Paul Reddick + The Sidemen - Rattlebag (2001)

I’ve heard a lot of blues music during my ever-lengthening lifespan and I’ve found that most contemporary blues artists fall into one of a handful of categories. There are Texas bluesmen like the Fabulous Thunderbirds, with one foot in rock & roll and the other in Lightnin’ Hopkins. There are the revivalists, like the Tarbox Ramblers, who camp it up old school-style with roots in Mississippi John Hurt, Son House and Robert Johnson. There are the six-string acolytes, who worship at the altar of Stevie Ray and, finally, there are the Chicago stylists with their stacks of Chess wax, following the footsteps of Muddy Waters, Junior Wells and Buddy Guy.

After playing Rattlebag a dozen or so times, though, I have to admit, dear readers, that I’ve never heard anyone quite like Paul Reddick + The Sidemen. With Rattlebag, their fourth album, this highly underrated blues outfit manages to incorporate damn near the entire history of the blues into sixteen rollicking songs. Reddick and the Sidemen have enough rock chops to boogie with the best of them. They also have a firm grasp on the artistic demons that drove hundreds of young men out of the Mississippi Delta and north towards the promise of a better life. The sixteen songs on Rattlebag mix rural blues, the Chicago sound, Texas six-string wizardry and New Orleans R&B into a thick musical gumbo that will satisfy your soul even while tickling your lobes.

Reddick blows a manic harp, sounding a lot like Paul Butterfield tho’ with a grungier edge. His vocals are perfectly suited to the material, gruff and soulful with just the right amount of world-weariness. Reddick is a talented wordsmith as well, infusing the material with a literary style absent from most blues tunes. Guitarist Chris Burgess is a mean six-string maestro, creating rich sounds and distinctive tones while the bass/drums combo of Greg Marshak and Vince Maccarone are capable of both great power and quiet subtlety.

It is the songs that do the talking on Rattlebag, though, carefully crafted compositions like the blustery “Sleepy John Estes” or “Trouble Again” with its infectious rhythms and mad harpwork. The title cut is a monster collection of rampaging riffs and wickedly echoed vocals while “I’m A Criminal” is a down-and-dirty blues tune that simply crackles with electricity. “Pear River Blues” is mesmerizing, Reddick’s voice weaving a rich, soulful tapestry that lulls the listener into a trancelike appreciation of the swamp-rock blues the band is kicking out.

Altogether, Rattlebag is one of the strongest blues albums these ears have enjoyed this year. Paul Reddick + the Sidemen claim that they deliver “hard blues for modern times” and you’d better believe it.... (Northern Blues Music)

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Shuggie Otis - Shuggie's Boogie: Shuggie Otis Plays The Blues (1994)

Although there have been a handful of young guitar prodigies since then, the late-60s emergence of fourteen year old six-string wizard Shuggie Otis was unheralded at the time. The son of R & B legend Johnny Otis, Johnny, Jr. – known as Shuggie – was discovered by the great John Hammond and signed to Epic Records. An enthusiastic Al Kooper featured Otis on one of his "super session" records soon afterwards, the young Otis making his recording debut in 1969 with Al Kooper Introduces Shuggie Otis.

Soon to follow was 1970's Cuttin' Up by Johnny Otis, which featured his multi-talented son on a number of cuts, playing a variety of instruments, including guitar, bass and keyboards. Later in the year came Shuggie's full-fledged solo debut, Here Comes Shuggie Otis, on which he performed all of the instrumentation save for bass guitar and wrote or co-wrote all of the disc's ten cuts. The critically-acclaimed album was a breath of fresh air, with the unique Blues-based guitar style evinced by Otis ground-breaking in its scope and surprisingly mature in its execution. Otis would go on to record a total of three solo albums for Epic in the early-70s, as well as continuing to do live work with his father's band.

