Bootleg Review: Roy Buchanan’s Telecaster Country (1999)

SOURCE: Radio broadcast on WLIR-FM, live from My Father’s Place in Roslyn, New York; August 17, 1973.

SOUND QUALITY: Good FM broadcast (6-7) with some hollow, cavern feel to it. When Buchanan hits the high notes on his Fender Telecaster, though, they ring clear as a bell.

COVER: Four-color, four-panel insert with picture of a young Buchanan on front cover playing his beloved axe, a sepia-toned pic of Roy in the studio with guitar in hand on rear of insert. Inside offers excerpt of Guitar Player mag interview with the artist while back cover shows a much older Buchanan and offers tracklist and venue information.

TRACKLIST: I Can Fly Now/ C.C. Rider (listed here as “See See Rider”)/ Susie Q/ Hey Joe/ Blinda Lou/ Johnny B. Goode/ Bad Case Of The Blues/ Green Onions/ Pete’s Blues/ You Don’t Own Me       

COMMENTS: Since editor Bill tossed this musical hand grenade in my lap, I handled the crisis as best as I could. You see, in my ignorance, I knew little about Roy Buchanan other than his name and the occurrence of his tragic death. I was uninitiated in the wonderful legacy that this Telecaster maestro left behind in his wake and therefore had to dig up every scrap of info that I could on the artist. Thanks to Big Joe at Rossi’s Record Room in Brentwood TN, I acquired copies of Buchanan’s first two albums; later a copy of Sweet Dreams: The Anthology, a two-CD retrospective of Buchanan’s work fell into my lap. I was ready to tackle “Darth” Glahn’s review assignment with the proper tools to do the job.

Buchanan’s story, for those of you as blind as I once was, is classic blues material all the way. Born in Arkansas, raised in the California desert, Buchanan grew up in the Pentecostal Church of God, his father a fire and brimstone preacher. He often attended revivals with members of the area’s black church and, falling in love with gospel music, the blues and African-American guitarists like Blind Boy Fuller, Buchanan taught himself to play. He left home at fifteen, made his first recordings at the tender age of twenty, and played with folks like Ronnie Hawkins, Dale Hawkins and Freddie Cannon. He really wasn’t discovered until he was almost 32 years old, when a 1971 Rolling Stone article sang his praises. A checkered career followed, with a slew of major label recordings, a handful of indie sides and lots of live performances earning Buchanan lots of critical praise but little in the way of filthy lucre. He tragically took his own life in 1998 after a minor arrest for public drunkenness.

Said story is a way of explaining that Buchanan may well be one of the first true “cult” artists, a six-string wizard without peer who numbered among his admirers folks like Stanley Jordan, Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, John Lennon, and Steve Cropper. All of which makes the appearance of this show especially poignant, since the market for Roy Buchanan boots must rank just above live discs by Stuffy & the Frozen Parachute Band or Hello People on the “labour of love” obscurity scale. Telecaster County documents a pretty tasty show, tho’, a fine mix of rocking covers like “Johnny B. Goode,” “Green Onions,” and “Susie Q” with extended blues jams on tunes like “Hey Joe” and the ten-minute “Bad Case of the Blues.” Although this show took place chronologically between Buchanan’s second album, released in ’73, and 1974’s “That’s What I’m Here For,” there’s very little overlap in songs. The performances slash and burn, however, Buchanan’s Telecaster dominating the arrangements – the shy artist never liked singing much and mostly stuck to instrumentals – while the rest of the band struggles to keep up.

Other than a few tapes that the hardcore faithful keep in circulation, there’s not much live Buchanan to be found in this world, and most of it is from late in his career. With much of his official efforts lapsing into undeserved obscurity, I’d recommend that anybody who loves guitar playing first check out Sweet Dreams: The Anthology. If you dig that, I’d heartily recommend Telecaster County, a fine document of an artist in his prime. (By the way, do you think that the producers of this disc meant to call it “Telecaster Country”? Surely the fabled guitar deserves its own fantasyland and not just a single county, eh?) (Head Records CD-R, released 1999)

Review originally published by Live! Music Review zine...

Archive Review: Jack Oblivian's Rat City (2011)

As a founding member of both the Compulsive Gamblers and the Oblivians, Jack Oblivian is as close to Memphis garage-rock royalty as you’ll find. For all that Oblivian has accomplished through the years, it’s often his solo work that shines the brightest. Rat City is Oblivian’s latest shot at glory, a boiling, rumbling stewpot of fatback punk-blues, spicy garage-rock, and sweet pop delivered in the Memphis tradition.

Whereas the title track is a streetfight with clashing instrumentation and city-slang lyrics that would make Armand Schaubroeck blush, cuts like the rollicking “Kidnapper” evince a Duane Eddy twang and Alex Chilton soul. “Girl On the Beach” is a melodic romantic ode with an undeniable hook while the stunning “Girl With the Bruises” is what the Clash would have sounded like had they come from Memphis. There’s a lot to like in the musical gumbo that is Rat City, Jack Oblivian one of rock’s lovable outcasts like Chilton, Willie DeVille, and all those others who dared walk on the edge with heart and soul. (Big Legal Mess/Fat Possum Records)

Review originally published by Blurt magazine, 2011

Hot Wax: The Reverend’s Summer Singles Playlist (2025)

Summer has finally opened its eyes and shaken off its long hibernation here in WNY, which means that those of us who reside on this frozen tundra are seeing the end of a long, cold, and wet spring season and staggering into the three-month inferno that is summertime ‘round these parts. The pile of 7” singles teetering in a haphazard pile in the Reverend’s office is threatening an unfortunate workplace disaster, so I thought that I’d pluck a few of the more worthy slabs ‘o wax from the stack and let you know about them with this year’s “Summer Singles Playlist.” Listen at your own peril…

The Big Ol’ Nasty Getdown – “Trill Seekers” b/w “Bananas” (Getdown Entertainment)
This one actually came out back in 2023, but it’s been given repeated spins on the trusty ol’ turntable since Big Ol’ Nasty Getdown bandleader John Heintz sent me a copy late last year. Side A’s “Trill Seekers” is a funky amalgam of Funkadelic and Sly & the Family Stone with the former’s wigged-out guitar strokes (courtesy of Timo Somers) and the latter’s undeniable rhythmic sense (provided by bassist Remco Hendriks and drummer Wesley Ritenour, along with wah bassist Cody W. Wright). It’s a pulse-quickening instrumental foot-shuffler with a bit of horn honk and an undeniable groove. 

Flip this gorgeous purple flapjack over and spin the “B” as in “Bananas” and you’ll find a similarly funky jam tho’ with more of a jazzy feel as a backdrop, the performance led by Keith Anderson’s frenetic saxplay and Bobby Sparks II’s nimble keyboards. Throw in Hendriks’ monster bass line, Jack Iron’s rock-solid timekeeping, and some delightfully skronky guitar via Tim Stewart’s out-of-control id and you have another liver-quivering, deep pocketed performance. The 7-incher is packaged in a thick quality fold-out sleeve adorned with gorgeous gonzo artwork by Jim Mazza and Jeff Wood.   BUY OR DIE!   

The Low Spirits – “You Lied” b/w “Never Said I Need You” (Outro Records)
The Low Spirits are a contemporary garage-rock outfit hailing from Rochester NY, but they sound like the Seeds cruising down Hollywood Boulevard on their way to Bido Lito’s. This latest 7” slab kicks off with “You Lied,” a punky high-octane treatise on love and betrayal fueled by Ryan Moore’s unrepentant keyboard-bashing, guitarist Michael Maier’s fuzztone string-pulling and snotty lead vox, and a heavy-as-uranium rhythm section comprised of bassist Richie Dejohn and drummer Zachary Koch. All of the guys contribute backing vocals, which add even more momentum to an already exhilarating performance. 

B-side “Never Said I Need You” rocks just as recklessly, but with a more somber vibe provided by Moore’s excellently-moody keys and moodier vocals, punctuated by shards of atmospheric guitar and well-timed backing harmonies. If you’re a fan of the Nuggets/Back From the Grave-inspired rock ‘n’ roll then you’ll dig the hell outta the Low Spirits!   BUY OR DIE!

