Archive Review: Brownie McGhee’s The Complete Brownie McGhee (1994)

That Brownie McGhee’s career should span several decades really comes as no surprise. The energetic and charismatic bluesman has 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 20s 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 the 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 previously-unreleased sides.

His fluid vocals are accompanied by his own guitar, 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, released 1994)

Review originally published by R.A.D! zine, July 1994

Archive Review: Blind Willie McTell’s 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), he picked up on 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 1920s 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, under whatever 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, released 1994)

Review originally published by R.A.D! zine, July 1994

CD Review: Freddie King’s Feeling Alright: The Complete 1975 Nancy Pulsations Concert (2026)

It’s heartening to know that, even at this late date in the growing shadow of the 20th century, there is still some amazing music being discovered in some vault or another. Last year we got an amazing, unknown John Lee Hooker album in The Standard School Broadcast Recordings and in 2026, so far, we’ve seen some fine live Humble Pie sides and a never-released Wild Tchoupitoulas set live in New Orleans. Now comes along Freddie King’s Feeling Alright, a previously-unreleased album documenting the legendary bluesman performing before 50,000 fans at France’s Nancy Jazz Pulsations Festival on October 10th, 1975. Released on vinyl as a three-LP set for this year’s Record Store Day event, it’s also available as a two-CD set for those of us with more discriminating budgets.

Freddie King’s Feeling Alright: The Complete 1975 Nancy Pulsations Concert

King wasn’t at his prime in 1975, but he wasn’t far from it even with his death tragically looming in the year to follow. The guitarist had released his sixth album of the ‘70s, Larger Than Life, which was a studio/stage hybrid with tracks recorded live in April of that year at the Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin TX and in the studio in Hollywood with producer Mike Vernon. King embarked on a lengthy tour in support of the LP, barrel housing his livewire sound around the globe. 

King is backed on Feeling Alright by a solid band that included talents like second guitarist Ed Lively, bassist Benny Turner, and pianist Lewis Stephens as well as keyboardist Alvin Hemphill and drummer Calep Emphrey. Together, they make a joyous noise, the band members knowing when to play and when to stay and when allow the maestro to perform his six-string wizardry. They run through sixteen songs which represent a little old, a little new, and a whole lotta blues.

Have You Ever Loved A Woman

The set opens with King’s take on the Billy Myles’ song “Have You Ever Loved A Woman?,” the 1960 single expanded upon with King’s elegant, lengthy instrumental intro (nearly four minutes of guitar blues nirvana!) before he introduces the band (accompanied by individual solos, as was the style at the time…). King jumps back on the fretboard for a few minutes of bliss before introducing himself; it’s roughly ten minutes before he gets to the actual singing part. His emotional vocals make it well worth the wait, however, King delivering the lyrics as a heartbroken torch song punctuated by lonely guitar notes against a somber instrumental backdrop. It’s a stunning performance, King’s dynamic six-string work providing the song with gravitas and soul.

Although the opening track takes up nearly one-third of the first disc, what follows is equally as fiery and entertaining. “Whole Lot of Lovin’” is a booger-rock romp with a swinging rhythm and shards of brittle fretwork falling like rain on the chiming keyboards. The “Hey Baby”/“Mojo Boogie” medley rocks and rolls like Saturday night at the club while King’s reading of the 1953 Guitar Slim R&B hit “The Things I Used To Do” is precious, slowing the tempo down to a smoldering temperature while King belts out the lyrics. Definitely more up-tempo than its predecessor, a rowdy cover of Junior Well’s “Messin’ With the Kid” enlists full band participation and offers up one of King’s best vocal performances. 

Goin’ Down

The Don Nix blues standard “Goin’ Down” (recorded by the guitarist for his 1971 Getting Ready album) becomes putty in King’s, a raucous, rockin’, hell-raisin’ performance that knocks all of the contenders and pretenders out of the box. Contrast it with King’s masterful rendition of T-Bone Walker’s “Stormy Monday Blues,” providing the song with a sober, nuanced performance. The second disc of Feeling Alright is comprised largely of inspired and wired blues covers, King tearing through songs like Robert Johnson’s “Sweet Home Chicago” and B.B. King’s “Sweet Little Angel” with reckless abandon. The disc’s opening medley incorporates King’s classic 1961 single “Sen-Sa-Shun” with John Lee Hooker’s “Boogie Chillun” and “Magic” Sam Maghett’s “Lookin’ Good,” creating an electrifying nine-minute-plus instrumental that blasts through your speakers like a lightning-bolt.