Shuggie's Boogie draws its dozen cuts from the first two solo albums from Otis and his aforementioned work with Kooper and the elder Otis. It showcases an artist wise beyond his tender years, the work representing a striking stylistic ability and an enormous power of expression. Cuts like Shuggie's Boogie, with its brief opening spoken autobiography, I Can Stand To See You Die, its country-styled slide guitar matched by the wonderful vocals courtesy of Sugarcane Harris or Shuggie's Old Time Slide Boogie, which brings up memories of Tampa Red or, more appropriately, Blind Willie McTell, all stand up well to the test of time. Shuggie's subsequent slide into obscurity makes these early achievements all the more impressive. During his brief career, Shuggie Otis left a large mark on the blues, his youthful enthusiasm and skill captured here on Shuggie's Boogie: Shuggie Otis Plays The Blues. (Sony Legacy)

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B.B.King - Blues On The Bayou (1998)

In a music world abounding with superstars and living legends, B.B. King can honestly stand tall with any of them. The guitarist has long lived in the artistic shadows of long-gone blues innovators like Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters and Willie Dixon. To tell you the truth, though, King is a trailblazer in his own right, accomplishing something that the aforementioned legends never really did: selling the blues to a mainstream white audience. Although this critic has criticized King in the past for going “Vegas,” careful consideration of his artistic milieu proves otherwise.…

Consider, for example, Blues On The Bayou. Taking his hard-working road band into a remote Louisiana studio, King and crew recorded Blues On The Bayou in a mere four days. A fifteen song collection of old and new tunes written or co-written by King, the album was done live in the studio, offering no overdubs or production wizardry, just plain music. The result is as tasteful treatment of the blues as you’ll find.

At the heart of every song is King’s masterful six-string work. A maestro on the guitar, King’s fluid playing style and the unique tone he coaxes out of “Lucille,” sounds more jazzy than bluesy. Throw in King’s growling, soulful vocals on songs like “Broken Promise” or “I Got Some Outside Help I Don’t Need” and you’ll find the traditional wellspring from which King draws his blues. The backing band, which has literally played hundreds of shows with King, support the songs in an understated manner, respectfully allowing King and his amazing guitar to dominate the proceedings.

As I stated earlier, I once dismissed King for going “Vegas.” From the earliest King sides that I’d ever heard, however, it’s evident that he has always played with a lot of stylistic flair and glamour. His stage presence and six-string prowess is larger than life, and if he’s not, to quote an unfounded criticism, as “authentic” as earlier bluesmen, well, he’s traveled his own path for over 50 years and brought the music of the blues to the largest audience it’s ever enjoyed. King has influenced dozens of younger guitarists, black and white, from folks like Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck to Robert Cray and Johnny Lang. While Blues On The Bayou isn’t a great artistic statement, it showcases King doing what he does best: singing and playing the blues. For that alone, B.B. King deserves a seat alongside the legends. (MCA Records)

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Lightning Hopkins - The Best Of Lightning Hopkins (2001)

The legendary Lightning Hopkins is a giant among Texas bluesmen, an important link between the early traditional blues of Blind Lemon Jefferson and highly-amped, rock-influenced guitarslingers like Charlie Sexton and Stevie Ray Vaughan. Like many of his Chicago counterparts, Hopkins was often cast by labels in an R&B light, recording material with a full band and an eye on the Black music charts. Where I feel Hopkins is at his best, however, is when he and his guitar are unaccompanied, Lightning kicking out some dirty country blues.

Hopkins was a prolific recording artist, much like John Lee Hooker, spitting out sides for whatever record company was paying any particular week. Blues artists got paid when they recorded or performed live; royalties were seldom paid by the labels on the 78s that they spun out during the '40s and '50s. During a career that spanned seven decades, Lightning recorded for dozens of labels, including Gold Star, Aladdin, Jewel and Modern. Pinning down any “best of” collection on Hopkins is like hunting down a snipe – you're better off not trying in the first place. The best that you can hope for is to isolate several distinctive eras in the artist’s career and dig up recordings that represent his best efforts in that time and place. Once you’ve done that, you can simply buy Arhoolie’s The Best Of Lightning Hopkins.

There are several reasons to choose this set over the dozen or so other “best of” collections that you’ll find on your local dealer’s shelf. Arhoolie founder Chris Strachwitz was a fan of Hopkins, and it was after seeing Lightning perform live in 1959 that Strachwitz decided to form his own record label. Strachwitz recorded Lightning several times during his career, and many of those recordings – especially the Texas Blues album – are considered bonafide blues classics. Many of the best of those tracks, recorded during the '60s, are included on this disc. Finally, Arhoolie got their hands on the 78s that Hopkins recorded for the Houston-based Gold Star label from 1947-1950 and several of those sides, including a couple of unreleased songs, are included on The Best Of Lightning Hopkins.