Nervous Eaters – “Man’s Got A Right” b/w “No More Idols” (Penniman Records, Spain)
Boston’s Nervous Eaters are, in my estimation, one of the sorely overlooked punk rock outfits of the 1980s, a “one and done” major label flash ‘n’ the pan that subsequently went indie, releasing a handful of rockin’ elpees before calling it quits. Eaters guiding light Steve Cataldo reformed the band in 2018 and has since provided fans with two wonderful new albums on Little Steven’s Wicked Cool Records label. This recently-released import single dives into the time machine to offer up two previously unreleased vintage tunes. Side A’s “Man’s Got A Right” is a slaphappy slice of early ‘80s punk with a power-pop heartbeat, Cataldo’s low-slung vocals pumped up by the band’s gang harmonies and Jonathan Paley’s delightfully-tortured fretwork. 

Bassist Rob Skeen and drummer Jeff Wilkinson are a strong rhythm section, never more apparent than on the B’s madcap “No More Idols,” which one-ups the Ramones with a machinegun arrangement that features chainsaw guitar and more manic beats per minute than any slackjawed EDM wank-off. Both tunes provide unbridled energy, guaranteed to kick yer pacemaker into overdrive. Dave Anderson (of the Rochester NY band Calidoscopio) does an impressive job resurrecting what seem to be unreleased demos, bringing them back to life in the studio, Frankenstein-style.   BUY OR DIE!

The Shitkicker Rebellion – “White Light, White Heat” b/w “99th Floor” (Penniman Records, Spain)
The Shitkicker Rebellion is singer Greg “Stackhouse” Prevost and some of his friends from ‘round the Rochester NY area (sensing a theme here, are we?). Prevost, of course, has released four fine blues-rock albums over the past few years, each guaranteed to tickle your eardrums and pound your medulla oblongata into submission. Prevost gets his NYC groove on with this groovy new black pancake and a turbocharged cover of the Velvet Underground’s “White Light, White Heat” that comes into the DMZ hot with snarling vox resembling a cross between Lou Reed and Iggy Pop. The backing band offers tilted harmonies, and the song’s git solo is razor sharp, devastatingly recorded in the red for major mondo distortion. It’s a spine-yanking cover of a legendary tune that many have tried, but few have mastered; kudos to Prevost for blitzing an otherwise overplayed cover with unrelenting energy and attitude.

The poop-punting B-side (sorry, couldn’t resist…) is an equally inspired cover of the Moving Sidewalks’ 1967 treasure “99th Floor.” As the former frontman of beloved garage-rockers the Chesterfield Kings, Prevost can growl these Nuggets-styled gems out in his sleep; he’s no slacker, though, so he imbues the performance with a crackling, uncompromised punkish ferocity that is calmed only slightly by the mournful wail of his harmonica in the background while guitarist Ryan Moore (The Low Spirits) doesn’t so much as mimic Billy Gibbons’ guitar noise as re-writes its DNA. Guitarist Paul Morabito delivers a subtle-but-strong instrumental backdrop while the rhythm section of bassist Rick Cona (Chesterfield Kings) and drummer Zachary Koch (The Low Spirits) provide a cold steel consistency to the song’s runaway locomotion.   BUY OR DIE!

CD Review: Dave Specter’s Live At SPACE (2025)

Dave Specter is the secret weapon of the contemporary Chicago blues scene. A guitarist of extraordinary talent, Specter is well-versed in, and adept at melding blues, jazz, and rock into a singular, unique style. He’s kept the flame burning for blues music in his hometown, and although he doesn’t seem to venture far beyond his Illinois base too often, he’s helped promote and support other artists as a co-founder of SPACE, the Evanston IL club that features a wealth of performers of the blues, folk, jazz, and rock persuasion. Even a glance at the club’s upcoming schedule – which includes a slate of ‘must-see’ artists like the Sun Ra Arkestra, Don Flemons, Cedric Burnside, Roseanne Cash, NRBQ, and Walter Trout – is enough to make any music enthusiast not in Chicago green with envy.

If Specter isn’t as well known to the casual blues fan, it’s not for lack of anything. The guitarist has played with some of the finest in the blues universe, artists like Sam Lay (Paul Butterfield Blues Band), Hubert Sumlin (Howlin’ Wolf’s guitarist), and Son Seals, and he’s produced a slew of records by talented bluesfolk. His relationship with the legendary Delmark Records goes back roughly 35 years, and the recently-released Live At SPACE album is Specter’s 14th release with the esteemed blues label. Specter doesn’t get nearly the respect he’s earned, nor the attention he deserves, but his legion of loyal fans wait in anticipation for each new album.

Dave Specter’s Live At SPACE

Specter’s Live At SPACE isn’t his first live effort – the wonderful Live In Chicago came in 2008, and the equally-engaging Live In Europe way back in 1995 (with soulful vocalist Tad Robinson on the microphone). Still, 40 years into his career, Specter pursues growth as an artist and Live At SPACE displays a still-creative performer using his guitar as the brush and the stage as his canvas. It helps that his firecracker band, comprised of keyboardist/vocalist Brother John Kattke, bassist Rodrigo Mantovani, and drummer Marty Blinder, has developed a closeknit musical chemistry with the bandleader and is skilled enough to follow his every move on stage. The result is an entertaining and enticing live performance that would thrill any Chicago blues fan.

Live At SPACE opens with a pair of rambunctious instrumentals – “Rumba & Tonic” and “Alley Walk” – that are reminiscent of Booker T. & the M.G.’s and Stax Records. The former offers up an exotic, jazzy guitar intro and a loping rhythm that sways from one speaker to the other, with some elegant guitar licks along the way. Kattke adds a rollicking piano jam in the middle, followed by some Southern-fried keyboards. The latter song offers up more of a menacingly slow-paced, low-slung groove that allows the band to revel in some free-wheeling instrumentation like Specter’s livewire fretwork, Blinder’s jazzy brushes, and Mantovani’s fluid bass lines. It’s an invigorating performance that, at nearly six minutes, still ends too soon. A cover of the 1962 Otis Rush single “Homework,” by way of the J. Geils Band, is a clever amalgam of both versions, jazzy six-string flourishes and soulful vox vying with Kattke’s lively keys.  

(Not The) Same Old Blues

Specter’s own “Blues From the Inside Out” offers a jaunty, up-tempo performance that matches its sly lyrics to a jump-blues framework with plenty of jazzy guitar and a swinging rhythm while the original “Chicago Style” is both a reverential tribute to those who came before, from Howlin’ Wolf to Otis Clay, while establishing a Chicago blues sound for the new millennium, with vibrant guitarplay, hearty vocals, and an infectious walking rhythm. A cover of Memphis music legend Don Nix’s “Same Old Blues” (originally recorded by Freddie King) is a pastiche of 70 years of rhythm and blues history, honoring the soulful original while embellishing it with some hot licks and subtle, yet powerful Gospel-tinged keyboards. Specter’s original “March Through the Darkness” offers an uplifting, almost anthemic performance marrying a spiritual, Staples Family vibe to Specter’s gorgeous fretwork and Kattke’s soulful, Booker T-styled keyboard runs. 

A cover of the traditional folk song “Deep Elem Blues,” best known as recorded in 1935 by country outfit the Shelton Brothers, but resurrected in 1981 by the Grateful Dead as an Americana-styled excuse for extended jams, hews closer to the Dead’s version in spirit, but puts a ‘Chicago blues’ stamp on the song with a distinct Midwest vocal drawl, lively guitar strokes, and a funky groove punctuated by Kattke’s honky-tonk piano-pounding. Specter’s take on the great Sonny Boy Williamson’s “Bluebird Blues” is a blissful blues romp with heartbreak vox, late-night piano trills, and nuanced but emotionally-powerful guitarplay while Specter’s reverent take on Chicago blues legend Magic Sam Maghett’s “Ridin’ High” closes the album with an upbeat, intoxicating blend of Chicago-styled guitar pyrotechnics delivered against an exhilarating rhythm track.    

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Dave Specter may not be as well known as some of his contemporaries, but he’s been a constant presence on the Chicago blues scene for better than four decades – so long that he’s helped refine and define the city’s traditional sound with disparate elements that have expanded and improved upon what stalwarts like Tampa Red, Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy, Paul Butterfield, and others had accomplished. Live At SPACE captures a March 2024 show by the underrated guitarist and it documents a performance without peer, as electric and entertaining a blues album as you’ll hear this year, or any other. If you’re a blues fan and haven’t yet picked up Dave Specter, you owe it to yourself to check out the transcendent performance offered by Live At SPACE. (Delmark Records, released June 6th, 2025) 

Also on That Devil Music:
Dave Specter’s Live In Chicago CD review

Buy the album from Amazon: Dave Specter’s Live At SPACE

Archive Review: Dave Specter’s Live In Chicago (2008)

Guitarist Dave Specter came up through the ranks differently than your typical blues artist. Specter didn’t pick up the guitar until the relatively old age of eighteen, but quickly immersed himself in the instrument. While working at the city’s famed Jazz Record Mart, the Chicago native took lessons from Steve Freund, Sunnyland Slim’s former guitarist. Freund subsequently hooked him up as a touring musician with Hubert Sumlin, Howlin’ Wolf’s guitarist, and Chicago blues legend, drummer Sam Lay.

