Early last year, we told you how good Canadian guitarist and singer Matt Andersen can be live. If you still haven’t gotten the chance to experience that for yourself, you no longer have to take our word for it, with Andersen’s latest CD Live at Olympic Hall (True North Records) providing all the convincing you’ll need. Backed here by the 10-piece Halifax ensemble The Mellotones, Andersen rolls through some of his catchiest tracks and a few choice covers that together allow him to accomplish just what he set out to do: “mak(ing) a live record that would be something fans could come back to again and again, the way he did when he was a kid, with Eric Clapton Unplugged“.
Kicking off on a soaring “Weightless” that will have you feeling good from the get-go while also quickly reminding you that Andersen is one of the most impressive male vocalists around, it isn’t until about four songs in (presenting along the way a swinging “Alberta Gold” and breezy, slightly countryish “I Don’t Wanna Give In”) that Andersen slows things down a bit, first with the somewhat haunting, groove-filled “What Will You Leave” and then the country-soul of a “Coal Mining Blues” that nicely demonstrates the softer, more tender side of Andersen’s vocals.
Continue reading
Appropriately available on the same Delmark Records label as on which Carey released his debut album (Carey Bell’s Blues Harp) almost 50 years ago and two collaborations with Lurrie in the 1977 Heartaches and Pain (Lurrie’s debut recording) and 2007’s Gettin’ Up, released just weeks before Carey died at age 70, Tribute to Carey Bell features a dozen tracks honoring their father. This includes the band’s take on a number of originals and classics performed by Carey throughout his career, as well as a pair of originals from the band in James’ dragging “Keep Your Eyes on the Prize” — one of three tunes on which James (who also plays drums on the project) handles vocals, along with “What My Momma Told Me” (Junior Wells) and the funky “Break It Up” (Little Walter) — and a shuffling, Billy Branch-penned “Carey Bell Was a Friend of Mine” that features Branch on vocals and trading some nice licks with Steve on harmonica.
We could easily go through this album for you track by track, but the truth is that 1) absolutely everything here is solid and 2) doing that will really only delay you from going out to get a copy, which is something you’re definitely going to want to do. If, however, you’re looking for suggestions on a track or two (or four) on which to start, we might recommend the uptempo “Tell Me Mama” (Little Walter) that features Oscar Wilson on vocals, Jimi “Primetime” Smith and Johnny Rapp on guitar, and Henry Gray on piano; a creeping “Laundromat Blues” that combines high, raspy vocals from Alabama Mike with some haunting harmonica from Corritore, guitar from Big Jon Atkinson, and piano from Bob Welch to make for a tune that’s so gritty, you might really actually need a laundromat; a shuffling “Steal Your Joy” with booming vocals from Sugaray Rayford, guitar from Chris James and Mojo Mark, and bass from Patrick Rynn; and the funky grooves of “Blues Why You Worry Me?” with its screechy Hill Country style vocals from Alabama Mike as well as guitar from Atkinson and Danny Michel.
With each person having already distinguished himself as an individual performer, sideman, or member of such accomplished blues bands as The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Ronnie Earl & the Broadcasters, The Mannish Boys, and Sugar Ray & the Bluetones, it should come as no surprise that the new soul-blues-rock supergroup The Proven Ones can make some great music together. But what may surprise you is just how great the music on the band’s debut album Wild Again (Roseleaf Records) is, with the recording quickly becoming one of our favorites of 2018.
Sometimes reflective, like on the slow, brooding opener “A Few Good Years”, the “Catfish Blues”-ish “Somebody Up There”, and the swaying, horn-drenched “End of the Line”; sometimes fun, like on a “Cognac” that also features guitarists Keith Richards and Jeff Beck to make for a smooth, slow-burning blues party of sorts on which Guy remembers another good friend with the lyrics “If the late Muddy Waters was here drinking with us, that bottle would be ten times gone”, then interjecting “can’t drink with me no more, Muddy, but I, I got Keith Richards”, and a Sly & the Family Stone-like “Whiskey for Sale” that’s, as Buddy likes to say, “so funky, you can smell it” (or, in this case, taste it) with backing vocals from the McCrary Sisters and Hambridge’s daughter Rachel, slide guitar, B3 and clavinet, with Guy at the end asking “Don’t that make ya’ feel good now?” (it sure does, Buddy, thanks); and sometimes just straight-up blues, like on the scorching cover of Sonny Boy Williamson’s “Nine Below Zero”, the shuffling, partly falsetto-chorused “Guilty as Charged”, and a cautionary “Bad Day”, the album is everything you’d hope for from the soon-to-be-82-year-old Guy, showing that he’s still got his stuff both instrumentally and vocally, from the hard, biting blues for which we’ve long admired him (check out, for example, “Old Fashioned”, another number that incorporates some nice playing from the Muscle Shoals Horns) to slower-tempoed collaborations with the likes of longtime friend Mick Jagger (who contributes harmonica and a single “yeah” on the creeping “You Did the Crime”) and UK singer James Bay (who joins Buddy on both guitar and vocals for “Blue No More”).
But it’s clear that Danielle hasn’t just pushed those days to the past, calling upon former Trampled Under Foot producer Tony Braunagel (Taj Mahal, Bonnie Raitt, Eric Burdon) to co-write a handful of songs (including the swaying, soulful title track), play drums on, and produce Cry No More, as well as guitarist brother Nick Schnebelen for the opening number “Crawl”, a powerful, rocking song on which Danielle — who, in 2014, became the first female winner of the Blues Music Award for Best Instrumentalist-Bass — immediately
Here’s one to help take you into the weekend from a new, New Jersey-based duo that goes by the name of Dharmasoul. Featuring Jonah Tolchin on guitar and Kevin Clifford on drums (with the two trading off on lead and backup vocals), Dharmasoul makes an awfully strong name for itself with its debut album Lightning Kid (Dharmasoul Records).