Muddy Waters’ signature tune, “Got My Mojo Working,” is tailor-made for King’s talents, his fluid guitar lines driving the band’s spry rhythms in creating a foot-stomping performance certain to get people out of their seats. Johnson’s aforementioned “Sweet Home Chicago” is equally audacious, slowed down to a mid-tempo barn-burner with plenty of piano and swinging bass lines to accompany King’s razor-sharp guitar solos. “The Danger Zone,” written by R&B great Percy Mayfield for Ray Charles, is a departure, a blistering ballad that King wrings dry of pathos. British rocker Dave Mason’s Traffic-era classic “Feelin’ Alright” is the album’s title track, King retaining the Mason’s hooky chorus but affording the overall song lively a funk-rock arrangement propelled by his scrappy guitarwork and Alvin Hemphill’s raving keyboard runs.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Feeling Alright: The Complete 1975 Nancy Pulsations Concert is provided lengthy liner notes by blues historian and Chicago native son Cary Baker (author of the excellent book Down On the Corner: Adventures In Busking & Street Music) that includes reflections from King’s daughter Wanda and bandmember Lewis Stephens. The set also includes a lengthy interview with Wanda King, who shares great memories of her dad. As there’s little of King’s live performance prowess available (a few tracks from Larger Than Life, a couple of bootlegs CDs, including Ebbets Field Denver ’74), Feeling Alright is a blues guitar showcase, an entertaining and provocative performance that cements Freddie’s status as one of the “Three Kings” of the blues alongside his contemporaries B.B. and Albert. (Elemental Music Records, released March 27th, 2026)

Buy the CD from Amazon: Freddie King’s Feeling Alright

Also on That Devil Music: Freddie King’s The Complete Federal Singles CD review

Archive Review: Nick Moss’s Here I Am (2011)

Over the course of a half-dozen or so studio and live albums with his excellent band the Flip Tops, singer and guitarist Nick Moss proved himself to be somewhat of a Chicago blues traditionalist. While the “Windy City” native would embellish the classic Chicago sound with a little houserockin’ energy from time to time, he was just as likely to go backwards in time, towards the “one step from the Delta” era of Tampa Red or Big Bill Broonzy, as he did with the acoustic disc of 2007’s acclaimed Play It ‘Til Tomorrow album. 

Drawing comparisons to another Chicago blues institution, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, it seemed as if Moss and the Flip Tops could do no wrong…and neither could they break out of the creative miasma that traditional blues can drag an artist into. Moss flipped the switch with his 2010 release Privileged. While still working with Flip Tops band members like multi-instrumentalist Gerry Hundt and drummer Bob Carter, Privileged was a solo album very much in a blues-rock vein, Moss sealing the deal with a high-octane cover of Cream’s “Politician.”    

Nick Moss’s Here I Am

Two years after unveiling his muscular new sound on the Blues Music Award nominated Privileged, Moss returns with a crackerjack new band and the steroids-enhanced, livewire blues-rock dinosaur stomp that is Here I Am. Building upon what now seem to be the tentative first steps of Privileged, Moss and his blues bruisers use a traditional Chicago blues framework to construct an imposing leviathan of riff-happy, percussion-heavy performances that masterfully weld familiar 1960s-era blues sounds to 1970s-and-‘80s-influenced, guitar-driven, amps-on-eleven blues-rock in the creation of a new 21st century blues paradigm.

Take, for instance, the album-opening “Why You So Mean?,” an unbridled seven-minute jam that smacks you upside the head from jump street with Moss’s fierce guitarplay, Travis Reed’s rollicking keyboards, and Patrick Seals’ unforgiving percussion. Grabbing the power and emotion of early Muddy Waters and matching it with the energy of 1970s-era Hound Dog Taylor, Moss unfolds a classic blues tune of romance and betrayal. As the locomotive rhythms and “Stumpy” Hutchkins’ throbbing bass line hold down the bottom end, Moss waxes pyrotechnic with an explosive six-string performance that storms out of your speakers like a bombing run, his anguished vocals providing an emotional urgency that is enhanced by the no-quarter-asked (and none given) nature of his screaming fretwork.

Blood Runs

If “Why You So Mean?” hasn’t left you on the floor gasping for breath, “Blood Runs” just might finish the job. A musclebound rocker with Southern soul roots, the song takes a little mojo from guitarist John Cipollina’s mesmerizing “Pride of Man” for its chorus, matching it with insightful and topical working class blues lyrics, Moss’s tortured vocals, Reed’s tinkling keys, and cool, gospel-styled backing harmonies. Moss’s solo is taut and menacing, like a barb-wire tattoo around your throat, while his intelligent lyrics pose a pretty damning question. The title track is a larger-than life musical throwback to Jimmy Page and Led Zeppelin, with a soupcon of Z.Z. Top thrown in to provide a little Texas twang (especially in Moss’s fluid vocals). The lyrics are defiant, and perhaps more than a little biographical, delivered with strength and certainty.