Before putting his own band together in 1989, Specter made his bones as a guitar-for-hire, touring with such major league talents as Son Seals and the Legendary Blues Band and recording with artists like Buddy Guy, Otis Rush, and Jimmy Rogers, among many others. When it came time, Specter signed with Delmark, and released his debut album, Bluebird Blues, in 1991. In the decade-and-a-half since, Specter has recorded six highly-regarded studio albums and a live album.

Dave Specter’s Live In Chicago

Specter’s Live In Chicago, released on both CD and DVD, documents two August 2007 performances – one at Buddy Guy’s Legends club, and the other at the legendary Rosa’s Blues Lounge. The talented guitarist doesn’t sing, so he enlisted the help of several friends to handle the microphone while Specter did what he does best…play. Tad Robinson, Jimmy Johnson, and Sharon Lewis lend their voices to the event. To back him up, Specter put together an incredible collection of Chicago blues talent, including keyboardist Brother John Kattke (formerly of Buddy Guy’s band), bassist Harlan Terson  (Otis Rush’s band), and drummer Marty Binder (a veteran of Albert Collins’ band).

Live In Chicago opens with the lively instrumental duo “Boss Funk/Riverside Ride.” Specter brings a jazzy tone to his playing, a fluid ease similar to B.B. King. Whereas King often imbues his songs with a darker hue, Specter’s fretwork is bright and playful. The opening song includes some tasty Southern-fried keyboard courtesy of Brother John. As Kattke double-taps the keys with a funky flair, Dave and the boys strut through the song with a smooth groove. 

Vocalist and harmonica player Tad Robinson joins Specter onstage for “What Love Did To Me, blowing the harp with a soulful self-assuredness. Robinson’s vocals are where his strongest talents lie, however…sweet, bluesy, gruff, and welded to the energetic harp passages. The song shuffles along to a fast-walking beat, Specter adding guitar flourishes throughout that add to the emotion that Robinson is pouring into the performance. 

How I Got To Memphis

A cover of Tom T. Hall’s urban country classic “How I Got To Memphis” is a fine example of Dixie soul that mixes a slight country twang with rough-hewn vocals and a deep rhythmic groove. Specter’s playing here is transcendent, displaying a tougher edge, trembling tone, and plenty of heart. Robinson’s potent vocals convey the song’s heartbreak and anguish. The instrumental “Texas Top” showcases the fine talents of the band that Specter assembled for the recording. Drummer Marty Binder keeps a steady, if subdued beat alongside Terson’s muted bass lines. Specter picks out a nasty sort of Lone Star state funk, channeling both Stevie Ray and T-Bone Walker on a red-hot six-string workout. Brother John Kattke’s fingers fly across the keys, lending a honky-tonk feel to the song.    

Guitarist Jimmy Johnson joins the band for the old-school Jimmy Rogers’ tune “Out On The Road.” Johnson’s style compliments Specter’s, the guitarist achieving a blunt, rich tone shorn of its edge, but stinging nonetheless. Johnson’s higher-pitched vocals, although not as strong as, say, Robinson’s, are just as expressive. The rocking standard 12-bar blues structure of the Chick Willis classic “Feel So Bad” benefits from Johnson’s opening six-string salvo, the bluesman playing off Terson’s bass groove before launching into a sorrowful tale of love gone wrong. It’s a classic blues tune, full of energy yet always just bubbling under the boiling point.

Singer Sharon Lewis hits the stage for the raucous, up-tempo “In Too Deep.” Lewis is an entertaining vocalist, capable of really belting out a song with heart and soul. Specter adds his tasteful fretwork astride a slip-sliding rhythm while Lewis delivers a crowd-pleasing performance. An original Lewis song, the soul ballad “Angel,” closes out the too-brief Rosa’s set. Specter’s delicate guitar intro reminds of the Jimi Hendrix’s classic “Little Wing” with beautiful tone and enchanting space between the notes. Lewis displays the other end of her great vocal range, delivering an emotional reading of the song in a Gospel vein. 

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

A gifted instrumentalist with a variety of styles at his disposal, Dave Specter is an unsung talent on the Chicago blues scene. Specter is no blues purist, but rather an enthusiast who incorporates elements of bluesmen like T-Bone Walker, Magic Sam, and Otis Rush in his work, along with jazzier influences like Kenny Burrell and, although it’s understated, B.B. King. Live In Chicago is an incredible display of Specter’s talents as a guitarist, as a stylist, and as a bandleader. This is a good show, and well worth hearing for any dedicated blues fan. (Delmark Records, released 2008)

Archive Review: True Believers’ True Believers (1986)

Austin, Texas has been the breeding ground of instrumental outlaws and various cosmic cowboys for nigh onto a decade now, ever since the city’s identification as a musical mecca in the early ‘70s. The current class of artists reaching for that ever-elusive brass ring includes such talents as Zeitgeist and True Believers, a band whose self-titled vinyl bow is sure to create unparalleled aural excitement in the uninitiated.

True Believers offers up an energetic blend of roadhouse blues, country-honk, and guitar band histrionics (the Believers featuring not one, not two, but THREE competent axemen!). There’s not a dull moment to be found within these grooves, with this writer’s personal faves, the melodic cover of “Rebel Kind” and the lyrically-haunting original “The Rain Won’t Help You When It’s Over” representative of the depth of talent to be found in True Believers. The band’s sincerity, the intensity of their music, and their sense of roots proves that rock ‘n’ roll lives outside of London or Los Angeles. (EMI America, released 1986)

Review originally published by Nashville’s The Metro magazine...

Archive Review: Eugene Chadbourne’s The President, He Is Insane (1984)

The founder and guitarist of Shockabilly, a demented C&W influenced outfit that had several albums released by England’s Rough Trade label, Eugene Chadbourne is one of America’s greatest natural resources, a one-eyed man among a nation of the blind. Eugene is a social and political satirist with the tact of a sledgehammer, his original songs showing reverence for no holy cows, calling a spade a spade, and hurling pointed barbs at targets as diverse as North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms (a politician once described as standing so far to the right that he makes Reagan look like a communist), President Reagan, Jerry Falwell, ‘Women Against Pornography’ and the Ku Klux Klan.

It's all done with a sense of absurdity in a musical style that can only be described as cacophonic and unpredictable, a strange blend of rock ‘n’ roll, county, and folk influences with a dose of metal-edged guitar and sheer noisy industrial instrumentation. Chadbourne’s The President, He Is Insane is a studio-quality presentation of some of Eugene’s best material. Side one features several of his…ah, shall we say…somewhat “structured” songs, including such fan favorites as “America Stands Tall,” “10 Most Wanted List,” and “Women Against Pornography.”

Eugene Chadbourne

Side two is strictly improvisational, mixing Eugene’s guitarwork with scrap vocals from late-night movies and early morning cartoons along with background instrumentation provided by Chadbourne’s infamous electric rake and, apparently, whatever noise he can drum up with various kitchen utensils and appliances. Not for everyone, to be sure, but nevertheless interesting and unique.

Eugene is, in the American tradition, somewhat of a capitalist, offering both his solo albums and older Shockabilly material for sale from his home. He also has a catalog of some 30+ original tapes, recorded at live shows and in his home, spotlighting and documenting a truly deranged genius, raw and totally uncommercial. (Iridescence Records, released 1984)

Review originally published by Nashville’s The Metro magazine...

Archive Review: Mojo Nixon & Skid Roper’s Frenzy (1986)

With the release of Frenzy, Mojo Nixon insures his place among the pantheon of great rock eccentrics, among such strange stalwarts as Frank Zapa, Lord Buckley, and Captain Beefheart. Mojo and his sideman Skid Roper can best be described as musical minimalists, mutant madmen who swap washboard licks with demented guitar riffs and a little wild mouth harp now and then as Mojo runs amok through a musical menu that includes inspired covers of Alice Cooper’s “Be My Lover” and an amazing one-and-a-half-minute version of Iron Butterfly’s psychedelic classic, “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.”