Ultimately, however, the music is why you should check out this Arhoolie compilation. Hopkins had a distinctive vocal style and a quick-witted ability to reinvent his songs and lyrics as whim and wisdom dictated. His electrifying guitar style is without peer; you can hear echoes of Lightning’s riffing in the work of Stevie Ray, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Doyle Bramhall II and other blues-based rockers. This collection includes a fine cross-section of Lightning’s career, from the magnificent country blues of songs like “Grosebeck Blues” and “Tim Moore’s Farm,” which sound like vintage 78s, to R&B flavored tunes like “Come On Baby.” Along the way, Lightning steps up to the keyboard and invents zydeco (“Zolo Go”) and refines the '60s protest song (“Please Settle In Vietnam”). Hopkins’ friendly vocals and blistering six-string wizardry are the stuff of legend, and the sound quality on The Best Of Lightning Hopkins – many of the songs appear on CD for the first time – benefits from top-notch production and more than a little TLC.

For those unfamiliar with Lightning Hopkins, this “best of” compilation serves as a fine introduction to an important and influential artist. After you’ve whetted your appetite on this Arhoolie collection, might I suggest you pick up a copy of Texas Blues and the two-CD compilation Complete Aladdin Recordings for a better overview of this magnificent blues legend’s career. You’ll be glad that you did.... (Arhoolie Records)

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Mississippi Fred McDowell - The Best Of Mississippi Fred McDowell (2001)

Like most rock fans, I came to know the legendary Mississippi Fred McDowell through the Stones’ version of his “You Gotta Move” and covers of songs by McDowell acolyte Bonnie Raitt. Once you discover the real thing, though, you’ll never go back. Born in rural Tennessee in the early part of the twentieth century, McDowell started playing slide guitar at the tender age of fourteen. His parents died while he was young, and McDowell played for tips in the streets of Memphis while still a teen. He eventually tired of rambling and settled down to a life of farming in Como, Mississippi. It was here that folk music archivist Alan Lomax found McDowell some thirty years later, first recording this enormous talent in 1959.

McDowell’s “discovery” threw the folk and blues community on their collective ears as Lomax had found an authentic Delta bluesman who had never been captured on tape before. McDowell’s ambitions never led him to seek out the traveling “record men” who haunting the Mississippi cotton fields and backwoods, so no recorded legacy from the '20s and '30s existed for modern listeners to familiarize themselves with McDowell’s considerable talents. Arhoolie Records founder Chris Strachwitz was one of those people amazed by McDowell’s music and the young producer promptly sought out the humble McDowell in Mississippi. Arhoolie recorded and released two excellent volumes of McDowell’s homespun country blues during the mid-60s, which subsequently made the artist a popular draw on the festival circuit throughout the decade until his death from cancer in 1972.

Arhoolie’s The Best Of Mississippi Fred McDowell revisits material originally released by the label on four previous titles, and recorded between 1964 and 1969 in a number of different locations. Much like Arhoolie’s recent Lightning Hopkins compilation, this CD is a wonderful overview of the artist’s too-brief career. McDowell’s songs drew upon a Delta tradition that was heavily flavored by the work of contemporaries like Robert Johnson, Tommy Johnson and Charlie Patton. McDowell brought a distinctive flair to his slidework, an impressive individualism that sets his playing apart from that of other Delta bluesmen. His voice was extremely expressive, showing a remarkable range and emotion.

The Best Of Mississippi Fred McDowell offers up a stylistic cross-section of material, from the country blues of standards like “Good Morning Little Schoolgirl” to inspired McDowell originals like “Levee Camp Blues” and “You Gotta Move.” There are gospel tunes here too, McDowell’s performances echoing those of Blind Willie Johnson on traditional songs like “I Wish I Was In Heaven Sittin’ Down” and “Keep Your Lamp Trimmed And Burning.” The album closed with a previously unreleased 1965 live performance from the Berkeley Folk Festival.