Not all of Here I Am is monster-riffed, moshpit blues-rock Sturm und Drang, nosirree…Moss’s “It’ll Turn Around,” for instance, is a slow-paced and deliberate mix of blues and Southern rock with a positive message and elegant guitarplay, while “Caught By Surprise” bolts a funky rhythmic track to an R&B styled soul-blues heartbreaker with nuanced guitars, subdued but effective vocals, and syncopated drumbeats. The red-hot “Katie Ann (Slight Return)” takes its cue from Jimi Hendrix’s bluesier side, throws a little of droning North Mississippi Hill Country vibe into the gumbo pot, and seasons the mix with a little Delta mud, stirring up an engaging and mesmerizing performance that rocks hard, but cruises dangerously below the radar with jet-fighter riffs and bombastic percussion. The instrumental “Sunday Get Together” is a low-key but effective jam with wave upon wave of bluesy guitar, sparse drums, and keyboard flourishes atop a traditional foundation.          

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Unlike a lot of acclaimed fretburners that began their career playing blues-rock, Nick Moss is coming in through the side door after spending a couple decades as a sideman and bandleader working in pretty much a straight blues vein. Unburdened by the clichés and expectations of the blues-rock style that often serve as an obstacle to musicians, Moss has taken to the form like a duck to water, but on his own terms and with fresh ideas as to the execution of the music.

Here I Am is a stunning, electrifying, and entertaining collection that places Moss at the forefront of today’s blues-rock scene. Exploring, and often exploding the boundaries of the style, Moss has staked his claim as an innovator, creating new possibilities not only for blues-rock guitar but for the music altogether. While I personally believe that Moss is one album away from creating a bona fide blues-rock masterpiece that will endure the test of time, with Here I Am he has delivered a near-classic collection, while all of the pieces – from the songwriting to his eclectic and exciting fretwork – are falling into place like dominoes…can’t wait to hear what he does next! (Blue Bella Records, released November 22, 2011)

Archive Review: Big Bill Morganfield’s Blues With A Mood (2013)

Big Bill Morganfield is getting a lot of ink these days – and deservedly so – to go along with multiple Blues Music Award nominations for his 2012 debut Son of the Seventh Son. But Muddy Waters’ other blues-singing son has been quietly building a legacy of his own for better than a decade and a half. Since the 1999 release of Big Bill Morganfield’s Rising Son album (which won him a BMA for “Best New Blues Artist”), the singer, songwriter, and guitarist has become a popular live performer and perennial festival attraction.

Big Bill Morganfield’s Blues With A Mood

For his fifth album, Morganfield goes indie all the way, Blues With A Mood released on the artist’s own Black Shuck Records imprint. Recorded in Nashville with producer Colin Linden and an all-star cast that includes guitar greats Eddie Taylor Jr. and Bob Margolin, as well as keyboardist Augie Meyers (Sir Douglas Quintet, Texas Tornadoes) and harp player Richard “Doc” Malone, Morganfield scatters a few well-chosen covers across Blues With A Mood, surrounding them with solid original tunes written in an undeniably retro style.

Morganfield’s stated intent for Blues With A Mood was to deliver a moody set of performances that would evoke memories of old-school John Lee Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf, and Muddy Waters and I’d say that he’s accomplished his goal. Only the original “Money’s Getting’ Cheaper” evinces any sort of contemporary lyrical influence – then again, poverty has always been a part of the blues landscape – socially-conscious lyrics accompanied by a raging vocal performance, Jim Horn’s icy blasts of sax, and Meyers’ fleet-fingered honky-tonk piano. “No Butter For My Grits” is a humorous but starkly realistic talking blues with a Chicago blues swagger and a swamp-rock vibe that showcases the hypnotic guitar interplay between Taylor and Linden.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Altogether, Blues With A Mood is a throwback to the Chicago blues and R&B of the 1950s and early 1960s when giants roamed the streets of the West Side. Morganfield has this stuff hard-wired to his DNA, and Blues With A Mood isn’t so much an attempt to recreate those golden days as it is an inspired tribute to the era’s long-lasting influence, lovingly delivered with no little style and energy. (Black Shuck Records, released 2013)

Review originally published by Blues Music magazine...

Archive Review: Tab Benoit’s Legacy: The Best of Tab Benoit (2012)

Louisiana native Tab Benoit has become such a large part of the Baton Rouge/New Orleans blues community that his music and career is virtually indistinguishable from the region he’s identified with. While the talented songwriter and guitarist has often incorporated elements of swamp-rock, country, and Cajun music into his original vision of the blues, he has also become an outspoken and effective advocate for wetlands conversation and the victims of Hurricane Katrina, his social activism as heartfelt as his music.   

