Paul Nelson, legendary guitarist, takes front-man spot

At this point in his career, Paul Nelson has pretty much done it all.

As a guitarist, he’s worked with Steve Vai, Eric Clapton, Kool and the Gang’s J.T. Taylor, Joe Louis Walker, Lucky Peterson and countless others. He was also the longtime guitarist and friend of legendary blues musician Johnny Winter.

As a producer, he’s worked with bands all over the world, from Norway to Kentucky.

Most recently, Nelson has added frontman to his repertoire.

Aside from an instrumental solo record called “Look,” which was released in 2001, Nelson has spent most of his career performing other artists’ songs. But with the Paul Nelson Band, his experience as a songwriter gets some time in the spotlight.

“After Johnny Winter passed, I knew it was time to put my own material out,” he said. “A couple months in, I said, ‘I gotta start doing this.’ ”

Nelson used his extensive performing and touring experience to handpick musicians to round out the quartet. The band then came together at Nelson’s studio in Connecticut, where he said the music for the band’s debut, “Badass Generation,” an eclectic mix of classic rock, blues and Southern rock, just flowed out of him.

“What was coming out wasn’t trying to be like a Johnny Winter record or try to do a blues record, it came out of a combination of all the stuff that we appreciated,” he said. “That was retro-izing a ’70s kind of production, a ’70s kind of vibe.”

To get that production and vibe just right, band members did their homework, studying every aspect of artists like Tom Petty, Led Zeppelin, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Bad Company and Queen (“The recording techniques, how the vocals work, what the song structures were like in that time,” Nelson said) to find out what makes classic rock so classic.

Everything about the album, from the production to the song order to the cassette tape on the album cover, was thought out in advance.

“That was the trick, to make people say ‘This is cool in itself. It’s not unhip to listen to this. This is new stuff. It’s a continuation of that era,’ ” Nelson said.

The band’s attention to detail didn’t go unnoticed by fans.

“One of the biggest compliments I received was ‘When I listened to your album, it felt like a classic album that I had forgotten to purchase,’ ” Nelson said.

Having added another project to his constantly full plate, Nelson is surprisingly unstressed about his hectic schedule, which, in a two-week span, finds him producing in Kentucky, rehearsing for Paul Nelson Band shows and traveling to Puerto Rico to perform on a blues cruise with Buddy Guy.

“As long as it’s under the heading of music, I’m good,” he said.

“You never know where this life is going to lead you, and as long as you hone your craft and learn your stuff, once you get in it, the phone keeps ringing.”