Mississippi Fred McDowell was a powerful and charismatic performer, an artist that came into his own late in life but had spent a lifetime working hard and playing music long before his discovery. McDowell’s was a unique talent and vision, The Best Of Mississippi Fred McDowell a wonderful introduction for the uninitiated and a welcome addition to the library for those of us still earning a degree in the blues. (Arhoolie Records)

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Brownie McGhee - The Complete Brownie McGhee (1994)

That Brownie McGhee's career should span several decades really comes as no surprise. The energetic and charismatic bluesman managed to wear many hats during his lengthy musical life, appealing to several disparate audiences throughout the years without ever changing his basic style or direction.

Born in Tennessee in 1915 and raised in a musical family, a crippling childhood bout with polio kept McGhee housebound, and thus able to hone his musical skills. He was already in his twenties when he graduated from high school, a short time after which an operation provided the young artist with near total mobility. He began his musical career as a traveling bluesman, playing towns across Tennessee, West Virginia and Virginia. He made his way to North Carolina, where he was discovered by J.B. Long, manager for popular blues artist "Blind Boy" Fuller.

Collecting the initial sides recorded by McGhee for Okeh/Columbia during 1940 and 1941, The Complete Brownie McGhee showcases a talented artist developing his style from record to record. McGhee seems to have enjoyed a fair degree of commercial success with several songs, including Me And My Dog Blues and Picking My Tomatoes, but a number of the 47 recordings presented on The Complete Brownie McGhee are unreleased sides. His fluid vocals are accompanied by his own guitar, and the harmonica playing of old friend Jordan Webb and maybe a washboard player, offering up a healthy dose of traditional southern blues, mixing the best of that musical history with strains of Gospel and hillbilly music in the creation of a style and performance that remains unique to this day. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

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Blind Willie McTell - The Definitive Blind Willie McTell (1994)

This two disc set provides a wonderful overview of the life of blues legend Blind Willie McTell, literally collecting nearly every side he ever recorded (only a handful of songs that couldn't be found in any form were omitted). A pioneer of 12-string guitar playing, McTell's unspectacular commercial career would prove to be quite influential nonetheless.

Born at the turn of the century in Georgia as Willie Samuel McTier (the origin of the McTell spelling is unclear), the guitarist picked up music at an early age, evidently discarding it while attending several schools for the blind only to pick it up again sometime in the 1920s. Throughout his career, McTell traveled constantly, performing for both white and black audiences, earning a reputation by word of mouth. If there was a crowd, whether in a club or on the street, McTell would play for them.

Lawrence Cohn, producer of The Definitive Blind Willie McTell has done an impressive job of collecting the various widespread recordings of McTell. He had recorded sessions for a number of labels during the '20s and '30s, often under a pseudonym. Many times, only a few hundred copies of a disc were pressed and distributed. McTell's thin, trebly voice, with its Southern twang, and his distinctive guitar style were undeniably his own, however, no matter what name he chose to record under.

The Definitive Blind Willie McTell offers them all, 41 songs total, including his best-known composition, Statesboro Blues. McTell incorporated a myriad of influences into his style, from talking blues to Ragtime. The collection offers fascinating look at an artist who built a legend entirely on the strength of his talents and his music. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

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Tampa Red - The Guitar Wizard (1994)

As Mark Humphrey's excellent liner notes to The Guitar Wizard point out, the Chicago Blues scene wasn't created by Muddy Waters in the '40s; post-World War I immigrants from the impoverished South to the industrial cities of the Midwest brought their Delta-born blues with them. The idiom, it could be said, had set its roots down some two decades earlier with the legacy of bottleneck blues genius Tampa Red.

Born Hudson Woodbridge in Georgia in the early part of this century, the talented guitarist was raised by his grandmother's family in Tampa, Florida. Making his way to Chicago, by 1925 he had already built a reputation as a street performer under his professional name, Tampa Red. Along with pianist/composer/vocalist Thomas Dorsey, a fellow Georgian, the two recorded their first sides in 1928. They instantly struck gold with the hit song It's Tight Like That, a song that they would go on to record several more times under a variety of names for a number of different labels.