After spending much of the early 1990s on the Texas-based Justice Records label, Benoit signed with the venerable Telarc Records as the decade was closing. He released his Telarc debut, the acclaimed Homesick For the Road album, in 1999 and from that point on, Benoit has released an album almost every year, ten in all. Along the way he has built a loyal worldwide audience one dynamic performance at a time. Not for nothing has the singer, songwriter, and guitarist been twice named The Blues Foundation’s “B.B. King Entertainer of the Year,” most recently in 2012. With a fat catalog of great blues and roots music under his belt, it only makes sense that Telarc should honor the prolific and popular bluesman with the Legacy compilation, which collects 14 of Benoit’s best tracks on a single disc for the hardcore and fair-weather fan alike. 

Tab Benoit’s Legacy: The Best of Tab Benoit

The songs on Legacy aren’t presented in chronological order, so we start out with “Shelter Me,” a forceful swamp-blues dirge from 2007’s Power of the Pontchartrain album. Backed by Louisiana’s LeRoux, Benoit delivers a scorching performance that mixes a down-n-dirty soundtrack with soulful vocals to great effect; the result is so earthy that you’d swear you were knee-deep in cypress and swamp water while listening. Jump back to 2004 and “Night Train,” from Fever For the Bayou, with Benoit leading a three-piece band that puts the muscle back into the power-trio concept. The song itself is a rolling, roaring locomotive with Darryl White’s powerhouse drums fueling the rhythms while Benoit lays down some greasy guitar licks and gruff, hurried vocals. Benoit’s spirited solo less than two minutes into this high-octane rocker shows him to be a vastly underrated blues guitarist.

Legacy features around a 50-50 mix of Benoit’s lively originals versus obscure and well-worn covers, but the odds are good that you’ve seldom heard Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put A Spell On You” tossed around like a ragdoll, as it was on Benoit’s 1999 debut album. Capably assisted by fellow Louisiana music legend Kenny Neal, Benoit infuses the song with a bluesy malevolence missing from many cover versions, playing down the rock ‘n’ roll elements in favor of a slow-burning fuse approach. With Bruce Katz’s eerie organ riffs chiming away in the background, and Neal’s solid rhythm guitar as a backdrop, Benoit lets his freak flag fly with a series of short, shocking solos guaranteed to singe your eardrums.   

The Blues Is Here To Stay

    
Stephen Still’s classic Buffalo Springfield hit “For What It’s Worth” may seem an unlikely cover, but Benoit blues it up nicely, slowing down the pace and discarding the country-rock vibe in favor of a twangy blues-rock sound that relies heavily on Louisiana LeRoux’s enormous instrumental textures, on top of which Benoit lays down some smoky vocals and sizzling fretwork. Benoit was joined for his 2002 album Whiskey Store by fellow axe-mangler Jimmy Thackery, formerly of the Nighthawks and a successful solo artist in his own right. The two guitar virtuosos are backed by Steve Ray Vaughan’s Double Trouble cohorts for the positively SRV-styled “Nice and Warm,” a Benoit original that rocks and rolls with jazzy intensity and a blues-rock heart. The chemistry between the two guitarists is natural and carefree, which would later lead to a live album featuring the two talents.

Benoit is joined by one of New Orleans’ favorite sons, Cyril Neville, for “The Blues Is Here To Stay.” Co-written by Neville with Norman Ceasar and the great Taj Mahal, the song is a sort of inspired history of modern blues music, Benoit and Neville swapping verses, both singers bringing a lot of joy to the lyrics as the guitarist adds his Delta-inspired, New Orleans-forged fretwork to play in the margins. Benoit displays a different side of his talents with a soulful cover of Otis Redding’s classic “These Arms of Mine,” from 2002’s Wetlands. Slowing down a bit to a grueling, heartbreaking pace, Benoit doesn’t mimic the Stax Records legend as much as pay tribute with a powerful, emotional vocal performance that is bolstered by his elegant guitarwork. Working with fellow bluesman Anders Osborne, Benoit and crew stomp and stammer all over the title track to his 2011 album Medicine, the performance resulting in a blistering, swampadelic houserocker.        

