In introducing the band on his recent recording paying tribute to the Three Kings of the Blues, Joe Bonamassa called fellow guitar-slinger Kirk Fletcher “one of the greatest modern blues guitar players in the world”, and one listen to that album and Bonamassa’s earlier Muddy Wolf tribute provides all the proof you might need that Fletcher has the goods to back that kind of statement up.
Stepping back to the center of the stage for his fourth solo studio album Hold On, Fletcher is even more superb, delivering not only the magnificent playing you would expect but some tough, seriously impressive vocals that put Fletcher in the same league as the likes of Larry McCray and the late Michael Burks.
Joined by Jonny Henderson (Matt Schofield, Ian Siegal) on keyboards and Matt Brown on drums, Fletcher works his way through a set of eight terrific tracks that range from the slow, straight-ahead blues of “Gotta Right” (“to sing the blues”) loaded with stinging licks to the heavy, dragging rocker “Time’s Ticking” to such funky numbers as the soulful, Billy Preston-like, make ya’ feel good “You Need Me” and New Orleans-style instrumental “Dupree” with its cool, second line grooves.
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But a few things do help separate this album from that of a Bluetones recording: all 13 of the tracks here were written by Geraci, and, although prominently featured, his former and current Bluetones bandmates actually make up less than half of the guests on this project, with other appearances including singers Sugaray Rayford, Willie J. Laws and Michelle “Evil Gal” Willson, horn players “Sax” Gordon Beadle and Doug Woolverton, and drummer Marty Richards, as well as singer Brian Templeton, guitarist Kid Ramos, bass player Willie J. Campbell and drummer Jimi Bott, the four of whom Geraci recently teamed with under the name of The Proven Ones (the 
From there, it didn’t take long for us to realize that Bramhall also wrote two of the tracks (“I Wanna Be” and “Marry You”) covered by Clapton and B.B. King on the previous year’s Grammy Award-winning collaboration Riding with the King, in addition to playing on most of that album as well. That project would, in fact, be the start of a long and productive relationship that would find Bramhall joining the legendary guitarist in the studio and/or on tour for much of the next decade and a half, with Bramhall even helping to produce the Clapton and Old Sock albums.
Everything here is solid, although we probably would have appreciated more of a straight-up blues take on the title track, a cover of a Koko Taylor tune on which Blue is joined by rapper Al Kapone. While we have to give Blue props for taking such a creative approach to the song, and it certainly works, there’s a part of us that really would have loved to hear Blue belting this one out just as Koko did (and as Blue herself does on other tracks like the tough driving rocker “Accidental Theft” that features former Gregg Allman Band guitarist Scott Sharrard and a New Orleansy “Wild Women” with horns, piano and female backing vocals), especially with so much of the project tending toward the swaying side.
This includes one more track for their father from Lurrie and his brothers (accompanied again by Eddie Taylor Jr. on guitar), who display every bit the fire here on “One Day You’re Gonna Get Lucky” as throughout their own recording, with other real gems coming from the likes of Omar Coleman (a funky take on Junior Wells‘ “Train I Ride” that gets the album off to a great start), Jimmy Johnson and Dave Specter (an “Out of Bad Luck” that honors Magic Sam), Linsey Alexander and Billy Flynn (a soulful, swaying tribute to Jimmy Dawkins in “All for Business”), and Lil’ Ed and Dave Weld (who present a stinging “Speak My Mind” in memory of Ed’s uncle J.B. Hutto).
Early last year, we told you how good Canadian guitarist and singer Matt Andersen