The Guitar Wizard presents seventeen cuts featuring the bottleneck stylings of Tampa Red, beginning with the Okeh label version of It's Tight Like That. The commercial success of that song, which brought a new, jazzy, more vaudeville-type sound to traditional blues, evolved into a style of music dubbed "hokum." A short-lived musical trend, represented on this collection by a handful of cuts, hokum's influence has nonetheless been long-reaching, touching artists such as Bob Wills and Leon Redbone.

The blues are what Tampa Red did best, though, and they are presented here in abundance. Nine cuts feature Red accompanied by "Georgia Tom" Dorsey, including such hits from the era as You Can't Get That Stuff No More or Reckless Man Blues. The Depression broke up the successful duo, with Dorsey going on to lay the foundation for the subsequent success of Gospel music with his spiritual recordings. Tampa Red went on to record solo for Vocalion before jumping labels in the late-30s. Red's distinctive vocals and bottleneck prowess are showcased in cuts here, from Turpentine Blues and Sugar Mama Blues to Black Angel Blues, which was to become a hit for several other artists as well.

Tampa Red remained a best-selling artist well into the '40s, by which time he had become the Godfather of the Chicago Blues scene. His stylistic breakthroughs, as illustrated by the work collected on The Guitar Wizard, would influence a generation of better-known blues artists, including Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon and B.B. King. The Guitar Wizard finally pays a fitting tribute to this obscure genius. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

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Howlin' Wolf - Ain't Gonna Be Your Dog (1994)

Howlin' Wolf is one of those blues artists that even non-fans of the genre recognize. Born as Chester Burnett in 1910 in West Point, Mississippi, he picked up the guitar in his late teens, mentored by blues legend Charlie Patton. A contemporary of Muddy Waters, Elmore James and Sonny Boy Williamson, Burnett often played alongside these greats as they all traveled the same Southern blues circuit. It wasn't until the late-40s, after a stint in the army during World War II, that Burnett decided to pursue music as a full-time vocation.

Moving northward to West Memphis, Arkansas, Howlin' Wolf began recording sides for Chicago's Chess label through Sam Phillips' Memphis Recording Service. Ain't Gonna Be Your Dog presents fourteen of these Memphis cuts, recorded in the early-50s and featuring the young bluesman backed by talents such as Hubert Sumlin and James Cotton. By the time that Burnett moved to Chicago to become a full-fledged Chess label artist in the mid-50s, he was an established name in the genre. He would continue to be a major player in the blues, a not-so-friendly competition arising between Wolf and another Chicago bluesman, Muddy Waters.

Wolf's late-50s/early-60s output is what sealed his legend as a great blues performer and can be attributed not only to Wolf's own charismatic talents, but to the instrumental contributions of long-time collaborator Sumlin and the skilled hand of songwriter Willie Dixon. Recording a number of Dixon compositions, Howlin' Wolf made them his own with inspired guitar playing and his magnificent trademark mouth harp work.

Ain't Gonna Be Your Dog pulls together forty-two wonderful Howlin' Wolf performances, from the aforementioned early Memphis sides to the landmark Chicago Chess sessions, including several cuts from the late-60s as well as alternates and a few unreleased songs. It is an excellent companion to the earlier released Chess box set, and well worth getting for fans for whom that set served as an introduction to this brilliant and complex artist. Ain't Gonna Be Your Dog, by covering almost twenty years of Howlin' Wolf's creative output, firms up any claims made for his considerable songwriting skills and instrumental talents. There is, perhaps, no better place for the music love to begin "rediscovering the Blues" than here. (Chess Records)

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Jimi Hendrix - Jimi Hendrix: Blues (1994)

Purists may feel that the inclusion of rock guitar god Jimi Hendrix alongside blues pioneers such as Tampa Red or Howlin' Wolf is shear blasphemy. It can be argued, however, that Hendrix did more to bring the blues to a white audience than any of the great blues artists of the era or the white British rockers who followed them. First and foremost, Hendrix was a bluesman, bringing a great deal of that style and tradition to the work he created during the late-60s.

Jimi Hendrix: Blues recognizes this debt to Hendrix's early influences and collects eleven of the legend's most soulful blues performances on one disc. Hendrix picked up the guitar as a young teen, quickly developing a style patterned after his favorites, artists like Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Lightnin' Hopkins and Slim Harpo. Living in Nashville after getting out of the army, Hendrix hooked up with Billy Cox, with whom he would play across the country, both as a duo and backing other artists. Hendrix eventually built reputation playing on the road with R & B artists such as Little Richard and Jackie Wilson.