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

As somebody much wiser than myself once said, “too much of a good thing is never enough,” and in my mind you just can’t get too much Benoit in your listening diet. My only bellyache about Legacy is that while the album’s tracklist pulls from all ten of Benoit’s Telarc albums, six albums are only represented by a single song. An artist of Benoit’s stature in the blues community could have easily carried a two-disc “best of” set and offered up a couple songs apiece from all ten platters. That minor cavil aside, Legacy is both a wonderful introduction to this talented and revered bluesman for the newcomer, and a welcome reminder of Tab Benoit’s talents for the long-time fan. (Telarc Records, released April 3, 2012)

Archive Review: Eric Gales’ The Story of My Life (2008)

Not to be confused with acclaimed jazz guitarist Eric Gale, Memphis-born blues-rock phenomenon Eric Gales first picked up the instrument at the young age of four years old. Tutored and encouraged by his older brothers Eugene and Manuel (better known as Little Jimmy King), Gales learned how to play the Fender Stratocaster upside-down and left-handed, as per his brothers’ lead. At age eleven, the youngest Gales was already smoking other players at blues competitions, with his brother Eugene backing him on bass.

Gales earned his first recording contract at age 15, releasing The Eric Gales Band album in 1991, followed by Picture of A Thousand Faces in ‘93. Fueled by Gales’ incendiary fretwork, the albums yielded a pair of rock radio hits and put the young player on the radar as an up-and-coming guitar god. Gales worked with both his brothers for 1996’s Left Hand Brand, and then disappeared for five years until the 2001 release of That’s What I Am on MCA Records. Since then, Gales’ association with Shrapnel Records founder Mike Varney has been, perhaps, the most prolific period of his life, resulting in three recordings to date, including Gales’ seventh studio album, The Story of My Life. 

Eric Gales’ The Story of My Life

From the very beginning, The Story of My Life is a roller-coaster ride of bent-strings and machine-gun notes…only the pace of the individual song is in question, as Gales approaches each song with a scatter-gun assault of solo flurries and rhythmic hurricanes. Featuring the guitarist’s trademark blend of traditional blues and soulful, Memphis-flavored, psychedelic-tinged blues-rock, The Story of My Life offers up a wealth of red-hot guitarplay that will singe the ear-hair right off your head. 

“Save Yourself” is a throwback to Gales’ earliest work, a rocker with a heart of gold that channels Hendrix by way of Robin Trower, Gales’ soaring fretwork supported by a blast-furnace rhythm section in bassist Steve Evans and drummer Jeremy Colson. The slow-walking “I Ain’t No Shrink” mixes some Texas-blues stew with a side-dish of Chicago-styled Westside shuffle, while the title track does an admirable job of updating a big-sounding early-1970s stadium rock vibe with an inventive arrangement, vocal harmonies, and time changes.

The Sound of Electric Guitar

Sounding like a 1960s-styled space-rock freak-out, Gales’ amps up the psychedelic tones for the ear-bashing six-string workout “The Sound of Electric Guitar.” Featuring one of Gales’ most inspired performances, the song’s blister-and-peel fretwork is matched, grenade-for-grenade, by Evans and Colson’s diesel rhythms. “Cut and Run” is a romp across the boogie-rock landscape, the band doing its best Foghat impersonation as Gales’ lays down his lightning-quick fretboard runs on top of the song’s choogling framework. 

The squirrely notes that kick off “Borderline Personality” disguise the song’s menacing, chaotic soundtrack, which teeters on the edge of psychosis throughout much of its six-minute run, Gales’ six-string screaming in perverse delight as the band whomps up a bunch of new big-beat ear-crackers. “Bringin’ the Hammer” down is bound to be a live audience fave, with a larger-than-life overall sound and tightwire guitar fills. The bluesy power-ballad “Gypsy” offers up a subdued, truly nuanced guitar performance from Gales, complimented by his serviceable vocals. 

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

You’ll hear a lot that’s familiar on The Story of My Life: scraps of Hendrix, shreds of Stevie Ray, impressions of Robin Trower; dare I say, even a hint of Curtis Mayfield. Gales has too often been criticized as being “derivative” or of “over-playing,” but in reality, the string-shredder is working in a well-trodden, time-tested blues-rock genre where there’s little truly new under the sun. As for Gales’ alleged “over-playing,” that’s a matter of opinion, really…some of us like manic OTT string-bending in a bluesy vein.

Gales’ vocals are soulful in places, raw in others, but he is always trying to transcend his limitations. For Eric Gales, his guitar does most of the talking, and it speaks loudly on The Story of My Life. Lest we forget, Gales is still relatively young by blues standards, and his continued evolution as an artist, a songwriter, and even as a guitarist is impressive to watch. (Blues Bureau International, released 2008)

Archive Review: Dave Specter’s Spectified (2010)

Chicago blues guitarist Dave Specter has flown under the radar for much of his considerable career. Mentored by Sunnyland Slim’s great guitarist Steve Freund, Specter honed his skills by apprenticing under giants like Hubert Sumlin and Son Seals. When he finally stepped out on his own to launch a solo career, Specter continued to play in the shadow of larger-than-life vocalists like Barkin’ Bill Smith, Jesse Fortune, and Tad Robinson.

