[Harp-L] Sugested player to learn from AND Norton Buffalo´s sources?

[martin oldsberg <martinoldsberg@xxxxxxxxx>]

It seems as if I´m in a situation where I´m expected to give another harmonica player some advice. I´ll do that by my example (and, maybe, by a formal lesson), sitting in with the band (who need a half bad harmonica player like a hole in the head but that´s their problem). I´ll also point to some recorded stuff. 
  This is not a blues band, although they play some blues, but more eclectic, some Tom Waits, some Clapton, some JJ Cale, quite a lot of Dylan. Nothing original at all.
  As a recorded example I thought of Butterfield´s Better Days live stuff: Check when he plays, when he plays not, what he plays when he plays and all that jass. Could be nice as a pointer on how to improve. Good stuff but not impossible to imitate. (And that´s a totally acceptable way to learn.)
 
Then I was looking for another example ... and fell short. The harmonica integrated in a band as a regular instrument in a ... well, 70´s rock context or something like that. Not J Geils, certainly not Bob D!
  Norton Buffalo came to mind but no, he´s far too advanced. But then I wondered -- when he started out, what were his inspirations? I haven´t a clue.
  He didn´t spring forth prepared with the chops on "Lovin´ in the valley of the moon" just from nothing, so one would assume. (I remember when I first saw that record, sometime in the late 80´s. "Hm, here´s a guy who obviously plays harmonica -- and it seems not to be blues. Never heard of him. Interesting, I´ll buy that one." Needless to say I was quite blown away by the level of his playing. Hadn´t a clue what to call the genre he played in, but that´s a minor problem.)
 
So two questions here:
1) Can you suggest another player who sits somewhere in the rock-country-blues zone and who´s not only using the instrument for soloing,
and
2) Where, if anywhere, did Norton Buffalo find sources to tap for the kind of playing you hear on his two 1970´s LP´s.
 
I´m down with a bad case of this nefarious swine flu, high fever, and my already turgid brain is really working in slo-mo at the moment so forgive me if I´m not making myself clear. I may even, from a different angle, have asked this question before ... What was the name of that Swiss doctor?
 
Cheers,
Martin