In the mid-60s, Hendrix was to turn away from his pure blues roots towards rock music. He put together a band, the Jimi Hendrix Experience and, cutting hit songs like Foxey Lady and Purple Haze, used his instrumental prowess to redefine the role of guitar in contemporary rock & roll. Indeed, Hendrix perhaps sealed the six-string instrument's fate as the driving power in rock, building upon the momentum created by British artists like Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton.

Through his brief tenure as rock star, however, Hendrix would always return to his roots both on stage and on record, albeit in a way that would make most purists shudder. Whether it was through his personalized versions of traditional blues standards like Catfish Blues or Bleeding Heart, covers like Muddy Waters' Mannish Boy, or cranking out originals like Red House, Voodoo Chile or Hear My Train A Comin', Hendrix always had one foot planted firmly in the blues milieu. Jimi Hendrix: Blues is an important collection, introducing listeners to a different side of this great artist, one that remained important until his untimely death. (MCA Records)

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Junior Wells - Live Around The World (2002)

Junior Wells was a legitimate giant in the blues world, contributing as much as any other artist towards defining the famed Chicago sound. With a career that stretched across five decades, Wells was a workhorse that kept busy until his death in 1998. Born in Memphis at the tail end of the Delta blues period, Wells was taught his first notes on the mouth harp by Junior Parker at the tender age of twelve.

After emigrating to Chicago like so many bluesmen before him, a youthful Wells made his mark as part of a band called the Aces. Greater opportunities struck in 1952, however, when Wells replaced the legendary Little Walter as a member of Muddy Waters' band. Solo albums for a myriad of labels sealed Wells' rep during the '60s, the harp player often collaborating with his friend, guitarist Buddy Guy.

Live Around The World collects various performances from the last year, year-and-a-half of Wells' life; the artist's worldwide touring taking him to Germany, Norway, Japan, England and points in between. The songs chosen for Live Around The World are fairly representative of Wells' milieu, signature pieces like Hoodoo Man offered alongside blues standards like Willie Dixon's Little Red Rooster. Junior's harp playing is straight from the Sonny Boy Williamson/Little Walter school of the blues, Wells developing his own distinctive style and adding his own peculiar flourishes through the years.

What set Wells apart from the aforementioned influences, however, are his vocal talents and skills as a bandleader. Wells developed a soulful, R&B-tinged singing style that was both emotionally expressive and powerful. Wells also played with some of the best bluesmen on the planet throughout the 40+ years of his career, but he was almost always the focus of attention, a strict bandleader who pulled the most out of his players.

Unfortunately for Live Around The World, the band assembled to back-up Wells on his last hurrah are no match for the Chicago gangs the diminutive harp player used to front. On many of these performances, the musicians are simply overshadowed by the dynamic Wells, a powerful player and performer who was always more at home on stage than in the studio. The resulting
songs are slick and professional, but lack the smoke and sweat and soul inherent in the best Chicago blues. Junior Wells is always a joy to listen to, though, and he gives his best to Live Around The World. Whether tearing through cuts like the lively Got My Mojo Working, the blues-tinged rave-up Help Me or the funky James Brown-styled strutting of Messin' With The Kid, Wells knocks 'em down with passion and precision.

There are precious few live recordings of Junior Wells available, which makes Live Around The World important from a historical perspective, the disc providing a rare glimpse of Well's talents, admittedly in the twilight of his career. (Legacy Recordings)

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James Blood Ulmer - Birthright (2005)

There's no doubt in my mind that James Blood Ulmer is one of the most ground-breaking, earth-shaking musicians to ever strap on a guitar and make the six-string beast talk. Best known as a "free jazz" artist and an acolyte of Ornette Coleman's Harmolodic theory, Ulmer has been kicking around since the early-60s, first playing with folks like Art Blakely and Coleman and later with Ronald Shannon Jackson, through whom he met Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid. Ulmer has enjoyed a lengthy solo career as well, recording his debut in '77 and nearly two dozen albums since, the artist's work gradually redefining the role of guitar in both jazz and contemporary rock music.