Mojo’s original material is not for the weak of heart, showcasing his fervor and passion on such songs as “The Amazing Bigfoot Diet,” a good-natured swipe at those tabloids found in supermarket check-out lines; “Stuffin’ Martha’s Muffin,” a scatological anti-MTV protest song which reveals Mojo’s hidden lust for veejay Martha Quinn; and the hero worship of “The Ballad of Wendell Scott.” All totaled, Frenzy delivers over a dozen of Mojo’s finest creations, a musical blend of talking blues, roots-rock, and incredible insanity, counting among his influences artists as diverse as Howlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker, Lou Reed, and Iggy Pop. Mojo Nixon is a true social iconoclast.

For those of you who can’t get enough of the right Reverend Mojo Nixon and his ‘Screamin’ Church of the Epileptic Jesus, his first LP – Free, Drunk & Horny – features such classic tunes as “Jesus At McDonald’s,” “Moanin’ With Yer Mama,” and “I’m In Love With Your Girlfriend” and is also available from Enigma Records. (Enigma Records, released 1986)  

Review originally published by Nashville’s The Metro magazine...

CD Review: Pink Floyd’s Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII (2025)

An often-bootlegged, fan-favorite performance(s) by classic rock legends Pink Floyd, the band’s four nights at the Roman Amphitheatre in Pompeii, Italy in October 1971 was filmed by director Adrian Maben and released as a concert movie in 1972. It was expanded from 60 to 80 minutes for re-release in ’73, and finally made its way stateside the following year, grossing roughly $2 million at the U.S. movie box office (pretty good for those days).

The performance has released on home video formats several times over the years, and was restored to 4k resolution for an April 2025 theatrical release. For whatever reasons, however, the performance has never received proper CD release, appearing in truncated form on the 2016 Obfusc/ation box set, leaving it up to bootleggers like The Swingin’ Pig and Black Cat Records to satisfy fan demand in the Floyd marketplace with dodgy, illicit (albeit entertaining) CD releases.

Pink Floyd’s Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII

At long last, Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII restores the concert to its full-length across two CDs and long-suffering Floyd fans should be overjoyed. The sound quality is excellent, beating the pants off previous bootleg versions, and although the tracks could have been split more evenly between the two discs (CD2 is a spry 18 minutes), that’s a minor cavil at best. The performance is awe-inspiring, the material falling into the band’s proggy, space-rock period around Atom Heart Mother and Meddle, with trippy performances of the latter album’s “Echoes” and “One of These Days” that presage then-on-the-horizon Dark Side of the Moon.

There are nods to Floyd’s formidable Syd-embroidered psychedelic past with “A Saucerful of Secrets” and “Set the Controls For the Heart of the Sun” as well as Ummagumma’s celestial classic “Careful With That Axe Eugene” and the oddball obscurity “Mademoiselle Nobs,” a curious country blues vamp. This is primo grade Pink Floyd at its experimental and innovative best, and a long overdue release from one of classic rock’s signature outfits. (Columbia Records, released April 25th, 2025) Grade: A+
   
Buy the CD from Amazon: Pink Floyd’s Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII

CD Review: Willie Nile’s The Great Yellow Light (2025)

It’s been 45 years since the release of singer/songwriter Willie Nile’s self-titled debut album by Arista Records, and the mere fact that the artist isn’t a household name on par with, say, his buddy Bruce – with whom he is often compared – is a national disgrace. As high-energy, intelligent, and rocking a debut LP as you’d find in the 1980s, Nile followed it up with the equally spirited 1981 album, Golden Dawn. From this point, though, he followed Springsteen’s path with label disputes, lawsuits, and years spent in the wilderness before signing with Columbia Records for 1991’s Places I Have Never Been, another fine album, and one with which Nile arguably found his creative voice and sound.

Places I Have Never Been received little label support and went nowhere, and Nile lapsed into obscurity. Not that he wasn’t performing, writing songs, and such – Nile recorded and performed during the ‘90s with legends like Ringo Starr, Elvis Costello, Lucinda Williams, and Ian Hunter, among others. No big-league label would touch him, though, and Nile followed his contemporary Joe Grushecky down the rabbit hole and went ‘indie,’ releasing the critically-acclaimed Beautiful Wreck of the World in 1999. Freed from the chains of major label restrictions, Nile went on a musical bender, resulting in a string of incredible albums, starting with 2006’s Streets of New York and extending through House of A Thousand Guitars (2008), American Ride (2013), and Children of Paradise (2018).

Willie Nile’s The Great Yellow Light

The Great Yellow Light is Nile’s 12th studio album since the turn of the century, and his 21st recording overall, and it’s obvious that the artist has yet to run out of fresh and exciting song ideas but, also, at 76 years old, he still has the energy and ambition of his debut album. Witness album-opener “Wild Wild World,” a bristling rocker with florid lyrics delivered with a fervor artists half Nile’s age can’t muster. The song’s gonzo storytelling is all over the map, but it boils down to the now-quaint (but never outdated) message that the Beatles gave us so many years ago, “all you need is love.” The twangy throwback guitar on the performance reminds of James Burton and really tickles the eardrums. Opening with a livewire guitar lick, “Electrify Me” kicks off with Nile’s earnest plea, rolling into a crackling new perspective on romance that is punkish in its intensity but Dylanesque in its joyous wordplay.

Willie Nile photo courtesy Willie Nile

 

“An Irish Goodbye” is a duet with underrated Irish singer/songwriter Paul Brady, a magnificently epic performance with crackerjack lyrics (“here’s fire in your whiskey, here’s mud in your eye”) and brilliant storytelling delivered with soulful nuance. Brady’s gruffer, accented vocals play off Nile’s wiry tenor quite nicely, and the musical addition of tin whistle and uillean pipes (courtesy of Black 47’s Fred Parcels and Chris Byrne, respectively…) reflect elements of the beloved Pogues. As Lou Reed once told Elliott Murphy, “if you want to hide poetry, put it in a rock ‘n’ roll song because no one will ever look there*,” and the album’s title track – the title a reference to Vincent Van Gogh – offers up brilliant poetic imagery in the service to a gorgeous romantic fantasy with crescendos of instrumentation and breathless vocals.

The self-referential “Tryin’ To Make A Livin’ In the U.S.A.” welds a familiar Nile melody to a hillbilly rocker that re-imagines Nile’s career with tongue-in-cheek lyrics (“there’s nothing wrong with me a hit record wouldn’t cure”) and the undeniable spirit of a man who has forged his own path through the barbed wire-clad minefield of the music business. Nile’s not afraid to offer a bit of trenchant social commentary with his songs, typically delivered with insight, and The Great Yellow Light includes two such “call to arms” in “Wake Up America” and “Washington’s Day.” The former, a duet with Nile’s country equivalent Steve Earle, is a wonderfully wry look at the state of the nation that points out the hypocrisy of hate and bigotry while the latter is a mid-tempo rocker which evokes the founding fathers in a brilliant essay on brotherhood and sacrifice.   

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

There’s not a dud among the ten songs on The Great Yellow Light, which is more than I can say about even the most erstwhile talents on the charts. Nile brings a fervor and heartfelt energy to every song as if his life depended on it. Much like his spiritual brethren – artists like Joe Grushecky, Elliott Murphy, Steve Wynn, and a few others – Nile is a poet in rock ‘n’ roll garb, a guise, a ruse, and a commercial burden that he’s carried across five decades but which has never kept him from shooting for the brass ring while staying true to his muse. I can honestly say that I’ve never heard a bad Willie Nile album, and that the man continues to deliver music as vital and intelligent as that on The Great Yellow Light is a testament to his talent, vision, and artistic ambitions. Grade: A+ (River House Records, released June 20th, 2025)

* Lou Reed quote from Fred De Vries’ wonderful Elliott Murphy interview in Record Time zine issue #3

Buy the album from Amazon: Willie Nile’s The Great Yellow Light

Also on That Devil Music:
Willie Nile - Positively Bob: Willie Nile Sings Bob Dylan review
Willie Nile - Children of Paradise review
Willie Nile - Beautiful Wreck of the World review

CD Review: Old Town Crier's Peterson Motel (2025)

Jim Lough a/k/a Old Town Crier got in touch to let me know that he has a brand spankin’ new album up on Bandcamp that I needed to check out. Curious, and always psyched to hear from Jim – I’ve reviewed previous Old Town Crier recordings like the four-song EP Motion Blur earlier this year, and the full-length A Night with Old Town Crier back in 2023 – I hustled over to Bandcamp and downloaded his latest five-song EP, Peterson Motel. Like its predecessors, half the proceeds from the EP’s sales will go to charity, in this case the ACLU, which can use the cash to, you know…fund its fight to keep democracy from dying in the good ol’ U.S. of A…

Old Town Crier’s Peterson Motel

Also like its predecessors, Peterson Motel rocks with the joyous abandon of the last day of school before summer vacation. The cover art – an antiquated photo of the sort of motor lodge that used to dot the highways of America in the 1950s and ‘60s – is a hint of the familiar sounds you’ll catch from the songs. The EP’s opening track, “Goodbye Jimmy D,” is an ode to the first Hollywood rock star, delivered with an echoey throwback vibe that mixes old-school rockabilly with a cool doo-wop vocal spirit. The breathless “Janeice” is equally engaging, an up-tempo slice of sly power-pop with a big heart and a bigger sound, with enough jangle to the guitarplay to satisfy even the most diehard rocker.

