IF blues is your bag, then The Joiners is almost certainly your venue. For the Joiners Arms, which has, until now, been renowned for putting on some of the top names in contemporary music, is branching out and going back to its roots - so to speak - with an Autumn season of top blues artists.

Completely re-decorated and spruced up, the venue isn't burning its indie bridges - just simply broadening its horizons and attracting some top names in the world of blues to boot.

The first blues evening takes place tomorrow night when the Vigilantes Of Love take to the stage.

Led by former school teacher Bill Mallonee, the Vigilantes Of Love, who hail from Athens, Georgia, have so far been compared to the likes of Bob Dylan and Neil Young and mix a unique blend of blues, country and good old fashion rock 'n' roll.

"The Beatles, The Kinks and the Stones were my favourite bands growing up," says Bill, who only started playing guitar and writing songs at the age of 30.

"Later I got into Dylan, but it was via The Byrds and Gram Parsons. When Dylan did Nashville Skyline my ears just exploded. I thought: 'I've got to find out where they're getting this stuff from'".

Bill started writing and recording with local Athens band The Cone Ponies and Bed Of Roses, before forming the Vigilantes Of Love in 1990. They released their first album, Jaguar the same year.

"We were playing a sort of acid-folk scene at the time, and released three indie records from 1990-1992 which were kind of folk-punk. There were definitely some thrashy elements."

The band signed a deal in 1992 with Capricorn Records where they released a further three albums. That deal ended but the band toured none-the-less and, two years ago, recorded their tenth album - Audible Sigh.

No sooner had Audible Sigh been recorded than the label that they were signed to - Pioneer Audio - closed its record operation leaving the band with a record but no way of putting it out.

"It was kinda weird," recalls Bill. "First they said 'the record is in limbo, we don't know what's going to happen to it,' and we thought that was it. We took it to all the major labels and most of them said 'We love it. This is the stuff we listen to when we get off work'".

The band eventually signed to Compass Records who put out Audible Sigh. The band are now looking forward to their small UK tour as well as working on a new album.

"I tend to write songs as a form of therapy. I think of myself as someone who is just a little crazy and happens to have a guitar, as opposed to a songwriter trying to craft songs."

n You can catch Vigilantes Of Love at The Joiners tomorrow night. Tickets are priced at £5. Other bands coming up at the Joiners include Howlin' Wolf's guitarist Hubert Sumlin and Sean Chambers this Monday (October 23), Muddy Water's son Big Bill Morganfield on November 7 and Guy Davis playing acoustic blues on November 20.