Bruce Cameron (guitarist)

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Bruce Cameron (1955-1999) was a mysterious guitarist who managed to attract an illustrious cast of legendary rock 'n' roll legends to record his 1999 debut and final album, Midnight Daydream. The unlikely cast of supporting great musicians for this seemingly lost album released on Brain Cell Records, North Carolina included:

Jack Bruce (Cream, BLT, Jack Bruce Solo)
Mitch Mitchell (Jimi Hendrix Experience, Ramatam, Gypsy Sun and Rainbows)
Buddy Miles (Hendrix's Band of Gypsys, Electric Flag, Buddy Miles Express)
Ken Hensley (Uriah Heep, Blackfoot)
Harvey Dalton Arnold (The Outlaws)
Neal Smith, Michael Bruce (Alice Cooper)
Bunk Garder (Mothers of Invention)

The entire album was self-recorded and engineered by Cameron at his own home studio in North Carolina. It was seemingly self-funded and promoted based on the quality of the website, advertisements and production quality.

A press conference concerning the release was held at the Hilton Hotel in Wilmington, NC on September 15, 1999 that included Buddy Miles, Billy Cox, Cameron and Cameron collaborator, ANT-BEE (drummer and quas online rock-journalist). Publicity material was touting this group of musicians as a reuniting of the famous Hendrix band, The Band of Gypsys on the then Cameron run website. Full page advertisements promoting the album had been run in a nationally distributed guitar magazine.

Unfortunately, within a month of the press conference, Cameron died an untimely death (conflicting reports of murder by his girlfriend and suicide currently on the internet) ending a rather curious and short high profile career of recording with world class greats known to millions. For obvious reasons, this release has been under-represented to the public by the high profile players have tended to not be listed by them in any public forums (with a couple of exceptions). But the fact remains that the record is a notable one due to the involvement of so many Jimi Hendrix alumni players along with great bassist Jack Bruce and others.

The record itself was a "buffet" of styles that mirrored the past releases of the guest talents involved. As an example, the title track "Midnight Daydream" which featured Hendrix "Band of Gypsys" singer/drummer Buddy Miles, sounds quite like a Hendrix like guitar driven song. Other examples of Cameron's quite inspired and accomplished ability to mimic the guest artist's well known style's included the Dalton (Outlaws) that sounded very much like his former band and the track featuring Bruce (Cream) that certainly had shades of styling from Bruce's former releases.