Throughout it all, Specter has quietly created a solid body of work, with eight acclaimed studio and live albums to his credit, as well as well-regarded contributions to recordings by Al Miller, Steve Freund, and Lurrie Bell, among others. Spectified, the guitarist’s first studio effort since his 2004 collaboration with Freund, Is What It Is, is an inspired collection of instrumentals that showcase Specter’s talents and place him firmly among such rarified company as Freund, Ronnie Earl, or Duke Robillard.   

Dave Specter’s Spectified

Spectified opens with a bang, the soulful and slightly funky “Stick To the Hip” featuring an engaging recurring guitar pattern, a solid rhythm, and below-the-horizon horns from the Bo’ Weavil Brass, led by former Tower of Power trumpeter Mike Cichowicz. Keyboards, courtesy of John Kattke and Pete Benson, evoke the wonderful glory days of Booker T & the M.G.’s and Stax soul, the resulting mix a sheer delight, the song a rambunctious rave-up that stays polite while proving the listener and the band alike no little amount of joy.

By contrast, Specter’s “Octavate’n” could easily be mistaken for a Stevie Ray Vaughan outtake, the song resounding with slinky Texas blues-styled fretbanging, Specter’s lively tones jumpin-n-jivin’ like the parking lot of a Jack-In-The-Box drive-thru in suburban Dallas on a Saturday night as the keyboards add some energetic riffing of their own. “Soul Serenade” is another engaging instrumental, with a hint of Southern rock and a little twang in the grooves between Specter’s jazzy tones and hot licks, the shuffling rhythm complimented by a subtle horn arrangement. This is the kind of warm and fuzzy tune that, in more adventurous times, could have topped the charts; instead it will be embraced by blues fans with good taste and an open mind.

Rumba & Tonic

With the indigo-hued “Blues Call,” Specter delivers what he knows best – a dusky instrumental that perfectly fuses a blues aesthetic with the imagination of jazz guitar (I’m thinking John McLaughlin or Al di Meola). This is break-of-dawn music, best heard by candlelight and preferably with something strong to drink…blues to the core, but sophisticated in a way that belies urban, urbane influences. The keyboards chime in around the three-minute mark with an extended solo that sounds fresh and yet familiar, influenced by the work of folk like Booker T and Isaac Hayes while adding something new and exciting to the vibe. “Alley Walk” is another rattletrap electric blues-burner with strutting rhythms and some of the raunchiest guitar Specter has ever played. 

David Hidalgo of Los Lobos lends his talents to the “Rumba & Tonic,” creating a Tex-Mex atmosphere, the song a spry little sucker with great echoed guitarwork and some south-of-the-border pickin’, tinkling honky-tonk piano, ringing accordion, and a strong rhythm that will set your feet to moving. Specter and gang jump back to the Windy City for “Lumus D’ Rumpus,” a strutting Chicago blues shuffle with a walking rhythm and dashes of piano and drums on top of which Specter embroiders his imaginative fretwork, which ranges from jazzy licks to ringing riffs. Spectified closes out with “Alley Walk Acoustic,” revisiting the earlier number with far different effect, Specter plucking the strings Delta-style, sounding more like Son House or Charley Patton than the seasoned Chicago bluesman that he is. It works like magic, creating a mesmerizing sound that sticks in your mind long after the album has stopped playing.    

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Dave Specter is a phenomenal talent, to be sure, but he’s not a musician that is content to rest on the laurels proffered his earlier work. Spectified stretches out the guitarist’s repertoire with some daring new styles and tones, Specter revealing a few new tricks to tickle your eardrums while still providing quite a few moments of old-school blues that the fans of come to expect. While he doesn’t have a shelf full of awards to bolster his reputation, Specter lets the music do all the talking with the realization that if you play this well for this long, the accolades will come when they come. If you’re a fan of blues guitar, you owe it to yourself to check out Spectified. (Fret12 Records, released September 2010)

Also on That Devil Music:
Dave Specter - Live At SPACE review
Dave Specter - Live In Chicago review

Archive Review: Lonnie Brooks, Long John Hunter & Phillip Walker’s Lone Star Shootout (1999)

By 1999, blues guitarists Lonnie Brooks, ‘Long John’ Hunter, and Phillip Walker were all in their mid-to-late 60s and had enjoyed varying levels of success with their own distinctive takes on blues music. All three men had come up through the rough-and-tumble Gulf Coast blues scene during the 1950s, honing their skills in front of the toughest, most demanding audiences you can imagine in dodgy bars and clubs in cities like Beaumont and Port Arthur, and backwater juke joints along the Texas and Louisiana border. 