“Room 615” is a mid-tempo twang-banger with an explosive chorus and effective vocals while “Tell Me That You Love Me” is a romantic, ‘60s-styled garage-rock romp with clamorous instrumentation, a busy arrangement, and vocals that vary from a whisper to a shout, with Lough pulling it all together into a single magical performance. EP closer “Truck Drivin’ Man” is, in this scribe’s humble opinion, the finest country song you’ll hear this year…some Nashville type with a big hat and small ambitions could throw some pedal steel on this tune and take it to the top. Lough imbues the song with lovely fretwork and yearning lyrics, providing the performance with reckless country soul.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Peterson Motel offers a lo-fi production aesthetic but high-energy delivery, each and every song a real charmer with smart lyrics and carefully-crafted instrumentation. Lough did it all himself this time around, without a band and with only ‘Riley Coyote’ providing backing lyrics. The results speak for themselves – Lough, as ‘Old Town Crier’ – is a fine songwriter and an intuitive musician that brings fresh energy to old sounds on Peterson Motel. (Stinkbug Records, released May 21st, 2025)

Buy the CD or download from Bandcamp: Old Town Crier’s Peterson Motel

CD Review: Rich Pagano + the Sugarcane Cups’ Hold Still Light Escapes (2025)

It’s been a while since we’ve heard from Rich Pagano & the Sugarcane Cups, which is our loss ‘cause Rich is a helluva singer, songwriter, and musician, as evidenced by Hold Still Light Escapes, his sophomore effort. An impressive and altogether amazing collection of lovingly-crafted songs, Hold Still Light Escapes documents Pagano’s late son Nic’s five-year substance abuse disorder, with the songs inspired by their texts, journals, and personal experiences. Heady stuff, to be sure, and such closely-held, obvious ‘labors of love’ sometimes fall flat – not this one! Pagano’s skills as a wordsmith and musician propel these ten songs firmly into classic rock territory, i.e. lots of infectious melodies, chiming guitars, and smart lyrics.

Rich Pagano + the Sugarcane Cups’ Hold Still Light Escapes

Hold Still Light Escapes opens with the title track, a rootsy rocker with cautiously optimistic, hopeful lyrics with Pagano’s vox nearly hidden in the mix, and some great guitarplay from former Jason & the Scorchers/John Mellencamp/Hearts & Minds guitar-wrangler Andy York. The more up-tempo “Slowly” evinces a garage-rock vibe, mostly due to Kevin Bents’ tasty keyboards work, while the lyrics showcase the positivity of putting the past behind us and moving forward with life.

The somber semi-balled “4th of July” offers insight and support of the lost and lonely with a gorgeous soundtrack reminiscent of Dave Alvin while “True Love” is an enchanting story-song about emergence and perseverance that sports nuanced vocals and instrumentation that creates a gossamer, hypnotic listening experience. The wry “Mother Teresa” is deceptively brilliant – a cautionary tale, perhaps, of the allure and struggles of addiction – the mid-tempo song diving into R&B territory with a blast of Craig Dreyer’s sax solo and subtle guitar from Jack Petruzzelli.

“Huntington Beach” may be my favorite song on Hold Still Light Escapes, a brilliant, cinematic portrait of addiction with poetic lyrics worthy of Bukowski and a sparse instrumental backdrop that swells in grandeur with Pagano’s crescendo of drumbeats. The confessional “Useless” veers directly into Pete Townshend and the Who with great vocals, whipsmart lyrics, and a 1970s-styled, radio-friendly arrangement. The last of the CD’s main tracks, “At the End of the Day” is a Gospel-tinged tale of survival and forgiveness provided gravitas by Pagano’s earnest vocals combined with Brian Mitchell’s reverent keyboards, with guitarist Ann Klein laying low in the groove.   

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Giving his fans more bang for their bucks, Pagano has fleshed out Hold Still Light Escapes with a half-dozen cool “bonus” tracks, including a powerful live acoustic version of “Useless” and solid, rocking, non-LP live performances of “Ariel’s Return” and “Rearview St. June,” from the self-titled 2009 Rich Pagano + the Sugarcane Cups album. The CD closes with the raw, immediate, and heartfelt “Something To Live For,” providing a poignant end to Hold Still Light Escapes. Net proceeds from the CD benefit The Nic Pagano LGBTQIA+ Scholarship for Recovery (www.releaserecoveryfoundation.org/lgbtqia), so what are you waiting for? Grade: A (self-produced, released 2024)

Buy the CD direct: Rich Pagano + the Sugarcane Cups’ Hold Still Light Escapes

Archive Review: Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups (2009)

A general rule of thumb in rock ‘n’ roll is that auxiliary band members (i.e. drummers, bassists) and sidemen (ditto) shouldn’t even attempt to record solo albums. The cut-out bins and used record stores of yore had shelves littered with examples of poor major label decisions (Bloody Egg Yolk are a BIG band, so it follows that the bassist’s solo album, recorded in his basement with his wife and next-door neighbor, should be HUGE!). Sure, there are exceptions to every rule, no matter how many lamebrained rockcrits say it’s so, but for every stellar effort from a Ringo Starr or John Entwistle, there are a hundred crappers rotting on the store shelves from Keith Moon, Tommy Lee, and (too many) others. Really, can you imagine a Lars Ulrich solo album, even in your worst nightmares? Eewww, wot a stinker that one would be!

Rich Pagano is a major exception to the aforementioned rule. A former member of the late ‘90s alt-pop outfit Marry Me Jane, in the ensuing years Pagano has become the skinman of choice for every pop-rock genius and street-smart rock ‘n’ roll idol to come down the pike, from Patti Smith and Willie Nile to Ray Davies and Ian Hunter, among many others. Performing and recording with a diverse range of talents has honed Pagano’s skills to a surgical precision, yet his drumming retains the unpredictability of spontaneity. It’s with this musical background that Pagano steps into a spotlight of his own with the sorta self-titled Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups, his debut album.

Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups

Right off the bat, let’s agree that Pagano is no poetic dilettante or wannabe wordsmith, but rather an impressive songwriter with a grasp of the language, imagination, and something to say…my guess is that Rich was paying attention when working with notable writers like Hunter and Nile. As such, Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups provides a rich lyrical experience, Pagano venting his spleen on such heady subjects as suicide (the darkly beautiful “Rearview St. Jude”); addiction and its effects on relationships (“You Want To Stay High”); and the frustrations of the working man (“Nine Lives”).  

Musically, Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups is a curious hybrid of classic rock and 1970s-era progressive rock, with a few folkish traits thrown in for good measure. Pagano doesn’t particularly wear his influences on his sleeve like some artists, but they’re certainly haunting these grooves, and you can pick out elements of John Lennon’s solo work, the Beatles, the Band and Levon Helm, and other sources among the blazing guitars and gospel-tinged keys. As for the aforementioned proggish tendencies, Pagano might not even realize that they’re here, but you can hear ‘em in the thick arrangements, instrumental virtuosity, and swooping musical landscapes that surround his whipsmart lyrics, scraps of Yes, the Strawbs, and Genesis ringing as clear as a bell.

Pagano’s backing musos, the “sugarCane cups,” are an all-star collection of the best and the brightest that NYC has to offer, with guitarists Andy York, Steve Conte, and Jack Petruzzelli, along with keyboardist Jeff Kazee shouldering the heavy loads, while various name-brand talents like Trey Anastasio, Ian Hunter, Willie Nile, and David Johansen drop by to lend a hand. Recorded in bits-and-pieces over the course of a year, Pagano used whatever friendly collaborators that he could rope into a session, but the results are surprisingly uniform, with the obviously inspired participants leaving behind some good work when they walked out the door.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups is an album that looks forward towards the future while gazing longingly towards the past. Pagano’s rough-hewn vocals are a welcome throwback to the pre-Pro Tools era, glorying in their warm authenticity and sometimes ragged emotion, while his percussion work sits comfortably behind his fellow players, rising now and then in the mix to add an invigorating blast of energy.