Heavily influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Ulmer has always incorporated elements of rock and blues into his jazz experimentations, but it was Reid who convinced the guitarist to rediscover the blues at length. Beginning in 2001 with Memphis Blood, a stellar collection of blues classics recorded with Reid in Sun Studios in Memphis, through No Escape From The Blues two years later, Ulmer has embraced and sharpened his understanding of the blues. With Birthright, Ulmer completes his journey into the heart of the blues. Recording unaccompanied, again with Reid at the board, Ulmer turns the blues into a sort of spiritual journey from which no one returns unscathed.

If previous albums in this loose-knit trilogy mixed traditional blues with scraps of guitar rock, psychedelia and funk with full band accompaniment, Birthright strips the music down to the bone. Raw, fiery and unadorned by modern trappings, Ulmer takes the blues back to its Delta roots (and maybe even further back, to Africa) with a stark and dark-hued collection of songs and performances. Ten of the twelve songs are Ulmer originals, but they successfully channel the cold presence of ghosts long passed. The Gospel-tinged "Take My Music Back To The Church" evokes the haunting sound of Blind Willie Johnson while "The Evil One" is a musically hypnotic dirge with eerie black cat moan vocals. A cover of Willie Dixon's classic "I Ain't Superstitious" is transformed into a plea for divine intervention supported by forceful six-string work. "Devil's Got To Burn" offers a complex soundtrack of guitar rhythms behind Ulmer's gleefully diabolic vocals.

Along the lengthy musical sojourn that is Birthright, Ulmer makes his guitar scream, cry, dance and sing with the skill that only a master can bring to bear. Ulmer's mournful, weathered vocals perfectly embrace the lyrics with a combination of soul, pathos, fear and passion. Birthright is a heady musical elixir, an incredible musical effort that could only be created by an artist that threw away the textbook long ago. Musically and intellectually challenging, Birthright may prove too difficult for some, though it is well worth the journey for the adventurous listener. Underrated and overlooked by all but a handful of aficionados, one day in the not-too-distant future academics and musical historians will recognize James Blood Ulmer for the genius that he is and Birthright as a shining example of Ulmer's incredible talents and far-seeing vision. (Hyena Records)

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Muddy Waters - I'm Ready (2002)

For the middle album of his Johnny Winter-produced, late-70s musical trilogy, blues giant Muddy Waters brought a new spirit to some familiar material. Starting with members of Waters' touring band – pianist "Pine Top" Perkins, bassist Bob Margolin and drummer Willie "Big Eyes" Smith – Winter added underrated guitarist (and long-time Waters' foil) Jimmy Rogers and extraordinary harp player Big Walter Horton to the mix. The songs recorded for I'm Ready offer a mix of new material and vintage hit singles like the title cut, the mid-60s jewel "Screamin' And Cryin'" or the Willie Dixon-penned "I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man." Waters and band provide these well-worn gems with a little new studio polish, but it is with the newer songs that the performers really shine.

On the powerful "33 Years," Waters punctuates his tale of lost love with snaky slide guitar, assisted by Big Walter's wailing electric harp. "Who Do You Trust" features some of Waters' dirtiest vocals, the bluesman growling the lyrics while Winter layers his twangy slide above Horton's harp and Perkins' mournful ivories. "Rock Me" is old-school blues, Waters revisiting this classic cut for the umpteenth time as Rogers and Walter support his vocals with smoky guitar and guest player Jerry Portnoy adds some subtle but assertive electric harp to the affair. I'm Ready closes with the Sonny Boy Williamson chestnut "Good Morning Little Schoolgirl," the high-spirited Waters sounding in good form as Portnoy's harp flails away in the background.

Although nearing the end of his career, Waters experienced a well-deserved artistic and commercial resurgence thanks to the three albums recorded with Winter for Blue Sky. Hard Again, I'm Ready and King Bee all bring a harder edge to Waters' classic performances, with Winter's production heavy on the guitar and lighter on the brassy Chicago blues sound unfamiliar to the rock-oriented target audience. For new listeners trying to get a feel of what the blues is all about, I'm Ready and its bookends are the albums to start with. Once you experience a taste of Muddy Waters, you'll be ready for more. (Blue Sky Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy a copy of I'm Ready from Amazon.com)