Alligator Records founder Bruce Iglauer had the idea to reunite these three talented performers and instrumentalists, all of whom had played together one time or another back in the day. Recording in Austin, Texas with local musicians, Lone Star Shootout was an album that excelled at execution but flopped at the box office. Critically-acclaimed and receiving two W.C. Handy Award nominations – ultimately losing both to a pair of fellow Texans, Albert King and Stevie Ray Vaughan, and their In Session album – Lone Star Shootout sold poorly nonetheless. It’s time for blues fans to take another look, perhaps, at the undeniable talents and fine performances of Lonnie Brooks, Long John Hunter, and Phillip Walker on Lone Star Shootout. 

Lonnie Brooks, Long John Hunter & Phillip Walker

The party kicks off with a particularly raucous rendition of Lonnie Brooks’ “Roll, Roll, Roll,” a swamp-rocker that throws a little New Orleans-styled piano courtesy of Riley Osbourn. The three guitarists swap both licks and vocals with reckless aplomb on this vintage 1950s-era rocker, Brooks taking the lead with his smoky voice and wiry solo while Long John shines during the second section with his soulful voice and high-toned, complex solo. Not to be undone by his compatriots, Walker steps out of his role here as rhythm guitar to tear off an impressive solo of his own that lands somewhere in between Brooks’ lightning and Hunter’s thunder.

Long John Hunter comes to the fore for one of the newer tunes on Lone Star Shootout, “A Little More Time” a 1950s-styled R&B romp penned in the manner of Guitar Slim. A mid-tempo semi-ballad with soulful vocals, bluesy lyrics, and a lovely, emotional lead, “A Little More Time” is the perfect fusion of rhythm and blues. The classic “Bon Ton Roulet” represents the New Orleans side of the Gulf Coast sound, the song featuring an infectious foot-shuffling rhythm and a jaunty, Cajun-flavored rhythm. Marcia Ball adds some lively piano fills behind the three guitarist’s imaginative leads, the undeniable influence of Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown lying heavy on the performance.

Lone Star Shootout

“Feel Good Doin’ Bad” is another new track, penned by Brooks in the style of Lightnin’ Slim’s Louisiana-bred Excello Records releases. Brooks takes the microphone for this one, laying down a blustery vocal take that he supports with an electrifying lead full of energy and gorgeous tone. Hunter holds down the bottom end with his solid rhythm guitar while Mark “Kaz” Kazanoff throws in blasts of icy harp throughout the song, his harmonica ringing as clear as a train whistle. The delightful “Street Walking Woman” features Hunter and Walker, this song itself influenced by the great T-Bone Walker. Walker’s hearty drawl is perfectly suited for the lyrics, and he and Hunter swap hot licks until the finale when the two friends set into a six-string swordfight with rockin’ results.

Although there are only three guitarists listed on the marquee for Long Star Shootout, longtime Gulf Coast bluesman Ervin Charles crashes the party with a pair of great performances. A former early 1950s bandmate of Hunter’s, and the elder musician of the bunch, Charles steps into the spotlight for “Born In Louisiana.” A smoldering, slow-paced blues tune with Charles’ tearjerker vocals and taut, muscular fretwork, assisted by Osbourn’ well-timed piano, Charles delivers a superlative, emotionally-charged performance. A spirited cover of Muddy Waters’ “Two Trains Running” places Charles and Hunter back together again, Ervin delivering haunting vocals above a hypnotic riff and Long John picking out a provocative lead before the two guitars intertwine into a single voice, the sound of Texas blues.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Fans of blues guitar who still haven’t discovered this incredible album, originally released in 1999, owe it to themselves to grab a copy of Lone Star Shootout sooner rather than later. Brooks, Hunter, Walker, and Charles deliver the real goods, the unique sound of the Gulf Coast fusing the roughneck, houserockin’ style of Texas blues with the soulful, R&B influenced sound of the Louisiana swamp. With four talented string-benders in the studio, and fifteen excellent performances, Lone Star Shootout is as close as you’ll get to that Port Arthur juke joint experience without actually travelling back in time. (Alligator Records, released May 25, 1999) 

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

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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)

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)

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Hot Wax: Jimmy Reed’s I’m Jimmy Reed (1958/2024)

Singer, songwriter, guitar, harmonica wizard…bluesman Jimmy Reed could seemingly do it all. He rode a string of Top Ten-charting R&B hit singles like “You Don’t Have To Go,” “Ain’t That Lovin’ You Baby,” “You Got Me Dizzy,” and “Honest I Do” to a modicum of fame during the 1950s. Reed carried his hit-making streak into the ‘60s with singles like “Close Together,” “Big Boss Man,” and “Bright Lights, Big City,” the latter two of which have since become blues standards covered by any contemporary artist worth their salt. But Reed’s singles began striking out more often than not when musical tastes changed towards folk-blues and he scored only one Top 40 charting song after 1962 until his death in 1975 at the too-young age of 50 years old.