An original and creatively exciting work, Pagano’s solo debut is a modern-sounding collection with a contemporary edge that still wouldn’t have sounded terribly out-of-place in, say, 1975. This is timeless, well-constructed rock music, and Pagano deserves every column-inch of critical accolades that he’ll receive for the album. Even if he doesn’t garner the ink spilled on undeserving, trendier artists, it won’t change the inconvenient truth that Rich Pagano + the sugarcane cups is among the best albums that you’ll hear in 2009. You can believe it ‘cause the Reverend says so! (self-produced, released 2009)

Review originally published by Blurt magazine...

Buy the CD direct: Rich Pagano + the sugarCane cups

Hot Wax: Scrapper Blackwell's Mr. Scrapper's Blues (1961/2025)

A brilliant self-taught guitarist, Francis Hillman “Scrapper” Blackwell was a popular star in the isolated blues world of the late 1920s and early ‘30s. Born in South Carolina, Blackwell moved to Indianapolis as a child, learned to play piano, and made his first guitar from a cigar box and wire. He was already venturing into Chicago to perform as a teenager alongside adult musicians. Known for having a quick temper (his grandmother allegedly gave him the “Scrapper” nickname), Blackwell developed a friendship with blues pianist Leroy Carr, who coaxed him into playing guitar on his 1928 recording of “How Long, How Long Blues,” which became a big hit for Vocalion Records.

Subsequent records by the duo like 1934’s “Mean Mistreater Mama” and “Blues Before Sunrise” were equally popular; Blackwell and Carr toured the country and recorded better than 100 sides together over seven years before their acrimonious break-up in 1935 (over money, naturally…). Blackwell also recorded several solo sides during his association with Vocalion, including the future blues standard “Kokomo Blues” (which was later re-worked by the legendary Robert Johnson as “Sweet Home Chicago”), “Down South Blues,” and “Hard Time Blues,” among a handful of other songs. After Carr’s 1935 death, Blackwell virtually disappeared from music for the next 20 years, until his “rediscovery” during the late 1950s folk-blues revival.

Scrapper Blackwell’s Mr. Scrapper’s Blues

After recording the 1960 album Blues Before Sunrise for the British 77 Records label, Blackwell signed with producer Kenneth Goldstein and the Bluesville Records label stateside. Recording in July 1961 in his hometown of Indianapolis with Goldstein and Arthur Rosenbaum producing, Blackwell laid down the ten songs that would become his enduring masterpiece, Mr. Scrapper’s Blues. Released by Bluesville in 1962, just months before the guitarist’s tragic murder in October of that year, Blackwell sings and plays guitar and piano on the tracks. Reissued on 180-gram vinyl by the recently resurrected Bluesville imprint, Mr. Scrapper’s Blues is an obscure, if important addition to the blues canon.

Although Blackwell isn’t as well-known as contemporaries like Charley Patton and Son House, one hearing of “Goin’ Where the Monon Crosses the Yellow Dog” will convince you that Scrapper, while maybe not in the same league as those legends, is nevertheless playing in the same ball park. With spry finger-pickin’ and his distinctive (though not entirely ‘distinct’) vocals, Blackwell delivers a spirited country-blues performance of the traditionally-based railroad song. His cover of the 1929 Bessie Smith hit “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out” differs from Smith’s with a lower-key vocal performance and delicate fretwork in place of the horns, and sacrificing none of the original’s pathos.

Blues Before Sunrise

The instrumental “A Blues” displays Blackwell’s six-string dexterity on a jaunty lil’ fretboard romp, and he takes to the piano for “Little Girl Blues,” a mid-tempo blues tale similar to those he recorded with Carr decades ago. Blackwell’s tinkling keys show an instrumental proficiency that he seldom utilized. “Blues Before Sunrise” was a major 1934 hit for Blackwell and Carr; reimagined here without the pianist’s larger-than-life presence and instrumental prowess, the song remains a blues classic. Here it provides an extended showcase for Blackwell’s imaginative and fluid guitar lines, which offer various textures and patterns to the performance.

The whimsical “Little Boy Blue” is a nursery rhyme retrofitted to the blues, Blackwell’s sly sense of humor shining through his vocals atop his energetic and gymnastic guitarplay. The instrumental “E Blues” carries this lighthearted vibe forward with serpentine guitar licks and an undeniable fatback groove while another song from his longtime friendship with Carr, “Shady Lane,” offers a bit of nostalgia to the album, Blackwell’s earnest vocals supported by a laidback but deliberate guitar strum. Originally recorded in 1927, “Penal Farm Blues” was Blackwell’s first song cut to wax; with reflection better than three decades later, it has lost none of its mournful resignation with high lonesome vocals accompanying emotional fretwork.        

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Scrapper Blackwell is an unheralded talent well worth rediscovering 60+ years past his previous rediscovery. A skilled guitarist and pianist, Blackwell was a songster capable of interpreting a diverse range of material. Mr. Scrapper’s Blues was designed to introduce the guitarist to a new generation of music fans; instead, it became his swansong with his tragic death a few months after its release.

With a scarcity of solo recordings to catch the ears of young blues fans, Blackwell has largely remained in the shadows of obscurity. While we don’t know what he may have achieved in the years after this lone album, recorded better than 25 years after his previous sessions, Mr. Scrapper’s Blues is a fitting testament to Blackwell’s talents and unique blues sound. Grade: B+ (Bluesville Records/Craft Recordings, released May 16th, 2025)

Buy the vinyl from Amazon: Scrapper Blackwell’s Mr. Scrapper’s Blues

Hot Wax: Buddy Guy's This Is Buddy Guy! (1968/2025)

Born in 1936 in Louisiana to a sharecropper family, George “Buddy” Guy worked the fields as a youth, picking cotton alongside his younger brother Phil. Looking for a way out of the backbreaking work of farming, Guy taught himself guitar by using a two-string diddley bow that he’d made. He later acquired an acoustic guitar, allowing him to hone his talents so, that by the mid-1950s, he was playing with various bands in the Baton Rouge area. Guy moved to Chicago in 1957, where he would find support from blues great Muddy Waters. After recording a pair of non-performing singles for Cobra Records (including one with Ike Turner), Guy signed with the legendary Chess Records label.

Unfortunately, Chess had no freakin’ idea what to do with the fiery, innovative guitarist; label founder Leonard Chess famously called Guy’s performances “noise.” Instead, Chess tried to shape Guy into a solo R&B singer, with a side dish of jazz instrumentals, a straitjacket not suited to Guy’s otherwise immense talents. The guitarist recorded but a single album for Chess – 1967’s I Left My Blues In San Francisco – the label preferring to use him as a session player for recordings by high-profile artists like Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Koko Taylor, and Little Walter. Moonlighting while signed to Chess, Guy started a lifelong friendship with harmonica wizard Junior Wells, contributing guitar to Wells’ classic 1965 Hoodoo Man Blues album under the “Friendly Chap” pseudonym.

This Is Buddy Guy!

Working with a  new manager, Guy signed with Vanguard Records which, thanks to the efforts of producer Sam Charters, was expanding the label’s roster beyond folk music and into the blues. Guy recorded his underrated sophomore effort, A Man & the Blues, for Vanguard in 1968 and followed it up quickly with the live This Is Buddy Guy!, released later that year. Recently reissued on gorgeous 180-gram vinyl by Bluesville Records, This Is Buddy Guy! captures the guitarist’s raucous July 1968 performance at New Orleans House in Berkeley, California. Backed by a horn-heavy outfit that featured saxophonists A.C. Reed and Bobby Fields alongside trumpeters Norman Spiller and George Alexander and including rhythm guitarist Tim Kaihatsu, bassist Jack Meyers, and drummer Glenway McTeer.

The band is red-hot and ready to roll, and Guy takes them on a hell of a ride. This early in his career, Guy wasn’t writing songs as prolifically as he would later, so half of This Is Buddy Guy! is comprised of blues and soul covers, with just a handful of original tunes. The Guy/Willie Dixon co-write “I Got My Eyes On You” is a perfect snapshot of the guitarist at this point in time – Guy shouting lyrics above a loping rhythm punctuated by the occasional blast of horns and embroidered with shards of hot guitar. The song has ‘Chicago blues’ written in its DNA and, if Guy’s jagged leads were unusual in 1968, they’d become standard for many instrumentalists in years to come.

