Bud Blackburn, High & Mighty bassist (1947-2020)

I just received sad news from Bill Blackburn that his uncle, Bud Blackburn, the bassist for the 1960s Pueblo garage band, High & Mighty, passed away, at the age of 72.

The High & Mighty were a popular East High School band, in the mid 1960s, playing for local dances and events. The group included Blackburn, along with Larry Duran, Larry Shuford, Scott DeTurk, and Milton Fender. Blackburn graduated from East in 1965, Duran, Shuford and DeTurk graduated in 1966, while Fender graduated in 1968.

Bud Blackburn 1965 East High School graduation photo

(courtesy of Bill Blackburn)

The Pueblo Chieftain, in a 2006 article entitled “High and Mighty Flies Again,” mentions that the band’s first gig was for a dance at Heaton Jr. High. According to Duran, the band only knew eight songs, but “The kids at Heaton thought they had died and went to heaven” hearing the band play the Beatles, Rolling Stones, and Kinks covers.

The High & Mighty would later go on to be regulars at local hangouts, Pinocchio’s, Dante’s Inferno and the Fantastic Zoo. They would open for Strawberry Alarm Clock (“Incense and Peppermints”), when the psych band played at Pueblo Junior College.

The High & Mighty would only last a few years, disbanding in the late 1960s.

Blackburn was an avid street rod fan, who married his wife Denise at the Rocky Mountain Street Rod Nationals, in 2006, at the Pueblo County Fairgrounds.

Funeral services and a memorial are pending.