Born in Dunleith, Mississippi in the heart of the Delta, Reed was taught guitar by his friend and fellow bluesman Eddie Taylor. After wandering across the state as a street performer, Reed immigrated to Chicago at the age of 18. He was drafted and served in World War II and, after being discharged in 1945, he began pursuing his blues career in Chicago clubs by night while working at the Armour meat-packing plant in nearby Gary, Indiana by day. Efforts to get a deal with R&B powerhouse Chess Records went nowhere, but Reed signed with Chicago’s Vee-Jay Records, where his labelmates included John Lee Hooker and Memphis Slim. Vee-Jay released roughly three-dozen Jimmy Reed 45s as well as a dozen albums before they went out-of-business in 1966, and it was with Vee-Jay that Reed found his greatest success.

Jimmy Reed’s I’m Jimmy Reed

Recently-reissued on vinyl by Craft Recordings’ Bluesville Records imprint, I’m Jimmy Reed was originally released in 1958 by Vee-Jay Records, the album a compilation of 12 songs previously released as singles between 1953 and 1958. The album’s original tracklist wasn’t in chronological order, so it opens with the slow-burning 1957 hit “Honest I Do” (#4 R&B), a slight shuffle complimented by Reed’s passionate vocals, fluid harmonica licks, and subtle fretwork. “Go On To School” was a single B-side but worthy of marquee billing, the song a much more aggressive shuffle closer in style to contemporary Chicago blues. Reed’s playful vocals are accompanied by fuller instrumentation, including his friend/mentor Eddie Taylor’s rhythm guitar.

Another B-side, 1955’s “Boogie In the Dark” is truth in advertising, an infectious instrumental booger-blues with a strutting, swaggering rhythm peppered by shots of harmonica and vibrating git play. Reed’s first big chart hit, 1956’s “Ain’t That Lovin’ You Baby” (#3 R&B) is a real swinger, with a jaunty shuffling rhythm and Reed’s laconic vocals singing of unrequited affection. Reed’s blistering harpwork adds to the overall timelessness of the performance. Side two of I’m Jimmy Reed kicks off with the artist’s second big chart hit of 1956, the jumpin’ “You Got Me Dizzy” (#3 R&B), whereas the singer’s romantic prospects have improved with a rollicking performance offering plenty of walking bass lines, harp riffs, and nuanced guitarplay.  

The 1956 single “Can’t Stand To See You Go” (#10 R&B) amps up Reed’s typical shuffle formula with soulful vocals, a strong lyrical presence, and elegant guitarwork propelled by Vernell Fournier’s rolling drumbeats. The exotic “Roll & Rhumba” blends Reed’s typical shuffle with an Afro-Cuban dance beat, creating an effective toe-tapping instrumental. One of the few Reed singles that failed to chart, “You’re Something Else” is nevertheless a pulse-quickening R&B romp. I’m Jimmy Reed closes with what was actually the singer’s first hit single, 1955’s “You Don’t Have To Go” (#5 R&B), which displays hints of John Lee-styled boogie beneath its shuffling soundtrack, Reed’s harmonica pushed to the front, and steady timekeeping by drummer Albert Nelson, who would soon thereafter change his name to King, take up the guitar, and carve out his own slice of blues history.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Jimmy Reed was a musician’s musician, and although he’s often overlooked in any discussion of great bluesmen in favor of legends like Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, or Junior Wells, Reed’s silky style and elegant fretwork influenced artists as diverse as Elvis Presley, Hank Williams, the Rolling Stones, Eric Burdon & the Animals, the Yardbirds, and the Grateful Dead as well as contemporary bluesmen like Johnny Winter, Jimmie Vaughan, and Omar Kent Dykes. More than just an inspired debut, I’m Jimmy Reed is also a fine introduction to the artist’s immense charms, representing a more urbane sound than the Delta blues of Reed’s youth and pointing a way towards the future.

Like previous Bluesville reissues of classic albums in their Acoustic Sounds series, I’m Jimmy Reed was remastered from the original master tapes and pressed on thick, lustrous 180-gram black vinyl and packaged in a hefty cardboard sleeve with glossy cover art, the original back cover liner notes from 1958, and an obi strip with new notes by Bluesville’s Scott Billingham. It’s a beautiful package, and if you have any interest in blues music at all, this is the place to start! (Bluesville Records, released September 25th, 2024)

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