The Things I Used To Do

Much of the live set follows a similar blueprint – a cover of the Guitar Slim classic “The Things I Used To Do” offers Guy’s stab at soul-styled vocals (something which he wouldn’t master until later in his career) accompanied by machine-gun flurries of notes. It’s fascinating to compare Buddy Guy now vs. then: while time has tamed the stormy nature of his early performances, the fire still burns brightly. “(You Give Me) Fever” is provided low-key vocals with the occasional outburst of enthusiasm, but the band smolders in the grooves and Guy’s six-string vamps display a subtlety that Mr. Chess sorely overlooked. Eddie Floyd’s Stax Records hit “Knock On Wood” is delivered in a R&B revue style similar to the original with rowdy, Floyd/Redding/Pickett-styled soul vox with plenty of blazing horns and scraps of guitar.

The second side of This Is Buddy Guy! leaps off the turntable with the roiling intensity of Guy’s original “I Had A Dream Last Night.” Guy sets a somber mood with his emotional fretwork as Jack Meyers’ jazzy walking bass line anchors the song’s rhythm and mournful horns sing the blues in the background. It’s a forceful performance, with extended instrumental passages, and the perfect lead-in to “24 Hours A Day,” an up-tempo R&B stomp with rollicking horns and a swaggering rhythm painted by Guy’s sporadic fretboard runs. The Chicago-styled “You Were Wrong” showcases Guy as bluesman with scorching, inventive leads, and a bad luck tale as old as the blues. The album closes out with “I’m Not the Best,” a juke-joint barn-burner that channels Guy’s energy and wildness into a singular outrageous performance that displays perfectly why Guy became a major influence on generations of rock and blues guitarists to follow.     

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Much like his old friend B.B. King, Buddy Guy is a blues chameleon, a talented guitarist and legendary performer capable of mastering various styles of the genre as witnessed by recordings like 1972’s Buddy Guy & Junior Wells Play the Blues (which strays onto blues-rock turf), 1981’s Stone Crazy! (pure blues-rock with guitar pyrotechnics to match), 1994’s Slippin’ In (back to Chicago), and 2001’s Sweet Tea (back to basics), upon which Guy built his Hall of Fame worthy legacy.

This Is Buddy Guy! documents the guitarist in his early years, and while his impressive six-string talents were nearly fully-formed at the time, he was still developing a sound of his own that would carry his career across seven decades. If you’re a Buddy Guy fan, you owe it to yourself to experience a young Buddy tearing up the boards and thrilling the audience a mere handful of years into his career with This Is Buddy Guy! Grade: A (Bluesville Records/Craft Recordings, released May 16th, 2025)

Buy the vinyl from Amazon: Buddy Guy’s This Is Buddy Guy!

Archive Review: Willie King & the Liberators’ Freedom Creek (2000)

He calls it “struggling blues” and Willie King is one of only a handful of blues artists alive today delving into such meaty subjects as racism, poverty, and social injustice. As such, Freedom Creek is a revelation and an inspiration. Not since Bob Marley’s early political songs have I heard such a lyrical vision of a community in trouble (Jamaica in Marley’s case, the rural south for King). Songs like “Pickens County Payback,” “Twenty Long Years” or “The Sell-Out” are hardcore declarations of faith – strongly held belief in the spirit of man and woman to overcome. As might be gathered from his music, King is social activist, as well, the founder of the Rural Members Association. An organization that preaches self-reliance by teaching African-Americans in rural Mississippi and Alabama  

Musically influenced by Howlin’ Wolf and John Lee Hooker, King’s sound is nonetheless unique. Using a second vocalist to enhance and echo his vocals and employing a guitar style that is equal parts Albert King and Willie King. Polished to a sharp edge by playing juke joints and house parties for a quarter century, King’s music is both hypnotic and uplifting. His vocals are drenched in the Delta and schooled by the church, delivered like a preacher at the pulpit with a physical and spiritual force that today’s most passionate rappers and rockers could never equal.

Freedom Creek was recorded live on two-track analog in a Mississippi roadhouse, providing an authentic gospel fervor to the material. When King states “I’m the reverend tonight” you know that he’s telling the truth, every song a sermon, every performance touched by the divine. King’s long-time backing band is as tight as a drum, providing a free-flowing undercurrent to King’s coarse vocals and steady guitar riffs. No less potent than the works of Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, or Muddy Waters, King’s Freedom Creek is a significant collection of contemporary blues that are steeped in tradition even while looking towards the future. (Rooster Blues Music, released October 4th, 2000)  

(Thanks, and a tip of the hat to local Nashville musician Colin Wade Monk for suggesting Freedom Creek to this critic.)

Review originally published by Alt.Culture.Guide™ music zine...

CD Review: Iron City Houserockers’ Blood On the Bricks (1981/2025)

By 1981, Pittsburgh’s favorite sons the Iron City Houserockers were increasingly viewed as old school rockers in a ‘new wave’ world. Pop stars like Olivia Newton-John, Diana Ross, and Kim Carnes ruled the U.S. charts and the AM airwaves while, on the other side of the pond, various flavors of  ‘new wave’ in the form Adam & the Ants, Duran Duran, Soft Cell, Human League, and the Police dominated U.K. charts as they prepared their assault on these shores, a siege made possible by the August launch of the MTV cable channel, which played British rock and pop videos almost exclusively until stateside labels got wise and jumped into the game.

Critically-acclaimed but commercially-challenged, previous IC Houserockers’ albums like 1979’s Love’s So Tough and the following year’s Have A Good Time (But Get Out Alive) provided an introduction to singer, songwriter, and guitarist Joe Grushecky, a street-smart ‘Steel City’ ruffian whose working class roots and insightful, poetic lyrics were backed by a tough-as-nails guitar-rock sound that, at the turn of the decade, was both passé and forward-thinking, presaging the ‘Heartland Rock’ of John Mellencamp and Steve Earle as well as the emerging superstardom of Bob Seger and Bruce Springsteen.

While the Cleveland International label that had released the band’s first two albums was trying to catch lightning in a bottle for a second time with a follow-up to singer Meat Loaf’s unexpected multi-Platinum™ hit Bat Out of Hell, Grushecky and the gang went straight to the label’s distributor, MCA Records, and finagled a deal that resulted in 1981’s Blood On the Bricks and 1983’s Cracking Under Pressure (for which MCA stupidly dropped the proud ‘Iron City’ from the band’s name). The Houserockers were shipped off to Los Angeles to work with producer and Memphis music legend Steve Cropper, whose work for Stax Records in the 1960s was the stuff of dreams.  

Iron City Houserockers’ Blood On the Bricks

Grushecky states in the reissue’s liner notes that he was writing best about what he knew, and it shows in Blood’s lyrics, which are personal and focused on the microcosm of life in the Steel City. Joe would later develop an insightful songwriting style that would make the personal universal – a sort of blue-collar blues – but you can see hints of this evolution in “Friday Night,” Blood’s opening track. A big, bold rocker with Gil Snyder’s tinkling keys and a boisterous rhythm track, the song borders on pop with an infectious chorus and an undeniable melody, and it’s sung from the perspective of the working-class guy waiting for the weekend so that he can cut loose. It’s a high-octane album-opener, and while Jim Horn’s mid-song sax solo edges up to Clarence Clemons’ turf, the late-closing squonk is a bit dissonant to my ears.

“Saints and Sinners” is one of my favorite Grushecky songs, a fantastic story-song that cuts a fine line between the two extremes of the title. A tragic tale of a Vietnam vet who’s gone off the rails and taken his family hostage, the lyrics are succinct, powerful, and poetic and supported by a solid vocal performance and screaming instrumentation. As Grushecky says in the liner notes, “those days weren’t too removed from the war. People my age all knew guys who went there and came back not quite the same.” The up-tempo soundtrack is unrelenting, the vox following a stark spoken/sung dynamic with plenty of silence and swelling instrumentation clashing for the moment.

A mid-tempo love song with some quirky instrumentation and vocal dynamics, “This Time the Night (Won’t Save Us)” is a Springsteen-esque romantic operetta  with moments of light instrumentation that didn’t land far from what the Cars had been playing (with some success), but with an undeniable, recognizable Houserockers feel. Cropper’s arrangement placed the song firmly in radio-ready territory, with a Southern-fried guitar solo from the Colonel to add gravitas, but it’s Grushecky’s sometimes distraught, sometimes regretful, but ultimately reluctantly accepting vocals that push the song over the line.

