lines (Don’t Do It)’ with Grandmaster Flash. While they worked at Sugar Hill, LeBlanc also freelanced at Tommy Boy Records where he first met Adrian Sherwood. LeBlanc introduced his colleagues to Sherwood and the trio were persuaded to relocate in London. They then formed a production team and, again, a house band, this time for the legendary On-U Sound.

The partnership developed and metamorphosed into a fully-fledged band, Tackhead. The dispersion of Tackhead in the early 1990s allowed Skip the time to work ever more closely with Sherwood, both on his own projects and as a musician on many other of Adrian’s On-U Sound productions – such as by Junior Delgado, Bim Sherman, Dub Syndicate and African Head Charge.

Skip has been the prime mover behind Little Axe since around 1992. Under a name inspired by Bob Marley’s Small Axe and gospel singer Willmer ‘Little Ax’ Broadnax, the debut album ‘Wolf That House Built’ was a personal take on blues and dub, and was released to critical acclaim in 1994. The second Little Axe album, ‘Slow Fuse’, was also well received. Then it remained silent for far too long. In 2002 Skip’s third Little Axe album ‘Hard Grind’ became the first release for four years on Sherwood’s revived and re-launched On-U Sound label with a mixture of raw blues and reggae. While Hard Grind no doubt will also draw comparisons to Moby’s ‘Play’, it was Skip who pioneered the fusion of blues and electronic music with Little Axe.

2006, and Skip finished the fifth Little Axe album, ‘Stone Cold Ohio’, after ‘Champagne and Grits’ (2004), the second record released on Peter Gabriel’s Real World Records. Skip still has got the blues but this time the emphasis is on the gospel, another of Skip’s old loves. The production and mixing was done by Adrian Sherwood; ‘gospel dub’ like you never heard before.

‘Call My Name’ (2009) was a side project with Mauritanian singer Daby Touré. McDonald and Touré, who met at the Real World facilities and immediately felt a strong connection, went back to their African roots and recorded cover versions of their own songs, resulting in a critical acclaimed mini album.

It’s 2010 now and Skip McDonald just finished ‘Bought For a Dollar, Sold For a Dime’, an album with covers his extended carreer, with new versions of old tracks. “I see myself as a time traveller,” he says. “I started out live and went into studio culture. I’ve gone all the way back and come full circle, though this time I’ve got the advantage of technology as well. Hey, I’m even doing covers of my own songs. It’s all part of the same puzzle.”