A Fool’s Advice      

The ballad “Be My Friend” was penned, jokes Joe in the liner notes, “to get some girls to come see us.” It’s a solid effort, Grushecky’s ragged, romance-weary vocals wrapping warmly around a plaintive yet earnest plea. The song could be considered a precursor to some of Grushecky’s later solo songs, a “proof of concept” that tough guys could be tender in the spirit of Otis Redding. A snappy drumbeat opens “No Easy Way Out,” a buoyant mid-tempo rocker with pop aspirations. Snyder’s underlying keyboards edge the performance close to a ‘new wave’ sound again – a conscious effort by Cropper to make the band more AM-friendly? – and while it’s an engaging enough song with grim, real-life lyrics, it’s inevitably just mid-album filler.

Much better is the following “No More Loneliness,” whose jaunty opening git licks and sparse harmonica swing like Graham Parker’s “Heat Treatment,” the song hewing closely to a R&B drenched, British pub-rock sound that is both energetic and refreshing. Grushecky’s vocals are light and effective, with greater range than most of the songs here, while the song’s fretwork flies high above a crackerjack rhythmic backdrop. A few well-placed horns embellish the performance while keyboards provide an instrumental undercurrent. The band gets back to basics with the gritty, forceful “Watch Out,” a street-smart slice of grimacing, dark-hued mid-tempo rock that rolls effortlessly into the album’s bruising title track.

“Blood On the Bricks” is another standout, a “ripped from the headlines” rocker with a raw, sparse soundtrack and strong lyrics that display Grushecky’s bluesy vocal style. The dynamic run-up to the song’s chorus, paired with Reisman’s mournful harmonica riffs, is simply exquisite while the backing instrumentation is restrained, not submissive. “A Fool’s Advice” closed the original LP, Snyder’s piano intro brushed away by a flurry of fierce guitar notes and Grushecky’s growled vox. A romantic ballad with muscle, the added horns are largely superfluous – Reisman’s devastating harmonica licks are all the texture the song needed. An unreleased bonus track, “Let the Boy Rock,” could have replaced “No Easy Way Out” in my opinion, the album outtake a rollicking honky-tonk rave-up with blazing horns, Jerry Lee-styled piano-pounding, and rockabilly-tinged guitar licks…a winner all around!         

“Bonus Bricks”

The bonus disc included with the album provides a real treat for Houserockers fanatics. Disc two kicks off with four live tracks from a 1981 performance at Inn-Square Men’s Bar in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Every one of ‘em is a banger, all from the Blood On the Bricks LP – “Watch Out,” “Saints and Sinners,” “Be My Friend,” and the album’s title track – and the performances in front of an enthusiastic crowd are so hot that one wishes they’d included the entire concert. The lengthy spoken intro to “Saints and Sinners” lulls you into a thoughtful complacency so you don’t realize that the backing instrumentation is gradually building to an electrifying crescendo when the guitars kick into overdrive and smack you upside the head.  

The live version of “Blood On the Bricks” is all muscle and sinew, Grushecky’s growled vox and edgy lyricism matched in ferocity by Eddie Britt’s flamethrower guitar and the deep resonant rhythm section of bassist Art Nardini and drummer Ned E. Rankin, while harmonica player Mark Reisman adds a bluesy vibe to the performance. The rest of disc two is comprised of demo tracks from the Blood sessions, with tentative early versions of album tracks like “This Time the Night (Won’t Save Us)” and “A Fool’s Advice” showcasing Grushecky’s evolving songwriting process. More interesting, though, are proto-versions of the poppy “Angels,” which wouldn’t appear on record until 1983’s Cracking Under Pressure, and “Jukebox Nights,” which evolved into “Blood On the Bricks.”      

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

I feel that there was a ton of opportunity lost with Blood On the Bricks when it was released. Cropper wasn’t a great choice to produce the Houserockers, and although he’s credited with helping the band firm up its song arrangements, some of his production choices are found lacking and contrary to the Houserockers’ bar-band-on-steroids aesthetic. Far too often, Cropper’s production is lacking in depth when a full Spector-esque approach (like Bruce Springsteen’s Born To Run) would have better suited the performances.  

MCA Records could have spiffed up “Angels” and released it as a single from the album; even in demo form, it’s a killer song that needed just a little more to make it radio-ready. Snyder’s keyboards would have fit right in with the sound of the early ‘80s and if the song wasn’t representative of the Houserockers’ ‘modus operandi’, well, neither was Blue Öyster Cult’s Top 40 hit “Burnin’ For You.” The album-opening “Friday Night” was the only single released from Blood On the Bricks (b/w “No Easy Way Out”), and while the song’s sparse, poppy arrangement isn’t miles away from “Angels,” it lacks the demo’s presence; “Angels” could have made for a dynamite, MTV-friendly promotional video.

Overall, Blood On the Bricks offers songs the equal of its preceding LPs, but the album’s lackluster production robbed the band of its streetwise gravitas. Grushecky and crew weren’t yet at the end of their rope, so the material still rocks with reckless abandon, and the live tracks display their strength in an unforgiving onstage environment. Grushecky’s songwriting skills were still growing and evolving into the master wordsmith he would become as a solo artist, and the band performed to the full extent of its considerable talents. Blood On the Bricks isn’t as impactful as Have A Good Time or Love’s So Tough, but it’s still a solid and entertaining album from a band that was always better on stage than in the studio, and still far above what almost anybody else was doing in rock music at the time. Grade: B+ (Omnivore Recordings, released March 28th, 2025)

Buy the CD from Amazon: Iron City Houserockers’ Blood On the Bricks

Archive Review: Joe Louis Walker’s Witness To the Blues (2008)

A phenomenal guitarist, a singer with a warm, soulful voice, a solid songwriter, and a dynamic showman – despite these assets, bluesman Joe Louis Walker still seems to fly under the mainstream music fan’s radar. ‘Tis a shame, too, ‘cause Walker possesses credentials that would satisfy and pacify any non-believer that might question his pedigree (or his sincerity), and he has the musical chops to backstop any argument.

Walker has performed for paupers and presidents; held his ground on stages around the world alongside larger-than-life talents like Jimi Hendrix, John Lee Hooker, Michael Bloomfield, and B.B. King; and he has a vast musical experience that runs the gamut from psychedelic rock and gospel to soul and the blues. He’s been chosen by folks like Bonnie Raitt, Ike Turner, Taj Mahal, and Branford Marsalis to back their play in the studio. In other words, you can’t deny that this is one artist that walks the walk...

Joe Louis Walker’s Witness To the Blues

Witness To the Blues is Walker’s latest, a stunning collection of rambling soul, bluesy guitar, big band blues, and rambunctious R&B. Produced with a deft hand by six-string wizard Duke Robillard – who knows his own way around a fretboard – the collaboration between two accomplished musicians results in near-flawless performances on half-a-dozen Walker originals and a handful of choice covers. Walker’s studio band includes top-notch musicians from the blues and jazz worlds, talents like keyboardist Bruce Katz, saxman Doug James, and drummer Mark Teixeira; Robillard even drops his axe in the groove on a number of songs.

Witness To the Blues is bursting at the seams with great songs and enthusiastic performances. For instance, “Midnight Train” is a jumpin’, jivin’ party on the rails, the band laying down a locomotive beat while Walker adds coal to the fire with his imaginative guitarplay, which flays back-and-forth between Texas electric-blues and Scotty Moore-styled roots-rockabilly. A duet with the incredible Shemekia Copeland, “Lover’s Holiday,” is a soulful romp reminiscent of the best early ‘70s R&B, with keyboardist Katz playing on the Booker T edge while Walker and Copeland’s soaring voices wrap around your eardrums like sugar-n-spice.

The traditional blues-blast “Rollin’ & Tumblin’” is a swinging, echo-laden rocker with haunting, swampadelic guitar and New Orleans-style piano-pounding. “Keep On Believin’” is a perfect example of old-school Stax soul, delivered with gospel fervor and graced with butterfly-fretwork, magnificent B3 organ fills, and pleading vocal harmonies. Another trad cut, “Sugar Mama,” is lifted by Katz’s barrelhouse piano runs, with Robillard’s elegant, jazzy rhythm guitar laying in the cut behind Walker’s raw, ragged solos and Sonny Boy-styled blasts of mouth harp.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

This isn’t music to change the world, but rather tones to sooth your soul. Witness To the Blues revels in the sheer joy that Joe Louis Walker and his kindred spirits achieve by playing the music they love. It’s contagious, and just one spin of Witness To the Blues will have you hooked as well. (Stony Plain Records, released 2008)

Review originally published by Blurt magazine...